USA > Indiana > Madison County > History of Madison County Indiana (Volume 1) > Part 11
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Ingalls is the only town of importance in the township. The vil- lage of Alfont, a short distance west of Ingalls, was laid out by Wil- liam Alfont about 1850. Some fifteen years before that time Mr. Alfont had established a small sawmill on Lick creek, from which power was procured to run the mill. This mill was burned in 1847, but was replaced by a steam mill, which did a successful business for a number of years. A few persons settled in the immediate vicinity and when the old Bellefontaine (now the Cleveland division of the Big Four) railroad was completed across the southeast corner of Green township, Mr. Alfont had a town regularly platted and named it after himself. For a time the venture prospered. A postoffice was established with William Molden as postmaster. Mr. Molden was also engaged in busi- ness as a general merchant. A warehouse was erected and a consider- able quantity of grain was shipped. Other business enterprises came in, but when Fortville, two miles west, came into prominence it proved to be the greater attraction and the growth of Alfont suffered a decided check thereby. With the establishment of Ingalls, only half a mile away, in 1893, Alfont passed into history.
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CHAPTER VI TOWNSHIP HISTORY, CONTINUED
JACKSON - LAFAYETTE - MONROE - PIPE CREEK - RICHLAND - STONY CREEK-UNION-VAN BUREN-SETTLEMENT AND ORGANIZATION OF EACH-EARLY SCHOOLS AND CHURCHES-MENTION OF PROMINENT PIONEERS-PRIMITIVE INDUSTRIES AND ROADS-EXTINCT TOWNS AND VILLAGES, ETC.
JACKSON TOWNSHIP
Jackson is the middle township of the western tier. It is bounded on the north by Pipe Creek and Lafayette townships; on the east by Lafayette and Anderson; on the south by Stony Creek township, and on the west by Hamilton county, and contains an area of twenty-eight square miles. The White river flows across the township from east to west in the southern part, the northwestern part is watered by Pipe creek and its tributaries, and Stony creek has its source in the southeast corner. Along the streams the surface is rather hilly, but farther back it is so level that artificial drainage is necessary in order to bring the exceed- ingly fertile soil. under cultivation. Jackson is one of the first five townships to be organized in the county and was named after General Andrew Jackson, who was president of the United States from 1829 to 1837.
Sometime in the year 1821 two men named Dewey and Kinser, with their families, came to what is now Jackson township. Mr. Dewey built his cabin on the south side of the White river, opposite the present vil- lage of Perkinsville, and Kinser located about a mile and half farther up the river. Neither of these men entered land, nor did they remain long in the county. In the spring of 1822 Daniel Wise came from Ross county, Ohio, and the following October entered four hundred acres of land on the south side of the river, including the cabin that had been occupied by Kinser the preceding year. This was the first entry of land made in the township. Prior to that time, however, Benoni Freel had cleared land and built a cabin opposite Perkinsville, not far from the Dewey cabin, and it is believed that he was the first actual settler.
Others who came during the year 1822 were the Montgomerys- David, William and John-George Cunningham and Robert Blair, all from Ohio. During the next three years a number of pioneers located lands in the township. Among them were Thomas Forkner, James White, the two John Connors (senior and junior), Matthew Connor, James, Alexander and George Mcclintock, Lemuel Auter, Joseph Lee
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and William Parkins. The last named, with his wife and seven chil- dren, came in the fall of 1825 and pitched his tent on the north bank of the White river, where Perkinsville now stands, and remained there until he leased a tract of land from Daniel Wise and built a cabin, into which he moved his family about Christmas. Mr. Parkins preached the first funeral sermon in the township over the remains of a young man who was killed by the falling of a burning tree in a clearing. He was also a blacksmith, as well as a preacher, and soon after becoming set- tled in his cabin on the Wise farm he opened the first blacksmith shop in the township.
About 1825 the Indianapolis & Fort Wayne road was surveyed through this region, and during the following fall and winter was cut
SCENE NEAR PERKINSVILLE
out by the settlers. It was the first road through this portion of Madi- son county.
