EARLY COMERS TO VINTON TOWNSHIP

     Vinton Township, north to Wilkesville Township, in the southeastern corner of the county, received an early influx of settlers, the following locating before 1825:  George Entsler, William Pierce, William Mark, Paul Mas, Royal R. Althas and James Read.  Other early settlers were John Booth, who came from Harrison County, Virginia, in 1831, was John Booth, who came from Harrison County, Virginia, in 1831, was long the oldest living settler in the township and passed the later years of his life at Radcliff's Station; Jonathan Radcliff, Jonathan Bloer and Stephen Aiken, all of whom located either in 1826 or 1827.  Mr. Aiken was a miller by trade, and soon after his arrival he built a mill on Raccoon Creek.  Very soon after the first settlers located in the township, a Methodist circuit preacher visited them to hold religious services, and in 1827 the first school was opened on fractional section 19, near the first cemetery.

SWAN TOWNSHIP

     Swan Township, which is bounded on the north by Hocking County, is one of the most productive sections in the county and has always been noted for its fine farms; so that it acquired a high standing long before its ore beds commenced to yield.  The settlers began to come as early as 1818, among the first being David Johnson, Frederick Kaler, David, Peter and John Kenders, and peter, Jacob and David Haynes.
     The first schoolhouse was built by David Johnson, Mr. Kaler and three brothers by the name of Hass.
     The first school was taught by a Mr. Hill, and the second by Harker Shoemaker.
     The first mill was built in 1823 by John Rager on Little Raccoon Creek, although there had been horse-mills previous to this, but these were considered to slow, so water power was brought into requisition.
     The first child born in Swan Township is believed to have been Hon. E. H. Moore, now of Athens, Ohio.
     The first death was a child of Mr. and Mrs. Jesse Collins.  It was buried in the cemetery near the residence of David Johnson.
     The first justice of the peace was Peter Haynes.
     Dr. Jesse Cartlich was the first practicing physician.
     The first church was built in 1830 at New Mt. Pleasant, although there was one commenced but never finished in the south part of the township at an earlier date.
     The first religious society formed was the Methodist Episcopal, which organized in 1818, at the residence of David Johnson.
     The first preacher was Reverend Coston, who was succeeded by the Reverend Gillruth, familiarly known as the giant preacher, as he was the strongest man in this section of the country, his strength being equal to the combined powers of two ordinary men.

BEFORE THE EARLY '20s

     The year after the arrival of the Bothwell family, in 1815, James and William Mysick settled on sections 25 and 26, and Edward Salts came in 1816 and entered the land upon which McArthur Junction afterward stood.  Some of the later arrivals, but still falling well within the list of pioneers, were Thadeus Fuller, David Richmond, Rev. Joshua Green, Lemuel and Allen Lane, Joseph Gill and Isaac West.

WILKESVILLE FOUNDED

     In the meantime quite a brisk settlement had been started in the extreme southeastern part of what is now Vinton County named Wilkesville, and in 1815 a separate township by that name was organized from Gallia County.  The village is now half a mile from the Meigs County line.  The land on which it stands, as well as a large part of the surrounding country, was purchased by an eastern gentlemen named Wilkes about 1807.

HENRY DUC AND OTHERS.

     In the year 1810 Henry Duc, the agent of Mr. Wilkes, arrived upon the ground and on the 10th of June laid out the town.  During that year the families of Isaac Hawk, William Humphreys, Henry Jones, Rufus Wells and Mr. Terry settled in the township.  The first was that of Mr. Hawk, which in 1807 had moved from Greenbrier County, Virginia, to the lower part of Gallia County, and thence, in January, 1810, to Wilkesville.  Mr. Duc offered a land warrant to the first child born in the new town and it went to Clara Jones.  He himself brought his family to Wilkesville from Middletown, Connecticut, in the spring of 1812.  About the same time Mr. Chitwood, another eastern man, moved to the farm afterward owned by Able Wells.  He opened a store in his house and was the first merchant of Wilkesville Township.

