The territory which now constitutes Scott County was granted to the State of Mississippi and to the United States at the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, concluded on September 27, 1830. The counties included in the Choctaw Purchase were Noxubee, Neshoba, Leake, Newton, Smith, Jasper, Clarke, Lauderdale, and Scott, all located in the central part of the state and six counties in other areas.

The Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek stipulated that the Choctaw Indians leave the area of the Choctaw Purchase as quickly as they safely could. The number of Choctaws who emigrated to the Choctaw Nation west of the Mississippi River was reported by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs of 1838 to have been 15,177.

Scott County, which was named for Governor Abram M. Scott, was formed on December 23, 1833. Governor Scott, a native of South Carolina, lived in Wilkinson County, Mississippi and served two terms as Lieutenant Governor.

The members of the first Scott County Board of Police (now called the Board of Supervisors) were John Dunn, James Russell, Wade H. Holland, Stephen H. Bery, and Jeremiah B. White. Other Officials were Sheriff John Smith, Clerk of the Probate Court Nicholas Finley, and Probate Judge William Ricks.