In the spring of 1826 John Ashby brought his family from Ross county, Ohio, and settled near the present village of Halford, where he died about two years later. His son, John Ashby, Jr., who was about eighteen years of age when the family settled in Jackson township, assisted in supporting the family and in 1842 opened the first tavern in Hamilton (now Halford). Among others who settled in the vicinity of Halford about this time were Joel White, Robert Cather, Joseph Miller, Joel Epperly, and the Robinett, Harless and Benefiel families.
The first white child born in Jackson township was Sarah, daughter of Lemuel Auter, but the date of her birth is not known. The first marriage was in 1825, when Isaac Shelton and Delilah Crist were made man and wife. The first death was that of William Montgomery. The
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first brick house was erected in 1827 by Robert Blair on his farm op- posite Perkinsville.
One of the great needs of the early settlers was a mill of some de- scription. It was fourteen miles by the nearest route from the settlement near Perkinsville to the McCartney mill at Pendleton, which was the nearest place where corn could be converted into meal. No roads had as yet been opened and the task of going to mill was one to be dreaded. In this emergency William Parkins set his ingenuity and industry to work and constructed a small mill, to be operated by hand power. The stones, which he dressed himself, were of native limestone, and the remainder of the "machinery" consisted principally of round poles. By the exercise of sufficient "elbow grease" this mill would grind about a bushel of meal an hour. It did not lack for patronage, as the settlers within a radius of several miles brought their corn and frequently furnished the power to grind their own grists. As the population in- creased in numbers, the old hand mill became inadequate to supply the demand. Again Mr. Parkins came to the rescue. With the assistance of his neighbors he constructed a dam across the White river in front of where Perkinsville now stands and built a small mill to be run by water power. The dam was made chiefly of logs and brush, weighted down with stones. The mill was a little log building containing one run of buhrs, or stones, which were fashioned by Mr. Parkins and his son James out of glacial bowlders, or "nigger heads." Such a mill would be regarded as insignificant in this day, but at that time it was looked upon as a triumph of mechanical genius. Subsequently a run of buhrs was added for grinding wheat, the flour being bolted upon a machine operated by hand.
Some years later this mill property was purchased by Andrew Jack- son, of Anderson, who in 1846 erected a large frame building, in which he installed the best milling machinery that day afforded. A sawmill was added in 1854. Mr. Jackson subscribed for stock in the old Indian- apolis & Bellefontaine Railroad Company and through this deal the mill passed into the hands of the railroad company, which afterward sold it to James M. and David B. Jackson, sons of the former owner. After operating it for some years, they sold it to Jacob Zeller, who in turn sold it to Alfred Clark. On the night of August 19, 1884, the building, with all its machinery and a large quantity of grain, was totally destroyed by fire and has never been rebuilt.
Kingman's History of Madison County is authority for the state- ment that the first school in the township was taught in the year 1825, in the cabin that had been erected by Mr. Dewey some four years before, and that the teacher was a man named Williams. Among the scholars were three or four of the Wise boys, about the same number of the MeClintock boys and Joseph Lee. The second school house was built a year or two later on section 34, on the Wise farm, a third was built a little later on the north side of the White river. Both were small log buildings of the usual frontier type, and the schools taught in them were subscription or "pay" schools. After the introduction of the public school system, better school houses were erected. In 1912 Jack-
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son had six brick buildings, valued at $10,000. During the school year of 1912-13 nine teachers were employed and received in salaries the sum of $3,636.75.
About 1824 a Methodist class was organized, with Benoni Freel as the first class leader, and the first regular services were held in the Dewey cabin. Sometime in the '40s a United Brethren church was organized at the house of Samuel Gentry, a short distance from Perkins- ville. A Christian church was organized at Hamilton about 1857 by Rev. Carey Harrison, but no house of worship was ever erected by the congregation, and in April, 1866, a Methodist Protestant church was organized at Hamilton with eight members.
Perkinsville, on the north side of the White river near the western boundary, and Halford, on the south side of the river, about four miles east of Perkinsville, are the only villages in the township. In what is known as the McClintock neighborhood, near the site of an old Indian village and burying ground, was once a little hamlet called Nancytown, but it is now extinct and the ground where it stood is used for farm- ing purposes.
