Transcription contributed by Martie Callihan 11 February 2005

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William C. Schenck was born in New Jersey in 1773, and was the son of Rev. William Schenck, a Presbyterian clergyman, and Anna Cummings, his wife. He was a surveyor by profession, and came to Marietta in 1793, and to Cincinnati in 1795. In the winter of 1795-96, in connection with Daniel C. Cooper, he laid out the town of Franklin, and in 1801, with two associates, laid out the town of Newark, Licking Co., Ohio. In 1798, he was married to Betsey Rogers, of Long Island, and, with his wife, reached Cincinnati January 1, 1799, where they resided until about 1803, when they became residents of Franklin. He was elected Secretary of the Council in the first Legislature of the Northwest Territory in 1799. His name appears in the court records as Foreman of a Grand Jury of Hamilton County in 1799, and as Foreman of the first Grand Jury of Warren County in 1803. He served as a State Senator from Warren County in 1803,1804 and 1805, and Representative in the Legislature in 1821. In 1814, he was appointed by the Legislature a Commissioner for the perpetuation of the evidence of the original field notes of the survey of the Miami Purchase, the original notes having been lost in a fire, which destroyed the house of Judge J. C. Symmes. He died at Columbus, Ohio, while serving as a member of the Legislature, on his forty-eighth birthday, January 12, 1821.

Gen. William C. Schenck left a large family, of whom the sole survivors, in 1881, were Gen. Robert C. Schenck and Admiral James F. Schenck, both of whom were born in Warren County.