METHODIST PIONEERS.

     Wilkesville developed into quite a village and naturally its people got together at an early date in their capacity as religionists.  Rev. Mr. Dixon, a Methodist, held the first services in the village and was followed by Rev. John Brown, who formed a class about 1814.

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH OF WILKESVILLE.

     But Henry Duc, the local founder of the place, was a Presbyterian and in 1821 he headed a movement among the laymen of Wilkesville to organize a church of his denomination.
     In October, 1821, the Presbyterian Church of Wilkesville was organized by the Rev. William R. Gould, a man to whom Southeastern Ohio owes much for his earnest labors in behalf of religion and education.  He came to this region as a missionary of the Connecticut Home Missionary Society, founded the churches at Gallipolis and Wilkesville, and was for many years an examiner of teachers for the public schools.

WILKESVILLE SCHOOLS

     The first school in Wilkesville was taught by Mrs. Crooker, in 1818.  A schoolhouse was built where the present one stands about 1833.  Mrs. Isham, sister of Doctor Isham, first taught in it.  Besides the public schools there were occasional select schools.  Maj. J. C. H. Cobb taught an excellent school for some two years, and Mrs. E. D. Shaw also taught for a time.  Just after the close of the war Rev. Warren Taylor taught for a time.  Just after the close of the war Rev. Warren Taylor taught a select school in the Presbyterian Church.  A number of Returned soldiers attended.  In the spring of 1866, at a meeting of a few leading citizens, called by Rev. W. Taylor, the building of Wilkesville Academy was determined upon.  The money was nearly all raised in the vicinity.  This school was of great benefit to Wilkesville, attracting students from abroad and furnished the surrounding country with some excellent common-school teachers.  The academy is now merged with the Wilkesville High School, which has recently received its charter as a first class high school, Prof. W. H. Durkee being the principal.
     Wilkesville was incorporated in August, 1881, but for the past twenty-five or thirty years has declined in population from about three hundred to two hundred.

OLD MILLS

     In the northern part of Wilkesville Township, near Hawk's Station of the present, was built one of the first mills of the county - Hartley's.  It was built on Raccoon Creek, probably as early as 1825, by one Houdasheldt, who, after operating it for twenty years, sold it to Benjamin Hawk.  The Quinn Mill, near what is now Minerton, is nearly as old as Hartley's.
     Among the early settles in the vicinity of Hartley's Mill were Peter Starr, a relative of Houdasheldt, who accompanied him to the locality; Isaac Hawk and his son, Benjamin Hawk, who settled in the northern part of the township in 1842 (Isaac Hawk died in 1863; Benjamin Hawk, in 1865); Michael Carpenter, Ivory Thacker, Thomas Thacker, Holman Thacker, James McNeal, Louis McDowell, Malachi Dorton, Dennis McGinnis and W. Knapper.  The last three were drowned at Hartley's Mill in 1857 by the upsetting of a canoe in which they were rowing.
     Vinton Township also contained two old mills; the pioneer was erected by Stephen Aiken in the early '30s.  It was burned and rebuilt in 1864.  Vale's Mill was built by Gabriel Bowen in 1839 and is still running, owned by J. Q. A. Vale.

CLINTON TOWNSHIP SETTLED.

     The first settlements in what is now Clinton Township were made about 1814 by Nathaniel Richmond, David Paine, Robert Elders, Downy Read, Robert Ward, Thomas McGrady, Willilam McGrady and Abraham Wilbur.  It was Mr. Richmond who bought the land upon which the Village of Hamden was laid out at a later day.  But the founding of McArthur antedates the rise of Hamden.

MCARTHUR FOUNDED.