LAFAYETTE TOWNSHIP
This township is centrally located and is the only civil township in the county whose boundaries coincide with the Congressional township lines, it being six miles square and embracing township No. 20 north of range 7 east. On the north it is bounded by the townships of Monroe and Pipe Creek; on the east by Richland; on the south by Anderson and Jackson, and on the west by Jackson and Pipe Creek. The surface being generally level, the lands were originally too wet to carry on farming successfully, but in 1875 an extensive system of artificial drain- age was inaugurated that has made this township one of the most desir- able in the county for agricultural purposes.
In 1831 Henry Ry brought his family from North Carolina and settled on section 36, in the extreme southeast corner of the township, where North Anderson now stands. There he built a cabin of round logs, the first civilized habitation in the township. During his ten years' residence here he made many substantial improvements, but about 1841 he sold his farm and removed to Randolph county, Indiana, where he passed the remainder of his life.
In the spring of 1832 John Croan, who had previously settled in Anderson township, in 1828, removed with his family to section 35, in what is now Lafayette township and established a new home, about half a mile north of Henry Ry's cabin. Later in the same year Reuben Junks, George Mustard and John B. Penniston came from Ross county, Ohio, and founded homes in this township. James Baily also came from Ohio in this year, but soon became dissatisfied and returned to the Buckeye State. Reed Wilson, of Wayne county, Indiana, came in the spring of 1834 and settled on what was later known as the Pierce farm, and about the same time Jordan Newton came from Ohio and settled on the Stanley farm. The next year (1835) there was a considerable tide of immigration to the township, Isaac Jones, William Lower, James
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Finney, Samuel Fetty, John Maggart, David Gooding and Mrs. Mar- garet Shinkle all entering lands and becoming permanent residents. Gooding was a Kentuckian, who had served as an aide-de-camp under Colonel Richard M. Johnson in the War of 1812, and was present at the battle of the Thames, where Colonel Johnson was wounded by the famous Shawnee chief, Tecumseh.
In July, 1836, James Hollingsworth settled upon the farm where he lived for many years, and soon after his arrival he built a carding machine, which he conducted successfully until it was destroyed by a flood in 1838. He had not been in the township very long before he started the movement for its organization. He circulated the petition, which was signed by himself, John B. Penniston, John Croan, Isaac Jones, Reuben Junks, Reed Wilson, Henry Ry, Jordan Newton, George Mustard, George Moore, William Lower, Enos Mustard, John Maggart, George Rains, Samuel Fetty, David Gooding and James Finney-the entire voting population living within the territory it was proposed to incorporate in the new township. The petition was duly presented to the county commissioners, who on November 9, 1836, issued the order for the erection of the township, as shown by the following entry taken from the records of that date:
"Ordered by the board that a new township be stricken off from the townships of Richland, Jackson and Pipe Creek, said new town- ship shall include all of Congressional township 20, north of range 7 east, and no more, and that all elections shall be held at the house of John Maggart therein, and the said new township shall be known and designated by the name and style of Lafayette township."
The name was suggested by James Hollingsworth, in honor of the Marquis de La Fayette, the gallant French general who rendered such timely and efficient aid to the struggling armies of the American colonies in the war for independence. Mr. Hollingsworth was also inspector of the first election, which was held at the house of John Maggart, as directed by the commissioners, on January 17, 1837. On that occasion no ballot-box had been provided and the inspector used his hat as a receptacle for the tickets. At that election John Maggart received a majority of the votes for justice of the peace and Enos Mustard was chosen township clerk.
Almost immediately following the organization of the township there was a decided increase in the population. By 1840 the following persons had founded homes and were developing farms: Daniel Sigler, Allen Simmons, Lewis and George Baily, Thomas G. Clark, Matthew Taylor, Samuel Moore, Henry Purgett, John Ridgeway, Washington Trotter, Zail and George Rains, Caleb Dehority, James Closser, Francis Colburn, Nathaniel G. Lewis, John Clock, James Wier, Joseph Van Meter, Samuel Westerfield, George Hilligoss, Sr., Robert and Samuel Gooding, John Burk and James Stover.
