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CHAPTER VIII
MONROE TOWNSHIP
p. 449
This township
was organized from territory belonging to Tiffin
Township, June 23, 1817. It was named in honor of
President James Monroe. Its boundaries are:
Beginning on Brush Creek at the upper corner of
William Stout's farm; thence on a line to three mile
tree below Kirker mill; thence on a divide line
to Clark's Meeting House; keeping on a direct
course to Sprigg Township; being bounded on the west by
Sprigg Township line and Island Creek to its mouth; on
the south by the Ohio River; and on the east by Brush
Creek. The first election was held at the house of
Arthur Ellison the last Saturday in July, 1817.
Early Settlers.
John Yochum,
whose name appears in the early land records as an
assistant to Massie and other surveyors, settled
on Gift Ridge in 1795. He cleared the first patch
of ground on the Fenton farm, and while doing so
lived under the shelter of two huge rocks, that are
pointed out to visitors to this day as "Yochum's
Hermitage." Following Yochum came the
Utts, the Wades, the Naylors the
Washburns, and many other pioneer families of Adams
County.
Zephaniah Wade, an associate of John Yochumin
the frontier days, located on Gift Ridge, and erected a
cabin in the latter part of the year 1795, and there his
daughter Christiana, the late Mrs. Trenary
of Manchester, was born Nov. 20, 1795. She
was probably the first white child born in the county
outside the Stockade at Manchester.
Nathaniel Washburn settled at the head of
Donalson Creek, in 1796 and soon thereafter built a
small mill, known as Washburn's mill for many
years. Daniel Sherwood settled at the mouth
of Ohio Brush Creek about 1795.
James Hemphill settled on Beasley's Fork
in 1797 and it is said cleared the first ground on
that stream where Newton Wamsley now lives.
The Grimes family settled at the mouth of Ohio
Brush Creek in 1796, where Noble Grimes, in 1798,
laid out the old town of Washington, for several years
the seat of justice of Adams County. Here
also were the Stephensons, the Brandfords,
the Sherards, Faulkners, and many other
early pioneer families.
Gift Ridge.
This is the
name given to that portion of the highlands of Monroe
Township where the first settlers of Manchester located
their one hundred acre tract of land given them by
Nathaniel Massie after a residence of two years at
Manchester in accordance with the terms of the agreement
made between him and them on Dec. 29, 1790.
Massie reserved one thousand acres on the high
table-lands overlooking the Ohio River about one mile
below Wrightsville. Here was built Buckeye Station
in 1796, for a full description of which see this volume
under the heading, "The Oldest House in Ohio."
Schools.
It is
said that the first schoolhouse in the township was on
the old Lewis Bible farm and was built in
1802. James Lane was the first teacher.
The second one was on the farm of Arthur Ellison,
where the first election was held, John Barritt,
teacher. The township business for years was
transacted here, and hence the name "State House"
was applied to it. There are now ten sub-districts
with the following enrollment the present year:
| No. |
Males |
Females. |
No. |
Males. |
Females. |
| 1 |
19 |
15 |
6 |
19 |
28 |
| 2 |
20 |
20 |
7 |
35 |
32 |
| 3 |
24 |
24 |
8 |
28 |
19 |
| 4 |
25 |
20 |
9 |
30 |
21 |
| 5 |
26 |
19 |
10 |
29 |
25 |
Villages and Postoffices
WRIGHTSVILLE
lies on the right bank of the Ohio River about six miles
above Manchester. It was laid out by James
Hobson, Apr. 22, 1847, on a plat of 144 lots.
The situation is pleasant and there is ample room for a
city, but the place seems never to have flourished
although it is the nearest shipping point from West
Union to the Ohio River.
For many years during the bitter contest between West
Union and Manchester over the county seat question, the
West Union merchants shipped and received their goods
via Wrightsville; and it would have become the permanent
depot for West Union merchandise, but for the fact that
in the location of the turnpike from West Union to
Wrightsville the Manchester people controlled the
engineer and commissioners and succeeded in having the
road made over a very long and high hill near
Wrightsville which precludes the hauling of full loads
over the road. Mules and bicycle riders have discovered
what civil engineers of our public roads seem to be
unable to comprehend; that it is nearer to go two miles
round, than one mile over the grade.
