kimerajamm
Joined: 28 Nov 2010 Posts: 785
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Posted: Thu Feb 24, 2011 4:12 am Post subject: The first county |
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In the centuries before the arrival of European settlers, the area that became Warren County was on the boundary between the Miami and Kickapoo tribes. By the late 18th century, many Miami had moved further south; most of Indiana north of the Wabash was then occupied by the Potawatomi people.[12] The first non-indigenous settler in the area was probably Zachariah Cicott, a French-Canadian who first traded with the Kickapoo and Potawatomi people around 1802.[13] Cicott served as a scout for General William Henry Harrison, who took an army from Vincennes to the Battle of Tippecanoe in late 1811; the trail taken by Harrison's army passed through the area that later became Warren County on its way to and from the battle site in Tippecanoe County.[14] Following the War of 1812, Cicott resumed his trading on the Wabash; the state of Indiana was established in 1816, and Cicott built a log house in 1817 at the location where he later founded the town of Independence.[15] Other settlers came to the area, but probably not until around 1822.[16]
The county was established on March 1, 1827, by the Indiana General Assembly. It was named for Dr. Joseph Warren, who was killed in 1775 at the Battle of Bunker Hill,[17] in which he fought as a private because his commission as a general had not yet taken effect. The short-lived town of Warrenton was the original Warren County seat, chosen by commissioners in March 1828; the next year an act was passed calling for the seat to be relocated, and in June 1829 it was moved to Williamsport.[18]
The first county courthouse was a log house in Warrenton that belonged to (and was occupied by) Enoch Farmer, one of the county's earliest settlers. When the county seat moved to Williamsport, a log house belonging to the town's founder, William Harrison, served this purpose for several years. The first purpose-built courthouse was completed in 1835 at a cost of $2,000;[n 1] in 1872, it was replaced with a new building that cost $48,000.[n 2] The third courthouse was built in 1886, in a new section of town that grew around the newly constructed railroad. That building burned in 1907, and the fourth and current Warren County courthouse was completed on the same site in 1908 at a cost of $115,000.tv with pc
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