Annis Croan, daughter of John and Sarah Croan, who was born in 1834, was the first white child born in Lafayette township. The first marriage was celebrated on March 19, 1838, the contracting parties being James Hollingsworth and Miss Elizabeth Shinkle, and the first death was that of Reuben Junks.
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George Mustard planted the first orchard in the township soon after settling there, procuring his trees from Dempsy Wilson, of Anderson township. The first mill was built by George Millspaugh and James Stevenson in 1851. It was a small steam sawmill and was first located on the farm of Patrick Ryan, but subsequently was removed else- where. In 1870 Roadcap & Van Winkle built a steam sawmill where the village of Florida is now situated. Two months after it went into operation the boiler exploded, completely wrecking the mill, killing Perry Moore and a man named Wolf and severely injuring the engineer, Solomon Muck.
A small log school house was erected in 1840, near the site afterward occupied by public school No. 7, and the first school in the township was taught there in the fall of that year by John Penniston. The first frame school house was built in the same locality in 1857 and was the first to be erected as a public school. In 1912 there were eleven districts, each provided with a modern brick building, the estimated value of the eleven houses being $22,000. Sixteen teachers were employed during the school years of 1912-13, receiving $7,666 in salaries.
A Methodist society was organized at the house of William Lower in the fall of 1836, by Rev. Robert Burns. A Christian church was formed in May, 1869, and the New Lights and United Brethren also established churches in the township. Accounts of these organizations will be found in the chapter on Church History.
Florida, on the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis (Pan Handle) Railroad, and Linwood, on the Michigan division of the Big Four, are the only villages of consequence. The town of Frankton is situated near the boundary line between Lafayette and Pipe Creek town- ships. Soon after the Pan Handle railroad was built in 1856, a ware- house was established on the road a mile and a half northwest of Florida and a general store was also opened there. For a time the trains stopped at Keller's Station, as the place was called, John Keller being the owner of the land upon which the station was situated. Owing to an insuffi- cient patronage the store-keeper disposed of his stock of goods and the warehouse was likewise an unprofitable venture. Trains ceased to stop there and Keller's Station is now only a memory.
MONROE TOWNSHIP
This township is the largest in Madison county. It is six miles in width from north to south; the northern boundary is nine miles and the southern eight miles in length, and the area of the township is fifty- one square miles, or 32,640 acres. Pipe Creek flows a southwesterly course across the township, entering near the northeast corner and crossing the western boundary a little south of the center. The south- eastern portion is drained by Little Pipe and Killbuck creeks and the northwestern part by Mud and Lilly creeks. Along Pipe creek the sur- face is somewhat undulating, but the greater part of the township is generally level. The soil is fertile and some of the finest farms in the county are in Monroe township.
The first white settlers to locate in what is now Monroe township
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were George Marsh and Micajah Chamness, who in the spring of 1831 came from North Carolina and made the first land entries in that part of the county. Chamness entered the west half of the northwest quar- ter of section 19 and the east half of the northeast quarter of section 24, all of which now lies within the corporate limits of the city of Alex- andria. His cabin, erected on this tract, was the first habitation estab- lished by a white man within the present limits of the township. Sometime during the following year, James M. James entered a part of section 25, about a mile down the creek from the Chamness cabin. Morgan James settled on Little Pipe creek, a short distance south of Alexandria, and Annon James entered land near the mouth of Mud creek.
In 1833 William Chamness and James Tomlinson, the former from North Carolina and the latter from Clermont county, Ohio, both set- tled in the neighborhood and during the next two years a number of immgrants founded homes in the township. Among them were Jesse Vermillion, from Lawrence county, Ohio, Thornberry Moffit, from Rush county, Indiana, David L. Pickard, from Maine, Stephen and John Marsh, Peter Edwards and Stephen Fenimore. The descendants of some of these pioneers still reside in Madison county.
One agency that materially aided the settlement of this portion of the county was the opening of two public highways in 1830. One of these was the Indianapolis & Fort Wayne road and the other was the road from Fort Wayne to Shelbyville. These two roads, which form a junction near the northern line of the present township of Monroe, were the first opened through that section of the county. Over them were carried the early mails and they served as a stimulus to the white man to move in and occupy a district in which the Indian had, up to that time, been the only inhabitant. Compared with some of the im- proved highways. of the present day, they were poor affairs. At the present time the township is well supplied with good country roads, while the Big Four and Lake Erie & Western railroads and the lines of the Indiana Union Traction Company furnish unsurpassed transporta- tion facilities to all parts of the township.
