By James F. Vivian

Captain John G. Chandler, according to the Arizona Journal-Miner on June 26, 1915, was presented as the “first man known to suggest that the first capital of Arizona be christened Prescott.”

The case for Captain Chandler raises to three the number of candidates for the honor. Richard C. McCormick, secretary to the Territory’s first governor, finds the most champions on his side. The sizable library he brought with him spoke to his classical education and intellectual bent. John M. Boggs, a pioneer resident, is loosely advanced by his own support. Barely more than circumstantial evidence figures in both instances, while nearly as many authors skirt the subject, as if to hurdle an accepted mystery.

Actually, Milnes’ case for Chandler is much the better prepared but, ironically, it’s also the most easily disproved. Milnes hinted at the uncertainty about the dateline of events, which allows us to excuse the mistake. He should have fixed on 1863, not "1860 or 1861." So too, in part, is the confusion between Simmons Springs on Mint Creek and Del Rio Springs on Granite Creek, farther northeast. Practically any older neighbor, had Milnes bothered to check, would have caught the fumble.

Milnes’ third error undermines the whole of his contention, however. A review of Chandler’s personnel file recently obtained from the Military Records section of the National Archives in Washington, D.C., has him posted nowhere in Arizona in 1863 and, in fact, not anywhere in the west.

In September, 1865, from the Union encampment in New Orleans, Major General N. P. Banks wrote the War Department to recommend Chandler’s promotion to major. Banks said that Chandler had been attached to his "department since the opening of the year 1863 as quartermaster, the greater portion of the time actively employed in the field." In connection with the endorsement, Chandler composed an autobiographical summary of his involvement in the Civil War. He noted that he had been stationed at the Presidio in San Francisco in early 1861, when he received orders to report for duty under General William S. Rosecrans, then operating in western Virginia, near Wheeling. A series of directives followed, placing Chandler, by turns, at the battles of Shiloh (TN 1862), Perryville (KY 1862), Corinth (MS 1862), and Mansfield (LA 1864), increasingly dealing with transport and supply.

His promotion to major took effect in October, 1866. His later assignments included a two-year tour of duty under General A. V. Kautz, successor to General George Crook, at Fort Whipple, starting in 1875. None of Prescott’s elected officials seem to have tipped a complimentary hat in his direction.

Just as Chandler had never before served in Arizona, neither would he ever return to the Territory. The Army sent him to Atlanta and New Orleans in 1876 and to the department’s headquarters in the Capital in 1881, where he assumed the duties of the assistant quartermaster general. His responsibilities in New York and Philadelphia as of 1889 involved regular inspections of the Army’s installations throughout the northeast. He was stationed once again in San Francisco at the time of his retirement.

So, a promising discovery became instead a frank disappointment. What happened that Milnes got it totally wrong? Did he confuse Chandler with someone else? Was he depending on a second-hand, dubious or spiteful source? Had he fallen victim to a hearsay story? It’s improbable that he knew Chandler, that he even met him, whether formally or by chance. They not only belonged to different generations, but also moved in quite different circles, under different conditions with separate credentials.

Concern, skepticism and objection, whether expressed or merely hinted, may have been among the early reactions to Milnes’ explanation. If so, they resulted in neither a serious protest, substantial revision nor open retraction. No one revisited the subject through the next several weeks in the newspaper.

Prescott has been known by its name for 145 years. Lots of people understand the ‘how’ and ‘why’ of the origin. Virtually no one knows who came up with the idea. My hope had been to broaden the possibilities, not to narrow them. Progress, as Thomas Edison once famously observed, sometimes results as much from elimination as by addition.

(James Vivian is an author and contributor to Arizona Historical Society publications and resides in Sun City, AZ)

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(SHM microfilm Arizona Journal-Miner) Reuse only by permission.

Excerpt from the Prescott Journal-Miner of June 26, 1915, claiming Gen. John G. Chandler as the "first man known to suggest that the first capital of Arizona be christened Prescott…."

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(po2279p). Reuse only bypermission.

William Hickling Prescott (1796-1859), Massachusetts-based historian and author, for whom the town of Prescott was named in 1864.

Sharlot Hall Museum Photograph Call Number:(J. G .Chandler) Reuse only bypermission.

Brigadier General John G. Chandler in one-star dress uniform. Photo from National Archives, Old Military Records, RG94.