Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1892, volume 3).djvu/591

KIRKHAM, Ralph Wilson, soldier, b. in Springfield, Mass.. 20 Feb., 1821. His great-grand- father. Henry Kirkham, served in the French and Indian wars of 1755-'63, and his grandfather pai - - ticipated in the American Revolution, and was severely wounded at the battle of Trenton, 26 Dec, 1776. Ralph was graduated at the U. S. military academy in 1842. After serving on gar- rison and frontier duty, he participated in the Mexican war, where he was brevetted 1st lieuten- ant for gallant and meritorious conduct at Contre- ras and Churubusco, 27 Aug., 1847, and wounded in the battle of Molino del Rev, 8 Sept., 1847. He was brevetted captain for gallant and meritorious conduct in the storming of Chapultepec, 13 Sept., 1847, assisted in the capture of Mexico, 13-14 Sept., 1847, and honorably mentioned in Gen. Scott's despatches. While in Mexico he was one of a party of six American officers and an English- man who ascended to the summit of Popocatapetl, the original number that set out upon the expe- dition being about one hundred. This mountain had never been ascended since the time of Cortez, a. d. 1519. From 6 Nov., 1848, till 1 Oct., 1849, he was acting assistant adjutant-general, with head- quarters at St. Louis. Mo. He was quartermaster of the 6th infantry, 1 Oct., 1849, till 16 Nov.. 1854. when he was ordered to the Pacific coast. He built adobe barracks at Fort Tejon and a military post at Walla Walla, constructed a military road from the latter place to Fort Colville, Washing- ton territory, participated in frontier Indian wars, and was ordered to San Francisco, where he served as quartermaster until his resignation in 1870. During the civil war he served as chief quartermaster of the Department of the Pacific in 1861, and subsequently of the Department of California, and was acting chief of commissariat in 1866. On 13 March, 1865, he was brevetted lieu- tenant-colonel, colonel, and brigadier-general, U. S. army, for faithful and meritorious services in the Quartermaster's department during the civil war. n 1870-'l he visited the far east with William II. Seward. He now (1887) resides in Oakland, Cal., where he has one of the best libraries on the Pa- cific coast, especially upon military subjects.

KIRKLAND, Samuel, clergyman, b. in Norwich, Conn., 1 Dec, 1741 ; d. in Clinton, N. Y., 28 Feb., 1808. He was the son of Rev. Daniel Kirt- land, but restored the old spelling of the family name. He was graduated at Princeton in 1765, receiving his degree, although he had left college eight months before, to go on a mission to the Six Nations. After remaining with the tribes a year and a half, and learning the Mohawk and Seneca languages, he returned to Connecticut, was ordained to the Congregational ministry, and com- missioned Indian missionary by the board of cor- respondence of the Missionary society. He then went to Oneida, and continued to labor among the tribes, with occasional interruptions, for more than forty years. During the Revolution he was active in endeavoring to preserve the neutrality of the Six Nations, made several long journeys among the tribes, and attended numerous councils. After the battle of Lexington the provincial congress of Massachusetts formally requested his influence to secure the friendship of the Six Nations, and he succeeded in attaching the Oneidas to the patriot cause, although the other tribes, through the influ- ence of Sir William Johnson and the Mohawk sachem Joseph Brant, had joined the British. Washington said of this mission in a letter ad dressed to congress in 1775: "I can not but intimate my sense of the importance of Mr. Kirkland’s intistation, and of the great advantages which have and may result to the united colonies from his situation being made respectable. All accounts agree that much of the favorable disposition shown by the In- dians may be ascribed to his labor and influence." He became brigade chaplain to Gen. John Sullivan in 1779, and accompanied him on the Susquehanna expedition. During the remainder of the war he was chaplain to the Continental forces at Fort Schuyler and at Stockbridge, Mass. When peace was declared he resumed his work among the In- dians, and in 1785 he received a liberal grant of land from congress in consideration of his services among the tribes. In 1788 the Indians and the state of New York added to this gift a large and valuable tract, on which he settled and founded the present town of Kirkland. In 1791 he made a statement of the numbers and situation of the Six United Nations, and in the winter of that year conducted a delegation of forty warriors to con- gress in Philadelphia in order to consult as to the best method of introducing civilization among the tribes. In 1793 Mr. Kirkland established the Hamilton Oneida college (now Hamilton college), an institution for the education of American and Indian youth. See a memoir of Kirkland by his grandson, Rev. Samuel K. Lothrop, in Sparks's "American Biography." — His son, John Thorn- ton, clergyman, b. in Herkimer, N. Y., 17 Aug., 1770; d. in Boston, Mass., 24 April, 1840, was graduated at Harvard in 1789, and began the study of theology at Stockbridge, Mass., under the Rev. Stephen West, but on changing his religious views returned to Cambridge, and while preparing to enter the ministry of the Unitarian church was tutor in metaphysics at Harvard. In 1794 he was ordained and installed pastor of the New South church, Boston, continuing in that charge till 1810, when he was elected president of Harvard. Under his administration of seventeen years, the course of study was greatly enlarged, the law-school es- tablished, the medical school reorganized, four different professorships in the academical depart- ment were endowed and filled, three new buildings erected, and large additions were made to the li- brary. Princeton gave him the de- gree of D. D. in 1802, and Brown that of LL. D. in 1810. Dr. Kirk- land had great natural dignity of person and charac- ter, and possessed in an eminent de- gree a knowledge of men. His con- versation was a succession of aph- orisms and max- ims. Hewasaverse to literary effort,

and published but

few works. These include " Eulogy on Washington " (1799) ; " Biography of Fisher Ames" (Boston. 1809): "Discourse on the Death of Hon. George Cabot " (1823); and numerous contributions to the periodicals of the dav. — Their cousin, William, author, b. near LTtica,"N. Y., in 1800; d. near Fishkill, N. Y., 19 Oct., 1846, was graduated at Hamilton college in 1818, was tutor there in 1820, and in 1825-7 occupied the chair of the Latin language and literature. He resigned his professorship in 1828, and estab-