King Woolsey

In 1863, Woolsey joined the Walker Party to explore the Hassayampa River for gold. Soon after, he homesteaded and established the Agua Fria ranch, near present-day Dewey, Arizona. Woolsey is most famous (or notorious) for his forays against the native Indians in central Arizona. During the American Civil War, after 1863, practically all troops were withdrawn from Arizona, and Indian attacks on white settlers and their property increased.

Ruins of King Woolsey's ranch in the now town of Dewey-Humboldt

In 1864, after a series of livestock thefts, Woolsey led a group of settlers to the vicinity of present-day Miami, Arizona, where they encountered a large party of Tonto Apaches. In the ensuing Battle of Bloody Tanks, the settlers killed (and later scalped) at least 24 Indians, with the loss of one settler. It appears that the settlers opened fire first, during a parley.[2] After this fight, Woolsey was appointed Lieutenant-Colonel of the Arizona territorial militia by Governor John N. Goodwin.

Later in 1864, Woolsey and several other men were working their mining claims in the Bradshaw Mountains. They were apparently confronted by a large party of Indians, probably Yavapais. Woolsey called for a parley, after first hiding a sack of pinole poisoned with strychnine nearby. As he had hoped, the Indians found the poisoned meal and ate it while he talked to their chiefs. As the poison took effect, and the others fled, his men opened fire on them. This encounter was later called the Pinole Massacre.[3]

The first Territorial Legislature voted a commendation to King Woolsey and his volunteers for, inter alia, "taking the lives of numbers of Apaches, and destroying the property and crops in their country." [4] In 1864 Woolsey was elected to the first Legislature of the Territory of Arizona, and was re-elected to several subsequent legislatures.

Grave site of King S. Woolsey

The creation of the Democratic Party in Arizona Territory was largely due to Woolsey's efforts. Since its creation by a Republican-dominated Congress in 1863, the Republicans had controlled Arizona politics. Woolsey called a meeting of like-minded Democrats in February 1873 in Tucson. Presiding at the meeting, he introduced a series of resolutions which led to organization of the Democratic Party in the Arizona Territory. He was the Democratic candidate for Territorial Delegate to the U.S. Congress in the 1878 election, but was defeated.

Woolsey died of a heart attack at his Agua Fria ranch in 1879. He was 47 years old. He is buried in Pioneer and Military Memorial Park in Phoenix.

King S. Woolsey, was, in all respects, a big man. He was a typical Westerner, bold, resolute and energetic. A natural leader of men, he was successful, not only in his Indian expeditions, but also in his business enterprises. His activities were known and felt in all parts of the Territory up to the time of his untimely death. Among the early pioneers of Arizona he stands out the most conspicuous figure of them all. [5]