Description

William Hudson Kirkland (b.1832 - d.1910) was born in Petersburg, Virginia on July 12, 1832.

He moved to California in 1852 and then to Tucson, Arizona in 1854. He was the first man to raise the United States flag in Tucson when the Mexican soldiers withdrew following the Gadsden Purchase of 1853. He discovered a valley in Yavapai County where he farmed and mined gold near the Hassayampa River. Later the area was named after him, Kirkland Valley.

In 1860, he married Missouri Ann Bacon (b. 1834 - d. 1915), with whom he had eight children.

In 1868, he returned to Tucson and operated a successful sawmill in the Santa Rita Mountains. In 1870, he moved to Phoenix and served on the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors (the first School Board), and became Justice of the Peace. In 1872, he donated 80 acres of land near Tempe Butte to Mexican laborers after their help with the construction of the Kirkland-McKinney ditch. The workers named their settlement San Pablo. In 1877, he moved to Safford to operate freight businesses and was appointed Deputy Sheriff, and subsequently he lived in the Congress Mining Camp, Palomas, and Congress Junction, where he held his last public office as Constable from 1903 to 1908. He is also credited for his contributions to the growth of the Salt River Valley in the construction of water-delivery canals.

Handwriting on back of photograph reads: "William H. and Missouri Ann (Bacon) Kirkland".

William Hudson Kirkland died on January 1, 1910 in Winkelman, Arizona although the Arizona Republican newspaper of January 12, 1899 had mistakenly announced his demise eleven years earlier.

Burial at Tempe Double Butte Cemetery in Tempe, AZ.

Sources: Weekly Journal-Miner January 26, 1910; findagrave.com.