The name of the postoffice at Wrightsville is Vineyard
Hill. It was formerly called Mahala, in honor of a
sister of Captain William Wade, an old resident
of the vicinity and a son of Zephaniah Wade above
mentioned. It was established in 1848.
GRIMES is the name of a postoffice recently
established at the mouth of Ohio Brush Creek, at the
site of the almost forgotten town of Washington once the
county seat.
BEASLEY'S FORK is the
only other postoffice in the township; it was
established in 1857 with James Miller as the
first postmaster.
Churches.
QUINN'S
CHAPEL, Methodist Episcopal, is said to be the
oldest church organization in the township, dating from
1805 when services were held by Rev. James Quinn
at the house of William Lucas on Gift Ridge.
The first house of worship was a hewed log structure
built on the Fenton farm. Afterwards a
frame was erected on the farm of John
Pennywitt and called Quinn's Chapel, in memory of
hte pioneer circuit rider, Rev. James Quinn.
UNION CHAPEL,
Methodist Episcopal, on Ohio Brush Creek near mouth of
Beasley's Fork, was organized in 1856.
BEASLEY'S FORK CHAPEL, Christian Union,
organized in 1864, and the present frame building was
erected in 1871.
REMINISCENCES.
Monroe
Township was the home of many old soldiers of the
Revolution. Among them was Henry Aldred who
is buried in Beach's Cemetery on the McColm farm.
He was wounded at the siege of Charleston by the
British, which lamed him for life. He had an
enduring hatred for everything English. Living in
the vicinity of Aldred's home in Monroe Township
was John Pike who had been in the English navy.
At a log rolling at the old Edward Hemphill's,
Pike was relating his experience in the navy, and asked
Aldred if he remembered what fine music they had
as they marched into Charleston after its surrender.
This so infuriated Aldred, that, crippled as he
was, it took several of the bystanders to keep him from
striking Pike with a handspike.
Old Donald Sherwood, a relative of the wife of
Stephen Beach, was a pioneer on Bush Creek, was
known as the "foolish Yankee." Among other things
related of him is that while living in a cabin near the
mouth of Brush Creek, before a settlement was made
there, he tracked a large bear into a cave in the hills,
and, Putnam like, with torch and gun, entered it and
shot the bear which weighed over three hundred pounds.
Captain William Faulkner, or Falconer, a
soldier of the Revolution and also of the War of 1812,
was an early settler at the mouth of Brush Creek.
He is buried in the old orchard on the Grimes farm.
He was a Catholic, and it is related of him that when
his wife died he had her buried at the chimney of his
house. He then built a kitchen, adjoining and laid
the hearthstone over her grave. He then built a
kitchen, sprinkle water over the hearthstone and
exclaim: "You are well ride out of this hell's kitchen,
my dear."
Henry Malone, who was born at Pleasant Bottoms
on the Hemphill farm near the mouth of Brush
Creek, Monroe Township, Jan. 26, 1815, related to the
writer recently it was said by all the old Revolutionary
soldiers in the vicinity that William Floyd, or
"Flood," as he was sometimes called, was an
illegitimate son of General Daniel Morgan.
Floyd is buried on the hillside near Cedar
College schoolhouse.
Mr. Malone said that when he was about eight
years of age the Methodists held a meeting at the home
of Stephen Beach who then lived on the opposite
side of Brush Creek. One Monday morning a young
man in company with Mr. John Brooks came to the
ford and called to him to bring his father's canoe and
ferry them over the creek. He did so, and the
young man gave him a six and one-quarter cents silver
piece, which was the first money he ever earned.
That young man was Henry Bascom then preaching
his first sermons in the pioneer settlements in Adams
County. Mr. Malone said he gave that piece
of silver to his mother to help keep old Abraham
Jones from being sold as a pauper as was the law in
those days, and remarked that although now eighty-five
years old, he had been "keeping paupers" ever since.
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