Warrick County

    Until the formation of Warrick County in 1813, its territory had been within the boundary of Knox County. Many of the earliest settlers came before that time, and while Indiana was yet a Territory. During these first years the hostility of the Indians was an impediment to the settlement of the new country. Eight years after the first location of white men in what is now Warrick County, the battle of Tippecanoe was fought, and the power of the red man in Indian forever crushed. Up tot hat time the settlement of the Territory only advances as the population became dense enough to repel the invasions of hostile Indians. Soon after that event people began to come in greater numbers, and the demands for a new county became imperative. Scarcely had the new county been organized ere the increasing population required its division. Unaccustomed to the usages of the white man and of civilization the natives retired to the distant solitudes, there hoping to continue in peace. Within a few years after the Miami Confederacy under Tecumseh was overthrown, nearly the whole of southern Indiana was abandoned by the Indians.

    Warrick County is situated in the southwestern part of Indiana, and is bounded on the north by Gibson, Pike and Dubois Counties; on the east by Dubois and Spencer Counties; on the south by Spencer County, and the Ohio River at low-water mark, and on the west by Vanderburg and Gibson Counties. Little Pigeon Creek flows along a large portion of the south3eastern boundary between Warrick and Spencer Counties, and by its numerous tributaries affords excellent facilities for drainage. The most important of these are Otter, Barren and Polkberry Creeks, and they ramify into the central and northeastern portions of the county. Cyprus Creek begins in the northern portion of Boon Township and flows in a southerly direction to the Ohio River. Big Pigeon, Squaw and Big Creeks carry off the surplus waters form the western and northwestern parts, thus completing a most perfect system of drainage. Most of the county is level or gently rolling, and the soil is a rich alluvial deposit, and capable, when properly tilled, of producing large and profitable crops. In the southern part, along the Ohio River bottom-land, is a narrow belt of hills, forming about the only exception to the otherwise level land in the county. The total area of the county is about 385 square miles, or 246,400 acres. Over most of the surface the alluvial deposit covers the rocks deeply, although in places they crop out and stand as mute monuments of the geologic past.