Washington Township, Brown County

How Washington Township, Brown County began

Washington Township was organized December 2, 1822, with boundaries later reduced by the 1828 formation of Scott Township. The Wardlaw family, who emigrated from Kentucky in the spring of 1800 and settled along White Oak Creek, are credited with the township's first permanent settlement. It holds the village of Sardinia, where early settler John Moore, an Abolitionist and Presbyterian elder, taught school from 1815 to 1834 and, by one account, "molded the character of the community." The Pettijohn family, among the area's earliest settlers, were noted Abolitionists whose descendants produced twelve physicians.

Settled 1800 (Wardlaw family), incorporated 1822-12-02, by Brown County (boundaries later reduced by the 1828 formation of Scott Township).

Where the name comes from

The reason for the township's name is not recorded.

Before the town

No Native American village, mound or trail specific to Washington Township is recorded, though Slab Camp Creek is said, by tradition, to be named for an Indian camp once pitched along its banks, whose remains were still traceable to the pioneer settlers. The township lies within the 1795 Treaty of Greenville cession and the Virginia Military District.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee, Miami.

• Slab Camp Indian camp (camp) — Along Slab Camp Creek, Washington Township, unspecified (archive.org)

Timeline

1. 1800 — Robert Wardlaw, his wife Martha Downey, and their grown children emigrate from Kentucky and settle along White Oak Creek, the township's first permanent settlement.
2. 1805 — Joseph Calvin, one of the township's early pioneers, marries Jane Wardlaw on June 1 and settles on White Oak just above the Wardlaw settlement.
3. 1809-11-28 — A deed for land in Survey 3,389 is made to Amos Pettijohn, among the five Pettijohn families -- noted Abolitionists whose descendants would produce twelve physicians -- who were early settlers near Sardinia.
4. 1812-09-18 — Thomas Pettijohn and John Moore are ordained Ruling Elders of White Oak Congregation, the Presbyterian church that became Sardinia Presbyterian Church, one of the township's earliest religious institutions.
5. 1812 — About 1812 or 1813 John Wardlow builds the township's first mill on White Oak Creek; it is sold to Levi Estel and, said never to have been of much force, does not stand many years.
6. 1812-08-04 — William Wardlaw, a member of Capt. Jacob Boerstler's company, is killed at the battle of Brownstown in the War of 1812.
7. 1815-1816 — John Moore begins teaching in what became known as the Moore Schoolhouse, near the present site of Sardinia, continuing there until 1834.
8. 1822-12-02 — Washington Township is organized with detailed boundaries running from the Highland County line south to Eagle and Byrd, then west along Eagle, Pleasant and Clark.
9. 1828-12-01 — Scott Township is formed in part from Washington Township's original territory.
10. 1829 — John Kibler, who built a mill on the East Branch of White Oak in the extreme northeast and laid out a town there, dies; the 1883 history says the town might otherwise have become the Sardinia of its day.
11. 1831 — John B. Mahan and John Dunham build a sawmill at the mouth of Slab Camp Creek, to which a gristmill is added; its dam washes out within a few years.
12. 1848-08-26 — Rolly Dunn lays out Brownstown on Brown's Run with 21 lots; its post office opens June 5, 1876, with J. G. Tracy as postmaster.
13. 1856-05-17 — A tornado cuts a path 15 to 20 rods wide across the township, wrecking Ira Tracey's barn and orchard on the farm of J. H. Dunn and Benjamin and James Wardlow's orchards; Tracey's loss is put at $500 to $600.
14. 1881 — Messrs. E. A. and B. A. Thompson build a steam sawmill at Brownstown in September and add a gristmill; the Kibler mill's dam is washed out the winter of 1881-82.
15. 1882 — Washington is the best served township in the county for railroads, with the Cincinnati & Eastern crossing its north, the Hillsboro & Sardinia ending at Sardinia, and the Georgetown & Sardinia under construction.
16. 2020 — The census counts 2,262 people in Washington Township.

Stories

John Moore, who molded a community

John Moore, born near Elizabethtown, New Jersey in 1779 to Quaker parents, left home at sixteen to teach school in western Virginia before settling near Sardinia after 1805. He farmed in summer and taught school in winter for years, finally teaching continuously at the Moore Schoolhouse near Sardinia from 1815 to 1834. An Elder in the Presbyterian Church from 1812 and later a founder of Sardinia's Congregational Church in 1851, Moore was an outspoken Abolitionist and later a Republican. His obituary, written at his death in 1857, called him "exact in his intercourse with his fellow-men, honest in all the transactions of life"; a venerable Sardinia citizen told the 1883 county history's author that John Moore had "molded the character of the community in which he lived."

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

Mostly private wells The water here

• Waynoka Regional Water and Sewer Dist47% of residentsLake Waynoka / Sycamore Run reservoirs
• Sardinia Village43% of residentsOhio River Valley Aquifer (wells)
• Georgetown Village9% of residentsOhio River Valley Aquifer (wells)
• Tate-monroe Water Association0% of residentsOhio River valley aquifer (collector/vertical wells)

Public schools (1)

Spills reported since 2021 (3)

Who holds office

Roster as of 2026-09-18: county board of elections.

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, 2024 to 2025, released 2026-05-26
• Basic Audit, 2022 to 2023, released 2024-07-25

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