Hutsonville Township

Hutsonville Township

This township, one of the most productive farming divisions of Crawford County, lies along. its eastern boundary of the county, with Clark County on the north, Lamotte and Robinson Townships on the south, the Wabash. River on the east, and Licking Township to the west. The Wabash furnishes its drainage, mainly through Raccoon and Hutson Creeks, and a portion of its area is liable to periodical overflows. Back from the Wabash the surface is somewhat undulating, varied by stretches of open prairie and patches of timber. Black walnut, oak, sugar maple, white walnut, elm, cottonwood, sycamore, buckeye, hackberry, pecan, hickory, etc., constituted the original timber growth. Its industries are mostly agricultural, and some of the farms are quite extensive, the only detriment to profitable soil-tilling being from the hazard of inundation in the depressed areas within its borders. The first white settlers in what is now Hutsonville Township, of which there is any reliable record, were the members of the Hutson family, all of whom, except its head, were massacred by the Indians during the War of 1812. The mother and four children fell victims to a savage onslaught on their log cabin outside of the fort. during the absence of the father, who was afterwards killed in a skirmish with another band of redskins. Hutson had refused to remove his family to the stockade where most of the pioneers had taken refuge.

The Eaton and Barlow families were conspicuous in the pioneer days of this township, John Eaton having been one of the inmates of the fort. The Barlow brothers, John W., Joel and Jesse, came from Kentucky in 1816, the first named locating on the spot where the Hutson family was killed. The Indians had burned the Hutson eabin, but had left the stable standing, which furnished shelter for the Barlows and was the birthplace of one of their children, Henry M., the first white child born in the township. With the Barlows came John Neeley and Joseph Bogard, and in 1818 followed Charles and John Newlin, John Hill and the Sackrider family - Sackrider having been a captain in the War of 1812, and one of Commodore Perry's command on Lake Erie. Eli Hand, Thomas

Lindley, Malin Voorhees and Aaron Bell were among the notable arrivals between 1818 and 1821, the first two coming from New Jersey and the last from Virginia, making the journey in a three-horse wagon. In 1826 came Nathan Musgrave, a North Carolina Quaker, together with Mrs. Zylpha Cox, a widow, and her son William, John R. Hurst, Benjamin Dunn, A. B. Raines, Joseph Green and James Boswell. William, Cox was the first man to open a store in Hutsonvile. John R. Hurst and his faithful wife continued to live until sometime in the '80s. The Gyers, a Quaker family from North Carolina, settled near what is now Hutsonville about the year 1826, the father. Aaron Gyer, dying in 1840, and another early settler was Bryant Cox, who arrived from the same State on June 1, 1881. All were men of sturdy habits and resolute character, anl lived arduous lives, confronting the perils of the wilderness, which abounded in wild beasts, clearing spaces for habitations and tillage and, in course of time, the children recited their lessons to the subscription teacher.