Holmesville

• Emma P. CarrPerson · 1880-1972
• William M. McCullochPerson · 1901-1980

How Holmesville began

Holmesville was platted in 1836 and named for its place within Holmes County. The site had earlier significance for frontier defense: in 1812, during the War of 1812, settlers built a block-house on the Dawson land half a mile east of the later village site, out of fear of Indian attack. The Croco House, an 1873 Italianate farmhouse associated with the village's zip code, is remembered locally as an Underground Railroad waystation, with the Keifer Croco farm and the neighboring John Croco farm both said to have sheltered freedom seekers moving north before the Civil War.

Settled 1812 (block-house on the Dawson land), platted 1836.

Where the name comes from

Named for its location within Holmes County.

Before the town

The strongest recorded Native connection is a small one from the first white settlement in 1809. Henry Howe's 1888 county sketch tells that the first settler, Jonathan Grant of Beaver County, Pennsylvania, fell ill in his cabin on Salt Creek in Prairie Township, where Holmesville lies, and lay for twenty-eight days, attended only by his boy. A Native man passing along the valley found the cabin and told Grant that a white man and his family were camped in the Killbuck valley at a big spring, and the boy went and fetched Jonathan Butler, whose help saved Grant; Howe adds that Grant could speak the Indian language and had been a surveyors' lookout. The same big spring was the camp of William Crawford's army in 1782 (Howe says 1781), and Howe says settlers feared Indians enough in 1812 to build a block-house half a mile east of Holmesville that was soon given up. No Native village or earthwork at Holmesville itself is documented.

Timeline

1. 1782 — Col. William Crawford's army camps on May 30 at a big spring near the Killbuck; a soldier dies and is buried there (Howe dates the camp to 1781).
2. 1809 — In July Jonathan Grant of Beaver County, Pennsylvania, builds the first cabin in the county on Salt Creek in Prairie Township, and in the fall Jonathan Butler and his family settle at the big spring.
3. 1810 — Hannah Butler, born at the spring in 1810 (April 4 on the marker; February 4 in Howe), is the first white child born in the county.
4. 1812 — Settlers build a block-house on the Dawson land, half a mile east of the future village, fearing Indian trouble during the War of 1812.
5. 1836 — Holmesville is platted.
6. 1873 — The Croco House is built in the Italianate style.
7. 1880 — The census counts 344 residents.
8. 1888 — Henry Howe records Holmesville as lying six miles north of Millersburg on the Cleveland, Akron and Columbus Railroad.
9. 1901 — William M. McCulloch is born near Holmesville on November 24; he becomes a Republican congressman and a chief architect of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
10. 1920 — The census counts 359 residents.
11. 1950 — The census counts 392 residents.
12. 1980 — The census counts 436 residents, the highest on record.
13. 1985 — The Croco House is added to the National Register of Historic Places, June 20.
14. 2018 — The Ohio History Connection erects marker 4-38 in Holmesville for William M. McCulloch.
15. 2020 — The census counts 371 residents.

Stories

A farmhouse on the Underground Railroad

The Croco House, built in 1873 in the Italianate style, is remembered in local history less for its architecture than for what came before it: the Keifer Croco farm on the site, together with the neighboring John Croco farm, is said to have served as a waystation and hiding place for enslaved people moving north along the Underground Railroad in the years before the Civil War. The house itself postdates that era by less than a decade, built on ground its family had already made part of a much older story of concealment and passage.

The sick man, the boy and the big spring

In July 1809 Jonathan Grant of Beaver County, Pennsylvania, and his young son walked into the Killbuck country with a gun and tools and built the first cabin in what became Holmes County, on Salt Creek about a mile east of the Killbuck. They cleared a patch and sowed turnips. Then Grant fell sick, and for twenty-eight days he lay on a bed of bark and leaves living on roots, looked after only by the boy, until both were close to starvation. A Native man passing along the valley found the cabin and told Grant that a white man and his family were camped at a big spring in the valley and pointed the way. The boy went, and came back with Jonathan Butler, who had reached the valley the day before with his father-in-law, James Morgan. Butler's help brought Grant round, and the turnips, which grew abundantly, fed the new neighbours that fall and the following spring. The spring where Butler settled is also where Crawford's army had buried a soldier, and where Butler's daughter Hannah was born in 1810, the first white child born in the county.

Photographs

Local history sources: en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · archive.org · en.wikipedia.org · commons.wikimedia.org · archive.org · hmdb.org · hmdb.org

No water-system data is linked to Holmesville's ZIP codes yet.

Fire and EMS stations (1)

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 2025-11-25

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