[5] In colonial times, Lieutenant Governor Alexander Spotswood had a stockade built nearby, called Fort Christanna, where converted Native American allies were housed and educated.

1700s Explorers left Fort Henry (Petersburg) to follow the Occoneechee trail on an expedition for trading with the Indians to the south.

By 1714 the area was known well enough that it was selected by Governor Alexander Spotswood as the site of Fort Christanna, which was largely a trading depot.

In 1720 the General Assembly passed an act for “erecting the Counties of Spotsylvania and Brunswick”, which directed “That five hundred pounds…be paid by the Treasurer to Nathaniel Harrison, esq., Jonathan Allen, Henry Harrison, and William Edwards, gentlemen… for a church, courthouse, prison, pillory and stocks, where they shall think fit.” The first courthouse was constructed circa 1732 on a site near Cochran.

The act directed that twenty acres of land belonging to Peggy Williams be laid off into lots and be known as Lawrenceville.

Legend has it that the name was inspired by a famous racehorse, Lawrence, owned by a prosperous landowner who had built a nearby racetrack at the end of the eighteenth century.

By 1836 the town was served by at least two stage routes, as noted on the Tourist's Pocket Map of the State of Virginia published that year.

Charles E. May later recalled the town of that era as “a very small village consisting of a courthouse, a few small stores, two blacksmith shops, a shoe maker’s shop and several dwellings.” In 1888 James Solomon Russell, an Episcopal priest born into slavery in 1857, established a parish school for black children.

The newly organized volunteer fire department constructed a firehouse on Sharp Street adjacent to the then new 100,000-gallon elevated water tank.

The town had tobacco warehouses, cotton gins, creameries, and other facilities to process the important commodity crops of the area.

The sale of the electric generating plant in 1925 provided money to replace the wood plank sidewalks with concrete.

During the depression years of the thirties, federal funds were used to build a baseball field and a swimming pool for the use of city youth.

In the late 20th century, the town began a Main Street beautification project which involves replacing downtown sidewalks with brick and installing new streetlights.

The new Albertis S. Harrison, Jr., Courthouse housing Brunswick's Circuit, General District, and Juvenile and Domestic Relations courts was dedicated on April 18, 1999.

[7] According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 0.9 square miles (2.4 km2), all of it land.