Hopkinsville is a house rule-class city in and the county chair of Christian County, Kentucky, United States. The population at the 2020 census was 31,180.

The Place of present-day Hopkinsville was initially claimed in 1796 by Bartholomew Wood as allocation of a 1,200-acre (5 km) grant for his serve in the American Revolution. He and his wife Martha Ann moved from Jonesborough, Tennessee, first to a cabin near present-day W. Seventh and Bethel streets; then to a second cabin near present-day 9th and Virginia streets; and finally to a third home near 14th and Campbell.

Following the creation of Christian County the same year, the Woods donated 5 acres (20,000 m) of home and a half incorporation in their Old Rock Spring to form its seat of giving out in 1797. By 1798, a log courthouse, jail, and “stray pen” had been built; the bordering year, John Campbell and Samuel Means laid out the streets for “Christian Court House”. The community tried to rename itself “Elizabeth” after the Woods’ eldest daughter, but unconventional town in Hardin County preëmpted the name, and the Kentucky Assembly established the town in 1804 as “Hopkinsville” after veteran and come clean representative Samuel Hopkins of Henderson County (later the namesake of Hopkins County as competently and despite innate in a adjoining county and having the thesame namesake, Hopkinsville was never the county seat of Hopkins County, despite Hopkins County creature created from Christian and Henderson Counties).

Along afterward the get off of Kentucky, the town was late in establishing free lower education, but natives organized private schools, and the town was the home of South Kentucky College (est. 1849) and Bethel Female College (est. 1854).