Shelby  County,  Indiana
Historical  Articles

Sugar  Creek  Township

Sugar Creek Twp, Shelby Co, IN: Township 13 North - Range 5, 6 East per Plat Directory distributed by the Purdue University Cooperative Extension Service, 1997.

          Sugar Creek Township is bounded on the north by Moral Township, on the south by Hendricks, on the west by Johnson County, and on the east by Brandywine Township. The Martinsville Railroad intersects it diagonally in a southwesterly direction. Its principal streams are the Sugar Creek and Little Sugar Creek. The face of the country is level, and the soil, particularly in the river bottoms, is very productive. The streams are spanned by two very fine iron bridges. Among the earliest settlers of what is now Sugar Creek Township, are the following:

John McConnell  S. G. Huntingdon  Adam Smith, Sr. (the father of David Smith)  James Johnson  Matthew Campbell  William McConnell  John Hindsman  Joseph Trusler  Reuben Strickler  Daniel Padrick  James White  Henry Willard  William Dannell  David Hoover  Linsey Boggess  Joseph Hough  Robert Myers  James Holmes  William Hoskins  William Croddy  William F. Morgan  Amos Collins  John H. Stewart  William Edwards  Lee Parrish

          Boggstown, the only post office, is located in the exact center of the township, and was founded at an early day by  William, Warren and Joseph Boggs, three brothers, who were leading men in their day.  It is now a railroad station, and contains a Presbyterian, a Methodist Episcopal and Methodist Protestant Church, and also a graded school.  There was formerly a Masonic Lodge, now removed to Fairland.  It is the headquarters of the largest grain trade in the county, outside of Shelbyville.  Hough's Mills, now called the Red Mills, has been in existence for over forty years.  Hugh and Adam McFadden  were among the early settlers; the former was the father of  Dr. William G. McFadden and  James B. McFadden, attorney at law, now of Shelbyville.  Edward Gird, Representative in the State Legislature (1836-37), was a resident of Sugar Creek Township.  The first school teacher here is remembered with great enthusiasm. It was the late William Manwarring, afterward of Franklin, Johnson County.  There were formerly a Baptist Church, known by the name of the "Morgan Church," in the northwestern part of the township, but the organization has been discontinued.  The Methodist Episcopal, of Boggstown was 1826 at the house of  Joseph Hough.  In 1830, it was removed to the residence of Adam McFadden, one mile south of Boggstown.  The Presbyterians had built a church at Boggstown which they offered to the Methodists for quarterly meetings and other great occasions.  In 1850, the present church edifice was erected.  There are six schools in the townships, five of them have brick schoolhouses.  Among the handsome improvements the following deserve mention: 

Philip Hoops  Herman Torline  David Smith  C. A. Gibson  Benjamin Farmbrough  George W. Holmes  Tillman H. Lee  Daniel Padrick  Benjamin Willard  William Weaver

          Many of the citizens of this township have occupied public positions.  John McConnell was County Commissioner;  John H. Stewart, Sheriff;  James O. Parish, Treasurer;  T. H. Lee , Sheriff and  George C. McConnell  is now Deputy Treasurer.
Atlas of Shelby Co., Indiana, Chicago: J.H. Beers & Co, 1880, page 14. 
Contributed by Phyllis Miller Fleming.

Township Map       Historical Articles Index       Main Page

To contact researchers listed above, use the Surname Index