     The site and central location of what is now the Village of McArthur pointed to their selection as the best for the seat of justice when the county was formed in 1850.  Its advantages as a town were evident to the early settlers thirty-five years before, and all of these features cannot be better presented than by quoting from the "History of the Hocking Valley," a publication long since out of print:
     "This village, the county seat of Vinton County, is located narly in the center of the county and but little south of the center of Elk Township.  Its situation on a slightly oval surface between the two main branches of Elk Fork and near their confluence is a pleasant one, rarely surpassed in modest rural beauty.  These streams are small, mere brooks, but for an inland village, this site is hardly equaled in all of Southern Ohio.  This strip of land is considerably elevated, forming a small plateau, the edges of which are in some places deeply carved by the action of running water.  Elk Fork, which has its beginning at the junction of the two smaller streams embracing the site of McArthur, is a branch of Raccoon Creek, into which it flows in the southern part of the county.  Of those two small streams the larger one comes from the north and the other from the northwest.
     "Cabins of early settlers had made their appearance on this little plateau prior to the year 1815, while nearly all was yet a forest.  But these, so far as can be learned, were only two in number and occupied by two brothers, William and Jerry Pierson.  About this time some burrstone quarries in the northern part of the county were being worked, and the roads over which these stones were hauled from two of the quarries coming together at this place made it of some importance as a stopping place.
     "Its eligibility for the location of a town attracted the attention of men of capital who happened to see it.  In 1815 Isaac Pierson, Levi Johnson, Moses Dawson, George Will, and John Beach - the two latter from Adelphi - forming a company, purchased the quarter section on which McArthur is situated, and laid out the town on the 25to of November in that year.  The situation is the southeast quarter of section 21, of township11, range 17, and at that time belonged to Athens County.  As laid out at this time it contained 112 in-lots and twenty-five out-lots.  These lots were conveniently provided with streets and alleys crossing each other at right angles.  Main street, running due east and west, is eighty-two and one-half feet wide, while North, High, Mill and South streets, all running parallel to Main are each sixty-six feet wide.  Boundary alley, which was the western boundary of the original plat, is thirty-three feet wide at the southern end and forty-eight feet at the northern end.  All the alleys within the in-lots are each sixteen and one-half feet wide.  Main, Market and North streets are each continued through the out-lots.
     "The dimensions of the in-lots are ten poles in length from north to south and four poles in breadth from east to west.  In-lots Nos. 63 and 64 were allotted for public ground and reserved for court and market house and jail.  April 10, 1840, the first addition was made to the original plat by Aaron Lantz and P. and S. H. Brown of 109 in-lots.  In May, 1842 P. and S. H. Brown made another addition of nine out-lots.  August 7 and 8, 1844, David Richmond's addition was surveyed and laid out.  B. P. Hewitt and Robert Sage made another addition in April, 1854, of eight in-lots, and Sept. 3, 1858, at the instance of Thomas B. Davis, another addition of twenty-four in-lots was made.
     "The newly laid-out town was named McArthurstown in honor of Hon. Duncan McArthur, a prominent Ohio statesman at that time.  The lots sold well at first, six or seven houses going up the first year.  Stanbaugh Stancliff built the first house after the town was laid out.  Stancliff was the grandfather of Judge Du Hadway.  William Green was the first shoemaker who lived here, and his daughter was the first child born in the village.  She was presented with a town lot by the town company.  A Mr. Washburn was the first blacksmith to locate here.  In 1815, a Mr. Paffenbarger started a tan-yard just east of the graveyeard.  In 1816 Joel Sage built the first tavern in the village.  His wife died in a year or so and he rented the tavern to Thomas Wren, who kept it for several years.  It stood on the corner of Main and Market streets.  In the same year the tavern was started John Phillips and Dr. Windsor started the first store.  The store was owned by Phillips and Windsor, was managed by Windsor, and handled general merchandise.

OLDEST CHURCH IN THE COUNTY.

     The Methodist Episcopal Church of McArthur was organized in 1814 by Rev. Joel Havens, and is the oldest religious organization in the County of Vinton.  Isaac Pierson's house was at first selected as the place for holding the services, but soon after the town was laid out the meeting house was changed to Rev. Benjamin Keiger's tannery, known previously as the Paffenbarger Tannery.  The Methodists erected a log church about 1819, and the building was used for some years by other denominations.  Mr. Keiger was followed in the pastorate by Rev. Jacob Hooper, the first regular preacher being Rev. David Culverson.  The old log church served its purposes well until 1843, when a small brick edifice was erected not far from the original house of worship.

