Clarendon, known as Mouth of Cache until 1837, is the present seat of justice for Monroe County, and was supposedly named for the Earl of Clarendon, England. Although Frenchmen had cabins there in 1799, Elijah McKinney was the first to obtain a patent on the 640 acre grant from which the original town was carved. He stated that he was residing upon and cultivating the land in 1803. Located on the bank of White River, near the mouth of Cache River, the settlement became the crossing point for the first east-west road in Arkansas Territory. With a ferry and a post office by 1828, Clarendon soon became an important river port as well as the terminus of a stage coach line to the west. It is the only existing city to have been settled prior to the creation of the county. William H. Thweatt was the first mayor when the town was incorporated February 8, 1859. The first charter was dissolved in 1884 and the town was reincorporated in 1898.