(This was the same sequence of county names in place along the eastern seacoast of England, running from the Scottish boundary down to the English Channel.)

[4] Shortly after returning from this tour, Simcoe received in March 1793 a petition from Thomas Ingersoll and associates asking for grant of a township to which they promised to bring settlers from New England.

In all of this, the first ones to become permanently settled in the township were likely Samuel Canfield Sr. and his wife and sons, who agreed to make their new home into a half-way stopping point for travellers along the road, at what became known as Oxford Centre.

This is commemorated with plaques at the cemetery there and in front of the elementary school a short distance to the east along what is now known as "The Old Stage Road".

[5] The Bostwicks, Ingersolls and Canfields were all New England families who had made their start in the New World in the 1600s, and frontier living had been second nature to them for generations.

In the early 1770s he and wife Lucy joined a group of Connecticut families who had been granted the wilderness township of Marlow there, and Samuel soon became a town leader, elected one of the selectmen for the community and appointed captain of the local militia company.

Samuel complained of hearing voices which eventually drove him to quit Marlow, and the family was living in southern Vermont by the time Gideon Bostwick was traveling his Anglican mission circuit which reached there, spreading word of the township grant which had been received in far-away Oxford.

The De Long family and nine others, principally from Dutchess County, joined Lossing the same year and by 1820 an additional group of about fifty had settled within the tract.

The Averill family was from the Great Barrington area in Massachusetts, where Thomas Ingersoll had lived before coming to Oxford.

The mill standing today, built in 1845 by Edward Bullock and Herbert Hilliard Cameron Tufford, is run by water power supplied by a dam on the river.

[10] By the 1840s, dairy farmers in Oxford, Norwich and Dereham townships were competing each year for top honours at agricultural fairs around the province for butter and cheese-making prizes.

In the 1860s, Norwich farmers were the first in Canada to adopt the American factory system for cheese-making, with two different approaches competing for acceptance.

Andes Smith took the approach of contracting with other farmers to buy their milk and haul it to a factory on his farm using a tanker wagon.

Smith was first and was the more innovative one, gaining international recognition in 1865 for manufacturing a 4,000 lb (1,800 kg) cheese, but he went bankrupt the following year.

Farrington's co-op system became the good news story that ended up being immortalized in published histories and on historical plaques.

The United Church at the top of the hill had its roof taken completely off and extensive interior damage, but all seven stained glass windows were left intact.

The F4 tornado, which had its beginning north west of Woodstock cut a swath all the way to Waterford of approximately 60 km and at its widest point near Oxford Centre was about 400m wide.

The tornado hit Norwich around 4:05 pm, damaging trees, farm equipment, barns, houses, and the wooden Holy Trinity Anglican Church (1867).

As of 2024, the elected council consists of:[18] Mayor: Jim Palmer Councillors: The Township offices, opened in January 2015, are located on Airport Road in the community of Norwich.