By the close of the year 1835 the population was considered suffi- ciently large to justify the organization of a new township. A petition was accordingly prepared and circulated, and it was signed by prac- tically every voter residing within the territory it was proposed to include. At the January term of the commissioners' court in 1836 the following action was taken by the board :
"On petition filed, it is ordered that the following described terri- tory be stricken from Richland township, to wit: Commencing on the country line, where the township line dividing townships 20 and 21 north crosses the same; running thence north with the county line to the northeast corner of Madison county; thence west with the north line of said county to the northeast corner of Pipe Creek township; thence south with the east line of Pipe Creek township to the line dividing townships 20 and 21 north; thence east on said line to the place of beginning, and that said territory so stricken off be organized into a separate township to be known and designated by the name of Monroe Vol. I- 8
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township. All elections are ordered to be held at the residence of Micajah Chamness until otherwise ordered."
As established by this order, Monroe township included all of the present township of Van Buren and the eastern half of Boone township. The township was named in honor of James Monroe, the sixth presi- dent of the United States. The first election was held at the designated place in April, 1836, and David L. Pickard was elected justice of the peace. Mr. Pickard seems to have been one of the most prominent pioneers. Besides being the first justice of the peace in Monroe town- ship, he was the first postmaster at Alexandria when the office was established, and was the first hotel keeper in that town. His hotel was built in 1838, though previous to that time he had been accustomed to entertaining travelers at his residence.
About the time the township was organized, or soon afterward, the population was augmented by the arrival of John Banks, Evan Ellis, John Brunt, Elijah Williamson, John Cree, Joseph Hall, Jacob Price, John Chitwood, Lorenzo Carver, Hildria Lee, Baxter Davis and some others.
The first school was taught by John Brunt in 1837. Twelve pupils were enrolled in this school, but the exact location where it was taught is uncertain. David L. Pickard built the first regular school house in 1839. Richard Edwards was one of the pioneer teachers. In 1912 there were sixteen school districts in the township, outside of the city of Alexandria. Ten of these districts were provided with brick buildings and six houses were frame, the value of all being estimated at $33,400. During the school year of 1912-13 there were twenty-six teachers em- ployed in the township schools and the payroll for the year amounted to $7,852.
The first brick house in the township was built by Peter Edwards, who came in 1835 and settled on the land afterward known as the Abram Miller farm, where he erected a brick residence soon afterward. The first deaths were two members of the Hyatt family and the third was that of Micajah Chamness.
There is a rumor, but it is not well founded, that a small corn mill was built on Pipe creek, about a mile northeast of Alexandria, soon after the first settlers located in that vicinity. The first mill of which there is any authentic record was a saw and grist-mill built by James M. James on Pipe creek, about a mile west of Alexandria, in 1834. A few years later Henry Huff established a saw-mill about two miles farther up the creek. In the early days Pipe creek abounded in fish and old settlers have been heard to relate how they would fish at James' mill of nights, with the wolves howling in the woods around them.
Alexandria, located a little west of the center of the township, at the junction of the Big Four and Lake Erie & Western railroads, is the most important town. Orestes, formerly known as Lowry Station, is situated on the Lake Erie & Western, two and a half miles west of Alexandria. On the same line of railway, near the eastern boundary of the county, is the station of Gilman, and the old village of Osceola is situated in the northwest part, on section 4 of range 7. Osceola was laid out in 1855 and was named for the celebrated Seminole chief. At
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one time it promised to become a place of some importance. E. M. Trowbridge opened a general store there soon after the town was laid out and when the postoffice was established he was appointed the first postmaster. David Perry established the first blacksmith shop and Absalom Webb was the first shoemaker. A large steam saw-mill was built, but after the most valuable timber had been manufactured into lumber the mill was taken away. The loss of the mill, the building of railroads through other parts of the county, and the discontinuance of the postoffice, all had a tendency to check the growth and prosperity of Osceola, and about all that remains is the public school and a few residences.
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