to pay a road tax. By a law of 1804 every male person over
18 years of age and under 50 years of age was liable yearly
and every year to do three days work on the public roads. The
trustees of Salisbury township levied a tax to be worked out
at sixty-two and one-half cents a day.
Rutland township was organized in 1812, being formed out
of territory embraced by Salisbury township, Gallia county,
and consisted of Township 6, Range 14, of the Ohio Company s
purchase. This Township 6 was divided by the original land
company into thirty-six square miles, or sections of 640 acres
each, commencing to number them at the southeast corner,
running north. Three sections were secured to Congress,
namely: Nos. 8, 11, and 26. For ministerial purposes No. 29,
and for school purposes No. 16, making in all five sections.
Nine sections near the center of the township were cut up
into fractions of 262 acres each, as follows: Nos. 9, 10, 14, 15,
20, 21, 22, 27, 28. leaving twenty-two whole sections and
twenty-two fractions for the company. The fractions in Rut-
land township are numbered so as to correspond with the
sections belonging to the company, Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 12,
13, 17, 18, 19, 23, 24, 25, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36. Six sections
were added after the formation of Meigs county, April lst,
1819, and are an important addition to Rutland township.
Among the pioneers who settled on this tier of sections were
Joel Higley, Jr., James E. Phelp, Daniel Rathburn, and Benjamin
Williams, all from Granby, Connecticut, in 1803.
In looking back to the days when Salisbury township ex-
tended from Kerr's run westward to Ross county, we have
introduced a list of some supervisors of roads, and after giving
names, dates and returns, find it interesting to describe the
boundaries of one or two road districts, viz, of Daniel Rathburn,
Second district, ordered to do work, beginning at
Widow Case's, down to the Butternut rock, when he thought
most proper, this being highway tax for the year 1806:
