It was named after the Township of Digby; this was named in honour of Rear Admiral Robert Digby, who dispatched HMS Atalanta to convey Loyalists from New York City in the spring of 1783 to Conway, which became known as Digby, as part of their evacuation and resettlement following the American Revolutionary War. The Crown resettled thousands of Loyalists in Nova Scotia and other areas of Canada. Digby County was established in 1837. Previously, from August 17, 1759, when Nova Scotia was first divided into counties, this area had been part of Annapolis County.
In 1861, Digby County was divided into two sessional districts: Digby and Clare. These were eventually incorporated as district municipalities in 1879.
As a census division in the 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Digby County had a population of 17,062 living in 8,117 of its 9,681 total private dwellings, a change of -1.5% from its 2016 population of 17,323. With a land area of 2,512.28 km2 (970.00 sq mi), it had a population density of 6.8/km2 (17.6/sq mi) in 2021.[3]