CHAPTER XXIII
LOUDON TOWNSHIP
Pg. 188
ITS BOUNDARIES - SOIL - POPULATION - SETTLEMENT -
VILLAGE OF KILGORE -
ENTERED BY GEN. ANTHONY WAYNE IN INDIAN WAR DAYS

     The extreme southeastern sub-division of Carroll County is known as Loudon civil township.  It once belonged to Rock Township in Harrison county.  It is composed of parts of Congressional townships 11 and 12, range 4, and townships 12 and 13, in range 5.  It is bounded on the north by Lee Township, on the east by Jefferson County, on the south by Harrison County and a small portion by Jefferson County, and on the west by Perry Township.  It contains twenty-one full and six half sections of land.
     The soil is a rich sandy loam and produces all that is grown in this latitude and longitude.  While the township has no railway facilities it has a valuable soil and the crops and stock here produced  are of the best quality and the railways are not far distant so that agriculture is easily and profitably carried on by a prosperous, happy and generally contented people.

POPULATION

     The United States reports of census for different enumeration periods gives this township as follows:  In 1840 it had 966; in 1880 it was 965; in 1890 it was 929; in 1900 it was placed at 909 and in 1910 it was 925.

EARLY SETTLERS

     Jacob Gotshall came in from Berks County, Virginia, and located in what is now known as Loudon Township, about 1802.  In a few years he was surrounded by Peter Albaugh, Daniel Shawver, Solomon Stine, Thomas Lucas and Adam Simmons, as neighbors.  As most all the pioneers had emigrated from Loudon County, Virginia, the county commissioners who organized the township in which settlement was effected naturally named it Loudon, hence the origin of the township's name.
     Among other early settlers in the township are recalled the names of William Wincler, 1806; George Iden, 1815; Samuel G. Queen in the spring of 1820.

GENERAL ANTHONY WAYNE HERE

     This distinguished American soldier, after the Revolutionary war, when the missionaries stationed in this portion of the great West (as Ohio was then styled), asked for protection from the invasion of savage Indian tribes, General Wayne was sent with

[Page 188]
soldiers in 1794 and crossed the southern part of Carroll County, camping on section 4, township 12, range 5 in Loudon Township, about two miles south of the present village of Kilgore on land later owned by Joseph Wilson.

THE VILLAGE OF KILGORE

     This little village in section 6 of Loudon Township, is twelve miles southeast of Carrollton.  In the eighties it had two hundred population; a Methodist Episcopal church, a Lutheran church and a Reformed church.  Its population is about the same today - less if any difference.
     The place was laid out soon after the organization of Loudon Township by John Able, in honor of Hon. Daniel Kilgore of Cadiz, Ohio, then a member of Congress from that district.  The county plat-book says:  "The above is a correct plat of the town of Kilgore, situated in Rock township, Carroll County, Ohio, in the northeast quarter of section 12, township 12, range 5, of the Steubenville district, as surveyed for John Able, the proprietor on the 17th and 18th days of December, 1834."
     A business directory of 1883-84 gives this on Kilgore:  Albaugh Brothers, stone-masons; J. D. Albaugh, pianos and organs; William Albaugh, saw mill; James Campbell, agricultural implements; S. M. Gottshall blacksmith; Simmons & Son, furniture dealers; John H. Smith, hotel; Spence, Tinlin & Company, general merchandise; with a few other dealers.