Thomas Butler
Thomas Butler was born in Monongahela County, Virginia, but in what is now Preston County, West Virginia, August 10, 1783, and came to Franklin Township in 1808, settling on the farm now owned by John and Elizabeth Butler and Isaac Munson. He entered 160 acres of land, the second land entered in the township, and being a single man boarded with James Morgan, and on April 12, 1809, married Rebecca, daughter of Mr. Morgan (first marriage in the county). He built a cabin and moved therein, but which was fired and destroyed when he was at Mr. Morgan's, by the Indians. Mr. Morgan had eight children, to wit: Sarah, Jane, Elizabeth, Morgan, Jonathan, Isaac, John and Andrew. Truly indeed was the county a wilderness when Butler and Morgan entered it. The bottoms of the Killbuck then abounded in plum tickets, cherry and sycamore trees and considerable walnut. For years Mr. Butler kept his wheat in the trunks of sycamore trees. Bears were plentiful and wolves numerous, Mr. Butler on one occasion killing one within half a mile of his house. Mr. Butler was a great talker, a pioneer of the true type; and performed a brave part in the early settlement of the county.
Jonathan Butler, his brother, was a native of Virginia, and emigrated to Holmes then, but Wayne County now, as early as 1818, and was the builder of the famous Butler mill. He died in Indiana. His father, Thomas Butler, Sr., an early settler likewise, died at Jonathan's.
From History of Wayne County, Ohio, From the Days of the Pioneers and First Settlers to the Present Time, by Robert Douglass, 1878