Butterfield Valley is a valley along the course of

Temecula Creek Temecula Creek, formerly known as the Temecula River, runs U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed March 16, 2011 through southern Riverside County, California, United States, pa ...

, in

Riverside County, California Riverside County is a County (United States), county located in the Southern California, southern portion of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, its population was 2,418,185, making it the fourth-most ...

. Its lower end is now filled by

Vail Lake Vail Lake is a large reservoir in western Riverside County, California. Geography It is located on Temecula Creek, in the Butterfield Valley, south of Oak Mountain, of the Black Hills, in the Santa Margarita River watershed. It is approximatel ...

. It heads at and its mouth is at the site of the Vail Lake Dam at the head of the deep canyon Temecula Creek has cut through Oak Mountain to the Pauba Valley.

History

The original name of Butterfield Valley, found on the first topographic map of the region, was "N*gger Valley" and was not renamed by the U. S. Geological Survey until 1970. It was named after Jim Hamilton, an

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

man who settled there as a

squatter Squatting is the action of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied area of land or a building (usually residential) that the squatter does not Land ownership and tenure, own, rent or otherwise have lawful permission to use. The United Nations estima ...

on the east end of the Rancho Pauba in the later 1860s. The 1870 census of

Temecula Temecula (; , ; Luiseño: ''Temeekunga'') is a city in southwestern Riverside County, California, United States. The city had a population of 110,003 as of the 2020 census and was incorporated on December 1, 1989. The city is a tourist and ...

showed James Hamilton was a 49-year-old widower, living on a 160-acre farm with his four children. The farm was evaluated at $5,000, more than the value of other similar farms in the area. Eventually Hamilton lost this land in a lawsuit over ownership of the Rancho Pauba in the early 1880s. Robert L. Carlton, Blacks in San Diego County: A Social Profile, 1850-1880, The Journal of San Diego History, SAN DIEGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY QUARTERLY, Volume 21, Number 4, Fall 1975
/ref> However, Hamilton moved out to the lands of the

Cahuilla The Cahuilla, also known as ʔívil̃uqaletem or Ivilyuqaletem, are a Native Americans in the United States, Native American people of the various tribes of the Cahuilla Nation, living in the inland areas of southern California. ...

, where he and two of his sons continued to raise cattle at their ranch in the Anza Valley, which was first known as the ''Hamilton Plain''. Hamilton Creek, originating east of Anza, still bears his name. Hamilton School in Anza was also named after him. The school has been divided into a

K-8 School K8 or K-8 may refer to: * K-8 (Kansas highway), two highways in Kansas, one in northern Kansas, one in southern Kansas * K-8 school, a type of school that includes kindergarten and grades one through eight * K8 telephone box, designed by Bruce M ...

and

Hamilton High School Hamilton High School may refer to: United States Alabama * Hamilton High School (Alabama) in Hamilton Arizona * Hamilton High School (Chandler, Arizona) in Chandler Arkansas * Lake Hamilton High School in Pearcy California * Hamilton High Sc ...

since 2006–2007. Hamilton was married to a Native American woman and had three sons. Two became U. S. Marshals, and one was killed in the line of duty at

San Jacinto, California San Jacinto ( , ; ) is a city in Riverside County, California, United States. It is located at the north end of the San Jacinto Valley, with Hemet, California, Hemet to its south and Beaumont, California, Beaumont to its north. The mountains ...

. The two surviving sons also married native women.Edgar F. Hastings, “An Interview with HARRY P. JONES” (March 10, 1960), Seth Mallios, Sarah Stroud, Lauren Lingley, Jaime Lennox, Hillary Sweeney, Olivia Smith, and David Caterino, Archaeological Excavations at the Nate Harrison Site in San Diego County, California: An Interim Technical Report for the 2005 Field Season, © 2006 by San Diego State University, Department of Anthropology

References

{{coord, 33, 29, 45, N, 116, 58, 36, W, display=title Valleys of Riverside County, California