Union Township, Madison County

How Union Township, Madison County began

Union Township, in west-central Madison County, was first settled around 1802-1804 by William Blair and James LaBarr along Glade Run, with German blacksmith John Deeds, Virginian John McDonald, and the Melvin family following within a few years. Its rich black-loam soil supported grazing and grain from the start, and its early industry ran on the township's streams: a tannery about 1811, a grist-mill and distillery on Oak Run about 1829, and a carding mill and sawmill about 1840. Most of the city of London, the county seat, sits in the township's northern end, and the township's water history is largely London's own. West Jefferson village's early story (New Hampton, 1822; platted by Isaac Jones, established 1834) lies just northeast in neighboring Jefferson Township but is closely tied to this part of the county through the shared National Road corridor.

Settled 1802-1804, by William Blair and James LaBarr, first settlers on Glade Run.

Where the name comes from

No source found gives a specific reason for the name Union Township; it is one of twenty-seven townships of that name in Ohio, a common name choice among Ohio's early civil townships.

Before the town

No mound, earthwork, treaty line, or named Native village has been found specifically inside Union Township's bounds. The 1915 county history records one direct encounter: a Native hunter known to settlers as 'Captain John' visited the township's early families and was later reported killed in a confrontation with a deer. At county scale, Madison County lay within Mingo, Shawnee, and Wyandot hunting and travel country before the 1795 Treaty of Greenville; Jonathan Alder, the county's first Euro-American settler, had been captured by Shawnee in Virginia in 1782 and adopted by Mingo chief Succohanos, and after 1795 he settled on Big Darby Creek in Canaan Township, a few townships away.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee, Mingo (Seneca-Cayuga), Wyandot.

• Captain John (visits to early settlers) (encounter) — Union Township, Madison County, early 1800s (ohiogenealogyexpress.com)

Timeline

1. 1802-1804 — William Blair and James LaBarr become the township's first permanent settlers, locating on Glade Run; Blair was a preacher, LaBarr a miller who later moved to the Darby settlements.
2. 1803-1805 — John Deeds, a German-born blacksmith, settles in the township.
3. 1807 — John McDonald, a Virginia native, arrives.
4. 1808 — The Lower Glade burial ground, one of the township's earliest cemeteries, is established.
5. 1811 — David Gorves erects the first tannery in Madison County within the township.
6. 1811 — Patrick McLene lays out London, the county seat, mostly within the township's northern end.
7. 1829 — James Garrard builds a grist-mill and small distillery on Oak Run.
8. 1834 — West Jefferson village, just northeast of the township, is formally established, platted by Isaac Jones on the National Road.
9. c. 1840 — Henry Inn builds a carding mill with an attached sawmill on Oak Run.

Stories

Captain John and the deer

Among the handful of direct encounters between Union Township's earliest white families and Native people that survive in the local record is the story of a hunter known to settlers as Captain John. He was a familiar visitor to the pioneer households scattered along Glade Run and Oak Run in the years after 1802, at a time when the Greenville Treaty line had only recently opened the area to settlement and Native hunting parties still passed through on established routes. County tradition holds that Captain John was later killed in a struggle with a deer he had wounded, a story repeated in the 1915 county history as one of the few named Native individuals connected to this particular township rather than the county at large. No fuller documentation of his identity or nation has been found.

A tannery, a mill, and a township built on its streams

Union Township's earliest industry ran directly on its small streams. About 1811, David Gorves built what is remembered as the first tannery in Madison County, turning hides from the township's grazing herds into leather without shipping them elsewhere. Roughly two decades later, James Garrard added a grist-mill and a small distillery on Oak Run, letting farmers grind their own grain and put surplus corn to use close to home. By about 1840 Henry Inn had added a carding mill and sawmill on the same creek, carding wool for homespun cloth and cutting the timber being cleared from new farms. Each business marked a small step from subsistence toward a cash economy, all built on the same short stretch of Oak Run.

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

Local glacial sand-and-gravel wells (Madison County) The water here

• Mid-ohio WSD - Chrisman Avenue WTP85% of residentsLocal glacial sand-and-gravel wells (Madison County)
• Choctaw Utilities, Inc.14% of residentsGroundwater wells (3 wells)
• Green Meadows Mobile Home Park1% of residentsGroundwater wells (2 wells)

Public schools (1)

Bridges rated poor (2)

Spills reported since 2021 (5)

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.
• Basic Audit, 2023 to 2024, released 2025-08-19

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