Oxford was Benton County's first town. Commissioners appointed by the Indiana General Assembly selected the location in May 1843 to be the site of the county seat on land donated by Henry W. Ellsworth and David Atkinson. It was first called Milroy in honor of Samuel Milroy, one of the commissioners, but a town in Rush County already bore that name. In October 1843 the commissioners changed it to Hartford, after Hartford, Connecticut (the home of Ellsworth and Watkins), but they discovered this name was also already being used in Indiana, so in December Judge David J. McConnell awarded the town its present name.