John Preston Osborn Biography

John Preston Osborn was born in Clairborne Tennessee, March 26, 
1815, son of John and Elizabeth (Flannery) Osborn, both 
natives of Virginia; married Perlina Elizabeth Swetnam 
(1821-1912), daughter of Neri Swetnam, in Lawrence County 
Kentucky, March 25, 1841.  Their children were: William 
Lewis (1842-1927); John Wesley (1854-1931) Neri Ficklin 
(1856-1943); David Ezra, Elizabeth M., Emma, Jeanette J. 
(Mrs. Thoams Barnum), Louisa A (Mrs. John T. Alsap), Pauline 
Rebecca (Mrs. Joseph B. Cramer) and Rose G (Mrs. Lucius D. 
Copeland).

He attended school in Virginia and then settled in eastern 
Kentucky where he was a merchant; moved with his family to 
Adams County in southwest Iowa about 1852 and from
there went in the spring of 1863 to Colorado Springs, 
Colorado.  He joined a party of emigrants which traveled 
via Santa Fe to northern Arizona arriving in Prescott 
July 6, 1864, with 3 ox teams and wagons and some fine 
Durham cattle; according to Varney A. Stephens he built 
one of the first hotels in Prescott:

	The Osborn House stood partly on the ground now (1900) 
occupied by Wallace's saloon, on Granite Street.  The hotel 
was a two story frame structure and by no means 
a pretentious affair.  Dressed lumber was worth $60 a 
thousand and nails 50 cents a pound in those days.  The 
best hotel fare to be had was pork and beans, with coffee 
and bread.  These meals cost $1 each. Mr. Stephens said that 
Mr. Osborn was one of the most industrious men he ever knew.

In January 1878 the Prescott Enterprise stated:

	Mr. J.P. Osborn, who boarded the members of the First 
Arizona Legislature, survived that embarrassment and is still 
alive and good natured.

In addition to his hotel in Prescott he began to cultivate a 
tract of land north of Prescott afterwards known as the 
Banghart Place; in a depredation claim filed in 1890 
against the United States and the Apache Indians he stated 
that he had suffered the 
following losses:

In March 1865 the Indians scattered his stock herd on 
Willow Creek about 4 miles north of Prescott and got away 
with 8 milch cows and a horse each worth $100.

Soon afterwards he moved most of his herd to the Verde 
Valley where his son, William L. Osborn had a farm below 
the present site of Camp Verde; the Indians raided the valley in 
June 1865 and drove off 30 head of cattle, 12 of which 
belonged to him, one being a fine Durham bull worth $500 
which he brought from Colorado.

In 1866 he built a house in Chino Valley with lumber that 
cost $100 per thousand; he went to San Bernardino, 
California that year to place his children in school and 
to buy a load of provisions but when he returned he was told by his 
neighbors that the Indians had burned the house which was worth 
$1,000.

In 1867, a horse for which he paid $100 was being herded 
between Prescott and Fort Whipple by Amasa G. Dunn when the 
Indians killed Dunn's herder, stampeded and stole 
the whole herd.

That same year he began farming on the Agua Fria River, 
southeast of Prescott and in the spring of 1868 the Indians 
stole a horse which had been turned out to graze for 
which he had paid $80, he grew 60 acres of fine corn but 
when it ripened, the Apaches came on different nights and 
stole large amounts of it; corn was then selling at 4 to 
6 cents a pound and the quantity that they took was worth 
at least $1,100.

In the fall of 1869 members of his family being sick, 
he had to move them to Prescott,and he rented the place to 
George Hamlin, furnishing seed, feed, plows, etc. in the 
winter of 1869-70 a band of Apache-Mohaves set fire to the 
house about daybreak and tried to kill the man who was 
inside but he got away; the barn was locked but they burned it 
destroying 3 horses in the stalls and about 10 tons of corn; 
the house that was destroyed cost about $1,000; the barn 
and stored corn were valued at $600 and the loss of farming 
implements and furniture amounted to $400.  The following 
items were printed in thePrescott Arizona Miner:

	October 9, 1869--J.P. Osborn and family get to 
town from their ranch on the lower Agua Fria Friday evening 
last, suffering with fever and ague, which will not 
stay with them long in this piney country."

	January 22, 1870--J.P. Osborn and family threaten to 
migrate to Salt River."

	January 29, 1870--J.P. Osborn and family started 
last (January 24) for Phoenix, Salt River."

Soon after his arrival in the Salt River Valley he settled in 
the N.W. 1/4 section 4, 1 north, 3 East and upon a cash 
payment of $1.25 per acre obtained a patent to the 160 
acres on April 10, 1874; the home that he built in 1871 was 
located at what is now 710East McDowell Road.  As a member 
of the Salt River Valley Town Association he took a 
leading part in the selection of the Phoenix townsite and 
assisted in surveying it; was a member of the first Board of 
Trustees of the Phoenix School District organized in 
1871; served from June 4, 1874 to May 18,1875, as Chairman 
of the Phoenix Townsite Commission which determined the 
ownership and fixed a value upon all the lots sold.

He died at Phoenix, Maricopa County, January 20, 1900, 
aged 84, buried A.O. U. W. section, old City (Pioneers) 
cemetery, Phoenix.

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

McClintock, J.H.--Arizona, the Youngest State, Chicago 1916, Vol 3, 
    pp.426-427
Chapman Co--Portrait and Biographical Record of Arizona, Chicago,
    1901 p. 172.
Sloan, R.E. and Adam W.--History of Arizona, Phoenix, 1930, Vol 3,
    p. 175
Barnes, W.C.--Arizona Place Names, Tucson, 1935, page 311.
U.S. Court of claims ((Indian Depredation Docket #1052).
The Arizona Gazette, Phoenix, January 20, 1900 (obituary)
The Arizona Republican, Phoenix, January 22, 1900 (funeral)
     December 4, 1912 (death of his wife)
The Phoenix Herald, March 26, 1891 3:1, January 20, 1900 (obit)
The Arizona Bulletin, Solomonville, February 2, 1900
The Arizona Enterprise, Prescott, January 19, 1878
The Arizona Miner, Prescott, October 9, 1869, January 22 and 29,
   1870.