History:

In 1799, David Bagley, a Virginia Baptist minister passed through the Glen Carbon area and determined that it was a land of such expanse and luxuriant vegetation that he compared it to the Biblical "Land of Goshen." References to this Land of Goshen have persisted since that time. In 1801, Colonel Samuel Judy received a military grant for 100 acres of land near the base of the bluffs, just north of Judy's Creek and became the first permanent settler of Madison County. The area became known as the Goshen Settlement, and while its boundaries were never clearly outlined, it was centered on the Judy property at the junction of Judy Creek and present day Route 157.

In 1808, the Goshen Road trail was built as a wagon road from the Goshen settlement to the Ohio salt works. The trail crossed the state diagonally following a route from Peter's Station to the north and west of Glen Carbon, east to Troy, and then in a southeasterly direction eventually ending at Shawneetown on the Ohio River. The existing Goshen Road running from Illinois Route 159 to the intersection of Route 143 is part of the original road.

A territorial government was formed in 1812 and Samuel Judy was elected to serve in the first legislature which convened at Kaskaskia. Madison County was organized in 1812 with its northern border reaching to Canada. Judy was one of the first county commissioners. Goshen Township was established soon after Madison County and Samuel Judy and Henry Cook were appointed overseers of the Township in 1818. The 1820 census reported 13,550 citizens in Madison County (which included present day Sangamon and Macoupin Counties) with 200 "heads of families" in Goshen Township. Between 1820 and 1830 the township was subdivided into five smaller townships with Edwardsville Township encompassing approximately one third of the original area (including Glen Carbon), and the remaining area divided among Silver Creek, Big Prairie, Six Mile Prairie and Wood River Townships.