FIRST SCHOOLS AND TEACHERS.

     In the meantime various schools had been established in the village.  About the time the old log Methodist Church was built a few select schools were being taught in private rooms.  Among the pioneer teachers were J. Stanclift, John Johnson, Anthony Burnside, John Dodds, George W. Shockey and the woman who afterward became so widely known in temperance work as Mother Stewart.
     The teachers mentioned mostly taught in rented rooms, but about 1828 lot No. 98 was bought and a very fair structure was erected thereon, 20 by 24 feet, from funds raised by subscription.  The schoolhouse was used for a number of years as headquarters for public education, as well as for a church and a township hall.  It was furnished with plank seats and desks, the teacher general furnishing his own splint-bottom chair.  The district was not set apart as an independent school until 1853.

MCARTHUR POSTOFFICE.

     A postoffice was not established in McArthur until 1828.  Previously the few inhabitants obtained their mail from Athens or Chillicothe.  Thomas Wren, the first postmaster, received the local mail by horseback messenger once a week.  After 1835 the trip was made twice a week.

GEORGE W. SHOCKEY ON EARLY TIMES

     George W. Shockey, mentioned as one of the early teachers of McArthur, many years afterward, while a resident of Washington, District of Columbia, wrote as follows regarding the pioneers and early events connected with McArthur: "I was born in Athens County, Ohio, now Vinton County, in the year 1822, and can recollect many of the first settlers of Elk Township.  My grandfather, Frederic Snyder, came from Hampshire County, Va., in the year 1821, and settled on the farm at Vinton Station, three miles east of McArthur.  He was a farmer, and also had learned the carpenter's trade.  Several yeas after, he removed to Ross County, and died at the rip age of ninety years.  His son, Smith Snyder, came from the same county in Virginia, and in the same year married Miss Rachel Fry,  and made a settlement on the farm now owned by Charles Brown.  He built a saw and grist ill on Raccoon Creek near his house, which were run successfully for many years.
     "Jacob Shockey, a pioneer, was a native of Berkley County, Va., and moved to Vinton County (at that time Athens) in 1821.  He first arrived at Chillicothe, but in the same year moved to Elk Township, Vinton County, one and a half miles east of McArthur, on Congress land, then known as the old Will fild, but now owned by Henry Robbins.  At that time Elk Township was almost a wilderness, with the exception of one or two acres.  This settlement was a dark, wild forest of heavy timber, in which many wild beasts of the forest loved to roam at large.  Near by and on this farm were several rock houses and a saltpeter cave.  Not far off was also an alum cave, and many dear licks and a wild-cat den.  I can remember of seeing a black bear near McArthur.  It was treed and shot by Stephen Martin in sight of the court-house in McArthur.  There were numerous wild animals in and about McArthur since my recollection, such as bear, deer, wolves, catamounts, wild-cat, foxes, coon, and other smaller animals.  A few years after, Mr. Shockey bought a piece of Congress land now known as the Howell estate, then sold it and purchased another place, known as the Purkey place, one and a half miles northeast of McArthur.  From there he moved to McArthur, and after all the hardships of pioneer life - of a new and unsettled country redeemed from a  wilderness, a family of seven reared, educated and provided for, and after living to see the march of civilization and modern improvements take the place of the Indians and wild beasts of the forest - he was destined, just as peace, prosperity and contentment had found an abiding-place in his home, to cross the mystic river and join those who had gone before, leaving an honored came and an unblemished reputation.  He died at the age of sixty-eight.
     "Robert Sage, Hiram Hulbert, Jacob Shry, Rachel Snyder, James Pilcher, John England, David Evans, Charles Bevington, David Culbertson, Michael Swaim, Moses Dawson, Eli and Cyrus Catlin, David Markwood, George Fry (Senior), Isaac Shry, William Hoffhines, John Wyman, Levi Wyman, James Robgbins, Philip Kelch, John Winters, John Morrisson, Lewis Benjamin, Samuel and Jacob Calvin, James Bothwell, Richard McDougal, Thomas Johnson, and Nathan Horton were among the early settlers.  I think there were never any block houses in Vinton County.  There were two water-mills on Elk Fork of Raccoon Creek, built by Moses Dawson as early as 1820.  One on the farm now owned by Harvey Robbins, one and a half miles east of McArthur, the other, one mile northeast of McArthur on the same stream, known now as the Gold Mill."
     John J. Shockey, a brother of the writer of the foregoing letter. once served as sheriff of the county, and another brother, Rev. William M. Shockey, was a Methodist minister who died in 1860.

