Washington Township, Clinton County

How Washington Township, Clinton County began

Washington Township lies in the south-central part of Clinton County, just below Union Township, and is one of only two townships (with Union) that does not touch the county line. The county commissioners organized it in June 1835 from parts of Union, Clark and other townships, with Cuba as its voting place. The College Township road from Chillicothe, opened about 1803, carried emigrants through it, and settlers from Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee and Pennsylvania took up the Virginia Military District surveys along Cowan's Creek, Silver Creek and the East Fork of Todd's Fork from about 1803. Cuba, first called Paris, was laid out in 1813. Water for the township's residents comes largely from Wilmington's municipal system.

Incorporated 1835, by Clinton County Commissioners.

Where the name comes from

One of forty-three Washington Townships in Ohio, presumably honoring George Washington in the common pattern of the era; no township-specific naming account was found.

Before the town

No village, trail or burial site specific to Washington Township itself turned up in the sources checked. The township sits immediately south of Wilmington and Cowan Lake State Park, where the Cowan Creek Circular Enclosure — an eroded Adena-culture earthwork on a peninsula in the lake — is the nearest documented Native site, though the National Register's own location data places that enclosure in neighboring Vernon Township rather than Washington Township. Clinton County as a whole was Shawnee, Miami and Delaware (Lenape) hunting and travel country before the 1795 Treaty of Greeneville opened it to survey and settlement.

Nations recorded here: Shawnee, Miami, Lenape (Delaware), Adena culture.

• Cowan Creek Circular Enclosure (earthwork) — Cowan Lake State Park, southwest of Wilmington (NRHP location data places it in Vernon Township, adjoining Washington Township), Adena culture, mound built c. AD 500 (en.wikipedia.org)

Timeline

1. 1802-1803 — The Ohio legislature provides for a road from Chillicothe by way of Morgantown to College Township in Butler County; opened at once through the future Washington Township as the College Township road, it is the first road opened in southern Ohio and a great thoroughfare for emigrants.
2. c. 1803 — Isaac Wilson, from Virginia, settles in Col. Carrington's Survey, on the account of one old settler perhaps the first white resident; another account names James Wilson, living in a three-sided cabin with a log-heap for a fireplace.
3. 1805 — Jonas Seaman and a Mr. Armstrong settle at the Cross Roads, the future Cuba, and Armstrong opens the first house of public entertainment; Thomas Thatcher, who forded the Ohio at Wheeling with a four-horse wagon, buys land on Silver Creek and serves twenty-one years as justice of the peace.
4. 1806 — Peter Lieurance settles in Steel's Survey and holds Baptist worship at his house; Adon Clevenger opens the first blacksmith shop at the Cross Roads.
5. 1807-1810 — The four Brown brothers, David, Asa, Elisha and James, move from Owen County, Kentucky; Col. Samuel Martin, a veteran of the Whiskey Rebellion, settles Survey No. 996 but loses his land to a worthless title.
6. c. 1809-1810 — James Wilson builds a mill on Cowan's Creek near the Cuba and Wilmington pike, perhaps the first on the creek.
7. 1811 — William Biggs builds a large log house three-fourths of a mile west of Cuba and opens a house of entertainment, trading salt for bear meat with the Indians who came to the door.
8. 1813 — Jonas Seaman and James Archey lay out the village of Paris, now Cuba, with 100 lots, the first village in the township and perhaps the second in the county.
9. 1818-1819 — The first Baptist church of the township is organized at the Lieurance Graveyard, on a lot Peter Lieurance donated for a log church and cemetery.
10. 1835 — Washington Township was organized by the Clinton County Commissioners, reducing neighboring Clark Township to its present boundaries in the process.
11. c. 1835 — Elliott Raynes, a Reformer from Kentucky, holds a revival that divides the Baptist church and gives rise to the Christian Church, later the township's leading church.
12. 1838-1839 — The Methodists organize a church at Cuba and build a brick house in the south part of the village.
13. 1840 — Peter Lieurance sells his farm at age 81 and moves to Warren County, Illinois, where he lives to 104.
14. 1881 — Cuba has about 150 people and the township has seven schoolhouses, five of brick, with grade schools at Cuba and Morrisville.

Stories

Thomas Thatcher fords the Ohio

Thomas Thatcher, born in Frederick County, Virginia, in 1769, emigrated to the future Washington Township in 1805 with a four-horse wagon and the typical old Virginia wagon cover. At Wheeling the only way across the Ohio was a flat-boat on the opposite shore. Thatcher asked some boys whether the river could be forded; they carelessly said yes. He drove in with his wife and a child in the wagon and the bound boy David Fisher on the off horse. Before long the horses were swimming and the wagon floating, and the boy cried out in fear as the water rose around him. 'Hold fast to the hames, David,' Thatcher called, and with guidance from men on the Ohio side he swam his team across without loss. He had contracted with Col. Samuel Martin for a thousand acres, found the title worthless, and bought the land a second time; he lived thirty-five years on Silver Creek and was a justice of the peace for twenty-one, noted for reconciling neighbours rather than encouraging lawsuits. He died in 1867 at ninety-eight.

Edward Powers walks home from Detroit

Edward Powers, born in the north of Ireland, came to Ohio in 1805, bought land on Silver Creek from Col. Martin, and enlisted in the American army in 1812 while still a British subject. When General Hull surrendered Detroit, Powers was in danger of execution if discovered as a British subject, so he hid in the fortress among the army supplies until he could slip through the guard lines. By great caution and privation, the 1881 historian writes, he eluded the many hostile Indian camps blazing throughout the Northwest and made his way alone and on foot from Detroit to Silver Creek. His land title, like Thatcher's, turned out worthless; he demanded his money back from Martin, who gave him other land in Greene or Clark County, and Powers moved there.

Photographs

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

Mostly private wells The water here

• Wilmington City60% of residentsCaesar Creek Lake (with Burtonville reservoirs/Cowan Creek as backup)
• Western Water Company27% of residentsLittle Miami River valley wells (51%) plus Cincinnati Ohio River water (49%)
• Blanchester Village13% of residentsWhitacre Run, Stonelick Creek & West Fork East Fork Little Miami River reservoirs

Spills reported since 2021 (1)

Money issues on the ballot since 2022: 1 of 1 passed.

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, 2024 to 2025, released 2026-06-02
• Financial Audit, 2022 to 2023, released 2024-07-16

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