Dover, the capital of Delaware

New Castle, the colonial capital

Delaware’s first capital was New Castle, an old port on the Delaware River south of Wilmington. Settled by the Dutch and taken over by the English, it became the meeting place of the assembly of the Three Lower Counties, as Delaware was then known, in 1704. The assembly met in the New Castle Court House, built in 1732, which still stands and is now a museum.

New Castle was where Delaware became a state. On June 15, 1776, the assembly meeting there voted to separate from both Pennsylvania and the British Crown. The new state’s first constitution was adopted there in September 1776.

The move to Dover

In 1777, in the middle of the Revolutionary War, the capital moved to Dover, a county seat in central Delaware, away from the river port. The Council first met there in October 1777, and both houses of the General Assembly met for the first time in their new capital on December 1, 1777.

The war was not finished with Delaware’s legislators, though. From late 1779 the General Assembly met in several towns, including Wilmington, Lewes and New Castle, as well as Dover. It returned to Dover for good in October 1781. Six years later, in December 1787, a convention in Dover ratified the US Constitution, making Delaware the first state.

The Old State House

Dover’s Old State House was built between 1787 and 1791, as a courthouse for Kent County and a meeting place for the state government. It housed the General Assembly for more than 140 years. A life-size portrait of George Washington hung there, ordered right after Washington died and shipped by sloop from Philadelphia to Dover Landing, at a cost of $513.03 with its frame. For the nation’s bicentennial in 1976 the building was restored to its 18th-century appearance, and it is now a museum.

Legislative Hall

In 1931 Governor C. Douglass Buck created a commission to plan new state buildings in Dover, and in 1933 the General Assembly moved into Legislative Hall, across the green from the Old State House. Designed by E. William Martin, it is a Georgian Revival building of handmade brick, with interiors in an 18th-century style.

The building has grown since. North and south wings were added between 1965 and 1970, two more wings on the east side in 1994, and the interior was renovated in the summers of 1995 to 1997. It holds the Senate and House chambers, and the governor and lieutenant governor keep offices there for the legislative sessions.

Dover today

Dover had about 40,600 residents in 2025, the second largest city in Delaware after Wilmington. It is also home to Dover Air Force Base. The Old State House is run as a museum by the state’s Division of Historical and Cultural Affairs.