It is believed that the original owners of the land, both Jesse Peebles and Aaron Tilly, were the ones who established the town in 1836. It is thought that the settlement got its name from the men's hometown of Chesterfield in Derbyshire, England. A post office was constructed in 1838 and Chesterfield was incorporated as a village in 1882. Reverend Jesse Peebles was buried in Peebles Cemetery in 1864, named after him and his family.
Chesterfield High School served the community from the late 1800s until 1947. By 1949 many educational consolidation issues were solved and Chesterfield students began attending classes at Carlinville High School.
Peaked at 377 in 1900; 170 people lived here in 2020.
15 censuses, 1880–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Chesterfield’s Wikipedia page.
From the old history books
What they wrote about Chesterfield in 1911
Passages that mention Chesterfield, cut from the printed page as they were published.
History of Macoupin County, Illinois1911 · page 218Read the page →
Read the text
After the removal of Rev. Johnston there were no services until the fall of 1857, when Rev. D. W. Dresser, having given up Waverly, took charge of Carlinville in connection with Chesterfield. His first service in Carlinville was held in a schoolhouse which stood where the public school now stands and which was later destroyed by fire. This schoolhouse was used as a place of worship for several years and subsequently the congregation occupied the old Methodist church, which adjoined the school building. St. Paul's church was erected in 1865-6, on lots purchased many years previously by Samuel Welton, A. McKim
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Timeline
Chesterfield, 1838 to 1934
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
Nothing in the archives for these yearsWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →
From Wikimedia Commons (1), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
