Muskingum Township

Around 1816, West Zanesville was divided between the existing Falls Township and a new township called Muskingum. It's possible that the new township was named for a large Wyandot village known as "Machkigen," a word referring to a thorn bush that grew in the area.  Machkigen (called Muskingum by white settlers) was established in 1747 and briefly became an important trading center until a smallpox epidemic wiped it out in 1752. 

The first white settlers, David Devore, James Black, and James Beach, arrived in 1797. Devore was a Revolutionary War veteran. According to a pension application Devore filed in 1828, he had served as a private in Captain McClure's Company, Fourth Regiment of Proctor's Brigade of Artillery during the Revolutionary War. The brigade took part in many of the most significant battles of the war, including the Battle of Monmouth (New Jersey) in which Mary Ludwig Hays, the legendary Molly Pitcher, served on a gun crew after her husband was wounded. However, Devore failed to include his dates of service on his application, so we don't know which of any of the great battles he might have participated in. Not surprisingly, his pension application was denied.

Molly Pitcher helped fire a cannon of Proctor's
Regiment at the Battle of Monmouth

When David Devore arrived in Muskingum Township, he got right to work. He built the township's first hewed-log house near the banks of the Muskingum River the year after his arrival . He also planted the first orchards, and built the township's first gristmill in 1812 on the tributary that became known as Devore's Run. Devore, clearly an enterprising man, also established the first tavern around 1812, serving liquor from his residence. 

On September 3, 1817, twenty years after the arrivals of Devore, Bland, and Black, Muskingum Township was formally organized. By the time of its organization, the township boasted a school (founded in 1815), two tanneries, and at least one of three distilleries. The number of distilleries in the township undoubtedly caused the Methodist, Baptist, and Presbyterian congregations (all established by 1814) much angst.

William Mattingly

There are no municipalities in Muskingum Township, but there is an unicorporated village and historic area called the Mattingly Settlement. The community is named for the Mattingly family whose progenitor, William Mattingly, a Roman Catholic, came to the area in 1812. The Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary (affectionately known as St. Mary's) was organized at William's residence in 1834, and ministered to by Dominican priests from Zanesville until 1855. In 1856, William's son John donated an acre of his farm land for the construction of a brick church and adjoining burial ground. Fittingly, William Mattingly's was the first burial in the church's cemetery, which is today called the Mattingly Settlement Cemetery.

Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin,
known as St. Mary's, in the Mattingly Settlement