Rogersville is part of the Kingsport-Bristol-Bristol, TN-VA Metropolitan Statistical Area, which is a component of the Tri-Cities region.

[8] In 1775, the grandparents of Davy Crockett, a future member of the United States Congress from Tennessee and hero of the Alamo, settled in the Watauga colony in the area in what is today Rogersville near the spring that today bears their name.

[10] After an American Indian attack and massacre, the remaining Crocketts sold the property to a Huguenot named Colonel Thomas Amis.

[11] In 1780, Colonel Amis built a fort at Big Creek, on the outskirts of the present-day town, with the assistance of fellow Scots-Irish settler John Carter.

[10] That same year, about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) above downtown Rogersville, Amis erected a fortress-like stone house, around which he built a palisade for protection against Native American attack.

[10] The next year, Amis opened a store, erected a blacksmith shop, and built a distillery.

William Cocke and Thomas King were elected representatives to the Franklin General Assembly.

[12] In November 1786, North Carolina began once more to contend with the Franklin government for control over the area, and that state's General Assembly passed an act creating Hawkins County.

[13] As had the state of Franklin, North Carolina set the new county seat about the property of Joseph Rogers.

In November 1863, during the Civil War, Rogersville was the site of a battle between occupying Federal forces and invading Confederate troops.

The Confederates, led by Brigadier General William E. Jones, were able to surprise the Union forces and pursue them across the Holston River and into Greene County.

Because Knoxville, the intended seat of the new territorial government, had not yet been established, Roulstone published the first year of his paper near the Rogers tavern.

[citation needed] Specialty publications emerged during these early days, including The Rail-Road Advocate, The Calvinistic Magazine, and The Holston Watchman.

Numerous other newspapers have been published in Rogersville over the years, most surviving only a short time and having modest circulation.

According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 3.4 square miles (8.8 km2), all land.

It is bounded by U.S. Route 11W on the northwest, Park Boulevard on the northeast, and East Main Street on the south.

The park has four children's playgrounds, two outdoor basketball courts, four outdoor tennis courts, numerous picnic shelters, three large, lighted pavilions (two with restroom facilities), an amphitheatre, a lighted stage area, six lighted baseball/softball fields, the town's soccer fields, a duck pond, a fitness trail, and two walking trails.

It is home to the Rogersville City Pool, the home pool of the Rogersville Flying Fish Swim Association, which is open to the public from Memorial Day to the start of classes in the City school system in August.

The park is the site of a traveling midway carnival in the late spring and early fall and hosts more than fifty thousand people annually during the Rogersville Fourth of July celebration.

In September 2023, the Rogersville Parks and Recreation Department was awarded a $500,000 grant, to be matched with local funds, from the TN Local Parks and Recreation Fund to install ADA compliant restroom facilities and upgrade playground equipment.

The site of Rogersville's first public swimming pool is here, as is the gazebo built to commemorate the bicentennials of both the town (1989) and the state (1996).

Rogersville was home to an African-American college, Swift College, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and Swift Park, located off North Hasson Street in the central part of the town, commemorates the legacy of that institution.

Mascot is the Warrior (Formerly the Chief; Until Cherokee High School in 1981); colors are red, white, and black.