Clayton Township, Perry County

How Clayton Township, Perry County began

Clayton Township, in north-central Perry County, was organized about 1810 as a township of Muskingum County and was named for one of its early settlers; the Claytons appear among its first families, and four of its original thirty-six sections went to Harrison Township soon after Perry County was formed in 1817. Settlement began about 1806 or 1807, mostly by families from Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia, and the township has never held an incorporated village. Its one notable place is Rehoboth, platted in 1815 by John and Eli Gardner with a public square and courthouse lot in anticipation of a county that did not yet exist; Rehoboth lost the county-seat contest to Somerset, then prospered from 1830 to 1842 as the center of the county's tobacco trade. The township is also home to Unity Presbyterian Church, organized in a log schoolhouse in 1816 and called the mother of the county's Presbyterian churches, and to the crossroads village of Saltillo, laid out in 1849.

Settled about 1806 or 1807, platted 1815 (Rehoboth, by John and Eli Gardner), incorporated about 1810 (township organized under Muskingum County), by John and Eli Gardner (Rehoboth).

Where the name comes from

Both county histories say the township was named in honor of one of its early settlers; the 1883 history lists the Claytons among the first settlers, including Joseph, William and John Clayton on record about 1817, but neither history names which Clayton. Howe (1891) lists John and Anthony Clayton among the county's early settlers. Rehoboth, its one notable community, takes a biblical place name (Genesis 26:22, a well Isaac dug after finally finding room to settle without dispute); no source found confirms this was the founders' intent, so it is given here as context, not as a sourced fact about the township.

Before the town

No source found records a Native village, trail, or named site specifically within Clayton Township. The 1902 county history's inventory credits the township with four earth mounds, without locations, and notes a saltlick at the 'Lick School House' in Clayton. The 1883 history records that during the War of 1812, while Judge James Wilson was away at Zanesville, an alarm spread that Indians were crossing the country killing settlers; many families fled, and Martha Wilson barricaded her cabin and stood guard with a gun all night, but no one came.

• Clayton Township mounds (mound) — Clayton Township, Perry County (four earth mounds; locations not given), pre-contact (unspecified) (archive.org)

Timeline

1. 1806 — Robert Pherson settles in Clayton Township, probably one of the first permanent settlements.
2. 1810 — Clayton is organized as a political township of Muskingum County about this year.
3. 1811 — Martha Wilson, wife of Judge James Wilson, arrives in the neighborhood where she will live until her death in 1880 at ninety-four.
4. 1812 — George Gardner organizes the Rehoboth Methodist class in 1812 or 1813, one of the oldest in the county; a log church follows about 1818 and a brick one about 1832.
5. 1814 — Rev. James Culbertson of Zanesville preaches his farewell sermon to the settlement in Isaac Sellers' barn.
6. 1815 — John and Eli Gardner plat Rehoboth in what becomes southern Clayton Township, laying out a public square and courthouse lot in expectation of a new county.
7. 1816 — On September 2, Rev. Mr. Wright of Lancaster organizes fourteen people in a log schoolhouse into a church they name Unity, 'because we are all of one mind'; Rev. Thomas Moore becomes pastor the same month.
8. 1817 — Perry County is formally organized; Rehoboth competes against Somerset in the election for county seat and loses.
9. 1826 — Unity congregation builds a log church thirty-five by twenty-seven feet; women spin and sell cloth to buy the window glass.
10. 1849 — F. Bradshaw lays out Saltillo on Buckeye Creek at the site of a long-standing tavern; its post office is named Buckeye Cottage. A Methodist church is built there the same year.
11. 1875 — Unity dedicates a new Gothic church, thirty by forty-five feet with a seventy-five-foot spire, costing $2,400.
12. 19th century — With county-seat hopes gone, Rehoboth turns to agriculture and becomes the center of Perry County's tobacco farming economy.
13. 1880 — Clayton Township has 1,164 people; Rehoboth has 162 and Saltillo 80.

Stories

The town platted for a courthouse that never came

Two years before Perry County existed, brothers John and Eli Gardner platted a town on high ground in what is now southern Clayton Township and named it Rehoboth. They laid it out the way a county seat is laid out, with a public square at the center and a lot set aside for a courthouse, betting that when the new county was formed its government would naturally land in their town. It was a reasonable bet: Rehoboth sat well-positioned along the routes settlers were already using. But when Perry County was organized in 1817, the seat went to Somerset instead, and decades later moved again to New Lexington. Rehoboth never got its courthouse. Its farmers turned instead to tobacco, and the little crossroads became the center of Perry County's tobacco-growing economy through much of the nineteenth century. It survives today as an unincorporated community on State Route 345, using New Lexington's mail service and ZIP code.

Martha Wilson's night on guard

Martha Wilson, born in Allegany County, Maryland, in 1786, came to Clayton Township in 1811 with her husband, Judge James Wilson, when neighbors were few and bears, wolves and panthers were often seen. During the War of 1812, while her husband was away at Zanesville, word spread that Indians were crossing the country and killing settlers, and many families loaded their wagons and fled. With three children and no way to leave, she barricaded the cabin door with timbers, loaded her gun, and stood with it in hand and the family dog at her side until dawn; no one came. Another time wolves attacked her only sheep, and she drove them off with a torch. The Methodists held camp meetings for years in a grove on the Wilson farm, and Wesley Chapel was later built near the camp ground. She died in March 1880, the last of the township's pioneer women.

Dr. Poujade's mill that became a church

Dr. Poujade, a Frenchman, built a large frame building near the south end of Rehoboth meant to be a grist mill, driven by an endless pump of his own invention. When the machine would not work, he sold the building to the Catholics, who had been worshipping in a log church in the eastern part of the township near the Zanesville road. Converted into a church about 1832 or 1833, it served a large congregation for some twenty years, drawing families from the neighborhoods later served by churches at New Lexington, McLuney and South Fork. The building was eventually moved to a back lot to make way for a brick church that was never built, and the congregation built at McLuney, just over the line in Harrison Township, instead. Poujade's name also survived on a coal mine near the township's southern border, one of the first regularly worked mines in the county.

Local history sources: en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org · archive.org

New Lexington Reservoir(s) (Old & New Reservoir) The water here

• New Lexington70% of residentsNew Lexington Reservoir(s) (Old & New Reservoir)
• Somerset Village Of19% of residentsSomerset Reservoir + Lake St. Joseph
• Roseville6% of residentsMuskingum River buried valley aquifer (wells near Duncan Falls)
• Southern Perry Co-mainesville2% of residentsHocking River Buried Valley Aquifer (wells)
• Maysville Regional Water1% of residentsMuskingum River buried valley aquifer (wells near Duncan Falls)
• Northern Perry Co.water #21% of residentsHocking River Buried Valley Aquifer (wells)
• Muskingum County Water - Se0% of residentsMuskingum River buried valley aquifer (wells near Duncan Falls)
• Crooksville0% of residentsHocking River Buried Valley Aquifer (wells)

High-hazard dams (2)

Bridges rated poor (1)

Facilities reporting toxic releases (1)

Spills reported since 2021 (3)

Auditor of State record

• No fiscal caution, watch or emergency on the Auditor of State's lists.
• Agreed Upon Procedures, 2023 to 2024, released 2025-05-27

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