Madison Township, Clark County

How Madison Township, Clark County began

Madison Township sits in the southeastern corner of Clark County and was carved out, along with the rest of the county, in 1818; for its first year or two it was called Vance Township before being renamed Madison Township for Madison County, the county it had belonged to before Clark County existed. It has always been a farming township: its one incorporated place, South Charleston, is treated as its own unit, and the township's own center of gravity is the unincorporated crossroads village of Selma, platted in 1842 along the Xenia and Columbus Pike and, before that, a station on the Underground Railroad. The Green Plain Monthly Meetinghouse, built by Quakers southwest of South Charleston in 1843, is the township's other landmark on the National Register. Outside Selma and the meetinghouse, the record is thin: this is a township of farms, and that is what the sources show.

Settled by 1807 (earliest documented settler arrivals in the area), incorporated organized as part of Clark County in 1818, first as Vance Township, renamed Madison Township about two years later, by Clark County commissioners, on territory previously part of Madison County.

Where the name comes from

The township was first organized as Vance Township when Clark County was formed in 1818 (the county's 1881 history thought the name likely came from a Vance family among the earliest and most prominent settlers; David Vance, a Kentucky-born settler who arrived in 1808-09, was a cousin of Ohio Governor Joseph Vance). Within about two years it was renamed Madison Township, for Madison County, Ohio, since this land had been part of Madison County before Clark County was organized.

Before the town

No Native American village, trail, mound, or documented encounter specific to Madison Township's own ground was found in the sources checked, including the 1881 county history's township chapter, which opens its account with the arrival of the first Euro-American settlers around 1807-1808 and says nothing about earlier occupants. The relevant record is at the county level: the Shawnee capital town of Piqua (recorded as Peckuwe by some sources), home to roughly 3,000 people, stood on the Mad River in Bethel Township, on the opposite side of Clark County from Madison Township, until George Rogers Clark's Kentucky militia destroyed it on August 8, 1780, in the largest Revolutionary War battle fought west of the Alleghenies. The land now making up Madison Township, like the rest of Clark County, was ceded by the Shawnee, Lenape, Wyandot, and other nations in the Treaty of Greenville in 1795, opening it to the survey and settlement described in the founding record above. This is general county background; readers should not take it as evidence of a Shawnee town or camp within Madison Township itself.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee.

• Piqua (Peckuwe), Shawnee town (battle) — Mad River, Bethel Township, Clark County (not within Madison Township), occupied until destroyed August 8, 1780 (en.wikipedia.org)

Timeline

1. by 1807 — George Buffenberger, a Virginia native, settles on the headwaters of the Little Miami River in what becomes the township, among its earliest documented settlers.
2. 1808-1809 — David Vance, a Kentucky native and cousin of future Ohio Governor Joseph Vance, settles in the township; it is organized as Vance Township when Clark County is formed.
3. 1818 — Clark County is organized from parts of Madison, Champaign, and Greene counties; the township, initially called Vance Township, is renamed Madison Township within about two years for the county it had belonged to.
4. 1822 — The Green Plain Monthly Meeting of Friends (Quakers) is established in the township, southwest of South Charleston.
5. 1841 — A post office is established at Selma, a crossroads community in the township; it operates until 1967.
6. 1842 — Selma is platted where the Xenia and Columbus Pike passes through the township.
7. 1843 — The Hicksite Quakers split over slavery; the conservative faction builds the brick Greek Revival meetinghouse that still stands on Clifton Road in the township.
8. mid-1800s — Selma operates as a station on the Underground Railroad, with local agents including Thomas Borton, William Thorne, Isaac Newcomb, Daniel Wilson, Joseph A. Dugdale, Richard Wright, and Pressly Thomas named in the county history.
9. 1870 — An African Methodist Episcopal congregation is organized at Selma.
10. 1875 — The Selma A.M.E. congregation builds its frame church building.
11. 1982-04-01 — The Green Plain Monthly Meetinghouse is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
12. 2020 — The census records 2,532 people living in the township, of whom 1,706 live within the incorporated village of South Charleston, leaving roughly 826 in the township's unincorporated area.

Stories

From Vance to Madison

Before it was Madison Township, it was Vance Township, a name the 1881 county history thought likely came from one of its early settler families; David Vance, who had come up from Kentucky around 1808-1809, was a cousin of Joseph Vance, who would go on to serve as Ohio's governor. The Vance Township name held for only about two years. It was then renamed Madison Township, for Madison County, to which this stretch of land had belonged before Clark County was carved out of Madison, Champaign, and Greene Counties; the records do not say exactly when or why the change was made. It is a small piece of bureaucratic housekeeping, but it is also a reminder that the township's boundary lines were drawn and redrawn more than once before they settled into their present shape.

Selma's Underground Railroad line

Selma, the township's unincorporated crossroads community, was platted only in 1842, after the Xenia and Columbus Pike reached that far, but its Quaker and antislavery roots ran deeper. The 1881 county history names a working list of local Underground Railroad agents tied to Selma: Thomas Borton, William Thorne, Isaac Newcomb, Daniel Wilson, Joseph A. Dugdale, Richard Wright, and Pressly Thomas. That the same neighborhood produced the Hicksite Quakers who split from the Green Plain meeting in 1843 specifically over slavery is not a coincidence; the meetinghouse and the Underground Railroad network around Selma were part of the same antislavery current running through this corner of Clark County in the decades before the Civil War.

Local history sources: en.wikipedia.org · ohiogenealogyexpress.com · en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org · en.wikipedia.org

Every historic place in Clark County on the full map

Mostly private wells The water here

• South Charleston Village84% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• Harmony Estates Mobile Home Park10% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)
• South Solon Village7% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)

Facilities reporting toxic releases (1)

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.
• Financial Audit, 2024 to 2025, released 2026-07-14
• Agreed Upon Procedures, 2022 to 2023, released 2024-11-12

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