JACKSON TOWNSHIP

     Jackson Township is between Swan and Eagle, in the northwestern part of the county.  It was organized from Eagle Township in 1831.  It is, like all the mineral country, broken and hilly, with a few narrow valleys, and well watered.  In the southern part it has the middle fork of Salt Creek, with several small tributaries, and in the west and north Pretty Run.  Numerous springs are also found, so that both before and after the Furnace Period it has always been considered a good country for live stock.
     Among the first settlers was John Tilton, Eli Hill, Isaac Hawks, Enoch DIxon, William Burns, Thomas Colwell, Archibald Drake, Peter Milton and Jacob and William Arkson, Frederick Garrick, Joseph Wyatt and Samuel Darby.
     The first church built in this township was the "Locust Grove" Church, and was first constructed of logs, but a large frame building now occupies the same foundation.  The first sermon was preached by Rev. N. Redfern.
     The first store in the township was opened by James Ankram on the middle fork of Salt Creek, on section 27.  This is the only store ever kept in the township.
     The first mill was erected on section 27 by Jacob Ankram.  This is a saw and grist mill combined, and at the present time does much toward supplying the wants of the people of Jackson and flour and lumber.
     The first township clerk was James Honnold.
     The first justice of the peace was Thomas Colwell. 

EAGLE TOWNSHIP

     Eagle Township, in the northwestern part of the county, is bounded on the north by Hocking County and on the west by Ross.  When Hocking County was organized, April 25, 1818, Eagle Township included the present Township of Jackson and had quite a number of settlers, who had been coming in during the previous five or six years.  These pioneers all settled along Salt Creek and Pretty Run, which are the chief drainage streams of the township, and included Moses Dawson, John Ratcliff, Lawrence Rains, Jonathan Francis, Joshua Pickens and William Vanderford, Sr.
     Mr. Rains built the first ill on Salt Creek, at the mouth of Pike Run, about 1813, and shortly afterward Solomon Cox erected one on Pretty Run.
     The first election in Eagle Township was held May 9, 1818, at the house of Moses Dawson.
     On June 2, 1834, the commissioners of Hocking County cut off the north their of sections from Eagle Township and added them to Salt Creek Township of Hocking County, leaving Eagle Township but five miles north and south by six east and west.  The following winter what remained of it was transferred by special act of the General Assembly to Ross County, where it remained until Vinton County to make up her required territory.  Thus Eagle Township had been some sixteen years a part of Hocking County and almost sixteen years a part of Ross.

