Duchouquet Township, Auglaize County, Ohio

Duchouquet Township is one of fourteen townships of Auglaize County, Ohio. It is in the north central part of the county and includes the county seat of Wapakoneta, Ohio as well as the village of Cridersville, Ohio. It was named for the Francis Duchoquet, a French-Canadian fur trapper who lived with the Shawnee in the late 1700s. Ducouquet is the largest township in the county containing forty-two whole sections. It had a population of 14,196 in 2000, down from 14,329 in 1990. Of those, 3,111 lived in the unincorporated part of the township, 9,401 in Wapakoneta, and 1,885 in Cridersville.

It is traversed by the Auglaize River and is bounded on the north by Shawnee Township and the village of Fort Shawnee, Ohio in Allen County, Ohio; on the west by Logan and Moulton Townships; on the South by Pusheta Township; and on the east by Union Township. The municipalities of Wapakoneta and Cridersville remain in the township.

The township is governed by a three-member board of trustees, who are elected in November of odd-numbered years to a four-year term beginning on the following January 1. Two are elected in the year after the presidential election and one is elected in the year before it. There is also an elected township clerk, who serves a four-year term beginning on April 1 of the year after the election, which is held in November of the year before the presidential election. Vacancies in the clerkship or on the board of trustees are filled by the remaining trustees.

The land roughly comprising Duchouquet Township was once apart of the Shawnee reservation at Wapaghkonetta which housed the Council House of the various tribes of Indians that lived in the Northwest Territory. The first European settlement was at Wapakoneta where it became the site of a large Quaker mission, established in 1809. In 1815, Peter Hammel moved from Canada to Wapakoneta, and built a store for settlers.

The entire township is in the Wapakoneta City School District. The southern sections of Duchouquet Township are served by the Wapakoneta (45895) with the northern section being served by the Cridersville branch of the Lima post office (45806).