Fitchville Township, Huron County

How Fitchville Township, Huron County began

Fitchville Township's first settlers -- Peter Mead, Abraham Mead and Amos Reynolds -- arrived in the summer of 1817 and had to cut their own road in; Abraham Mead later relocated near the township's center and platted the small village of Clinton there. The township was organized in 1828, detached from Greenwich, and named for Colonel Fitch, a Connecticut-born landowner. Its Congregational church, founded in the summer of 1819 with just seven members, was organized unusually early for the county, and counted the noted Native American missionary Rev. Alvin Coe as its first pastor.

Settled summer 1817 (Peter Mead, Abraham Mead and Amos Reynolds, first settlers), platted Clinton village laid out in 1832 on lands of Abraham Mead, Joseph Washburne, Rundel Palmer, Dr. Ladd and Nathan Palmer, incorporated 1828 (organized, detached from Greenwich), by Peter Mead and Abraham Mead, of Carmel, Putnam County, New York (originally from Connecticut); Amos Reynolds, of Westchester County, New York.

Where the name comes from

Baughman's 1909 history says the township is 'supposed' to have received its name from a man named Fitch, a large landholder who lived in Connecticut; Wikipedia calls him 'Colonel Fitch'. Neither history gives a first name; Fitch heirs (Thomas, Ebenezer and Hannah) do appear among the original grantees of the township's land.

Before the town

No Native American village, trail, or site specific to Fitchville Township is documented in the sources consulted, but the township's Congregational church, organized in 1819, was led as its first pastor by Rev. Alvin Coe, described by the 1879 county historian as 'the celebrated Indian missionary' -- a figure with a fuller documented record in neighboring Greenfield Township's history.

Timeline

1. 1817 — Peter Mead, Abraham Mead and Amos Reynolds become the township's first settlers, cutting their own road in and planting corn before building log cabins on the township's east line.
2. 1818 — The Palmer family -- Rundel, Alvah, Seeley, Linus and later Samuel, and in all twenty-five people bearing the Palmer name -- arrives from Fairfield County, Connecticut.
3. 1819 — The township's Congregational church, its first, is organized in the summer with seven members -- an unusually early church founding for the county, just two years after settlement began -- under missionaries sent by the Connecticut missionary society; Rev. Alvin Coe, a noted missionary to Native Americans, becomes its first pastor.
4. 1822 — Dr. William M. Ladd settles in the spring at Abraham Mead's cabin as the township's first physician, with a practice extending over half a dozen townships; a Methodist class is also formed this year at Thomas B. White's house.
5. 1823 — Five-year-old Marcus Palmer, nephew of settler Rundel Palmer, becomes lost in a violent hail and sleet storm while following an older brother out shooting, and dies of exposure overnight despite a neighborhood search.
6. 1823 — Deborah, wife of Abraham Mead, dies on July 23, the first death in the township; her daughter Mary dies in November.
7. 1824 — Samuel Palmer teaches the first school in a log building south of the center, which also serves as the township's meeting-house for many years; the first Sunday school meets in 1825.
8. c. 1827 — Alvah Palmer is the first person buried in the cemetery laid out about 1826 on the Norwalk road, and Ludovicus Robbins builds the first framed house.
9. 1828 — Fitchville is detached from Greenwich Township and organized separately, with Rundel Palmer as first justice of the peace and Samuel Palmer as clerk; the village of Clinton, platted by Abraham Mead near the township center, has by this time been established for about a decade.
10. c. 1828 — The first post office in the township is established, with Rundel Palmer as postmaster, keeping it in his house; before that the settlers got their mail from Norwalk.
11. 1830 — Union White opens the first store in a small building; he and J. C. Curtiss later run it as White and Curtiss. The township's first church building, a small Congregational church, is raised north of the later village.
12. 1832 — Clinton village is laid out on the lands of Abraham Mead, Joseph Washburne, Rundel Palmer, Dr. Ladd and Nathan Palmer, and is incorporated a few years later with Rundel Palmer as first mayor.
13. 1833 — Hiram A. Curtiss builds the Clinton House, the first tavern in the township, a two-story frame building; Union and Daniel White build the Mansion House about 1837-38.
14. 1838 — A Baptist church is received into fellowship by council on August 16, with Elder F. P. Hall as first pastor and Hiram Barnum first deacon; its church is built in 1843 or 1844.
15. 1852 — The North Congregational church is organized with eleven members near the township's northeast corner, and its building is raised in 1856 for about $900.

Stories

The hanging that might have been a murder

Around 1829 or 1830, word spread through Fitchville of an intimacy between a man named Towne, who lived just over the line in New London Township, and the wife of a settler named Morris. One morning a young girl driving cows past the Morris place looked through a window and saw a man's body hanging from the ceiling; she ran for help, and neighbors found Morris dead and cold, his wife at Towne's house. The community buried him as a suicide -- until, sometime later, his body was exhumed and physicians concluded death had come from suffocation, not strangulation, suggesting Towne had smothered Morris and staged the hanging afterward. Towne was arrested, tried and convicted, won a new trial on a legal technicality, and vanished from the county for good; Mrs. Morris disappeared as well. The case was talked over in Fitchville and its neighboring townships for years, and, the county historian noted, 'there were very few... who did not feel sure that Morris was murdered.'

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

New London's upground reservoir, filled by pumping from Buck Creek, just outside the Village of New London The water here

• New London Village60% of residentsBuck Creek, impounded in New London's upground reservoir
• Rural Lorain Co. Water A20% of residentsMostly Lake Erie (bought from Avon Lake); some New London Reservoir and Ashland wells
• Greenwich Village13% of residentsGroundwater wells (6 wells)
• North Fairfield Village5% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Northern Ohio Rural Water - SE District1% of residentsLake Erie

Spills reported since 2021 (2)

Ballot issues

Elections for office

Winners in bold. Results from the county board of elections' official canvass unless marked.

Auditor of State record

• No fiscal caution, watch or emergency on the Auditor of State's lists.
• Agreed Upon Procedures, 2023 to 2024, released 2025-05-08

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