RICHLAND TOWNSHIP

    RICHLAND TOWNSHIP was organized about 1824, as a portion of Ross County.  It was afterward attached to Jackson County for political and legislative purposes and in 1850 was incorporated into the body politic of Vinton County.
     The following is a partial list of the old settlers of Richland Township.  Henry, John, Abraham, Job, William and Joseph Cozad and their families; John A. Swepston, James and Solomon Redfern, Robert Clark, Levi Davis, Samuel Darby, Enoch Dixon, John Loving, George Claypool, Philip Waldron, Geroge Waldron, Nathan Cox, Jeremiah Cox, Samuel Cox, Samuel Graves, James Graves, William Graves, Henry Graves, Nathan Graves, Jonathan Graves, Joseph Graves, Thomas Graves, William Graves, Jr., John Graves, Eli Graves, William Hutt, Charles Hutt and Lemuel Hutt.  Samuel Darby was a soldier in the War of 1812.  His father, William Darby, was a soldier of the Revolution, serving under Washington for five yeras as a drummer in a Pennsylvania regiment commanded by Colonel Patton.  He died in Vinton County and is buried in an old cemetery near the Morgan Mill.
     The first mill in the township - a combined grist and sawmill - was built about 1843 by Benjamin Rains.  The Allensville and Graves mills followed later.
     Richland is the largest township in the county, comprising forty-two full sections, or 26,880 acres, most of which is excellent land.  It is drained principally by the middle fork of Salt Creek.  The mineral section of the township is in the southern part.
     Harrison Township, to the west of Richland, is bounded on the west by Ross County, of which it was once a part.  It is watered and broken by Pigion Fork and the middle fork of Salt Creek, along which the pioneers of the township settled, viz., James Brady, Morris Humphrey, Solomon Wilkinson, Joseph and William Dixon, Joseph Baker and John Nicholas.

ALLENSVILLE

     Henry Cozad, one of the fist to settle in Richland Township, entered land in Harrison Township, northeast of its central sections, and in 1837 laid off a town there which he named Allensville, in honor of William Allen.  Mr. Cozad was the first merchant of the place and became its first postmaster when an office was established in 1839.

BROWN, MADISON AND KNOX.

     Brown, Madison and Knox townships form the northeastern portion of Vinton County and are quite noted for the complicated way in which they were bandied about between Athens and Hocking counties before they were finally settled at their later home within the bounds of Vinton County.  The original Brown Township of Athens County comprised all three, but at the organization of Hocking County, in 1818, it was divided and the present Brown Township of Vinton County was attached to Hocking County, while the present Madison and Knox Townships formed Brown Township of Athens County.  In 1850, when Vinton County was organized, the two Brown Townships were incorporated into it as North Brown and South Brown.  On December 2, 1850, the county commissioners of the new County of Vinton ordered that "the two tiers of sections which formerly belonged to Lee township, Athens county, and which were now attached to the township of Brown in this county, and the two tiers of sections which formerly belonged to the township of Brown in Athens county, forming originally the east end of that township, be erected into a new township to be known by the name of Knox."  In 1852 the county board changed the name of South Brown Township to Madison, what was left of the original territory retaining the name of Brown.

ZALESKI AND NEW PLYMOUTH

     The three townships lie in the valley of Raccoon Creek in the minieral belt of the Hanging Rock Iron Region and were for many years given over to the iron and coal industries, the widely known Village of Zaleski being in the northwestern corner of Madison Township.  Little progress had been made in the way of settling this part of the county previous to 1850.  One of the oldest points in that region is near the present New Plymouth, John Wright, Francis Bartlett, Isaac Lash and others locating in that neighborhood in the early '20s.  The first school was kept in Mr. Bartlett's house, and the pioneer log schoolhouse erected about half a mile northeast of New Plymouth about 1824.  The town was laid out at an early day by eastern people, some of them having migrated from old Plymouth, Massachusetts, and by 1850 the settlement was granted postoffice privileges.

THE FOSTER AND BOLEN MILLS.

     There were a number of pioneer mills which were built in Knox Township on the banks of Raccoon Creek.  The Foster mills, a grist and sawmill combined, were erected on section 31 as early as 1830, and forty years after were thoroughly rebuilt and modernized.
     The old Bolen mills were erected in 1845 by William Bolen, who owned and operated them for over twenty years.  The machinery was originally run by water power, but later a steam engine was placed in the building to be used in case of a deficiency of water power.
     Having thus in a general and perhaps cursory manner introduced the chief events and personages, as well as the early settlements, which prepared the way for the political and civil organizations of Vinton County, the writer passes on to those implied features of the history.