Alexander P. Crittenden

Alexander Parker Crittenden (January 14, 1816 – November 5, 1870) was a 19th-century pioneering attorney and politician in California, and a member of the influential Crittenden family of Kentucky. Early life Alexander Parker " A.P." Crittenden was born in 1816 to Thomas Turpin Crittenden (1788-1832) and Mary Wilson Parker (1792-1869) in Lexington, Kentucky. He was the nephew of John Jordan Crittenden and grandson of John Crittenden Sr. He graduated from West Point in 1836 at age 20. He had once been expelled for a prank but was reinstated by appealing directly to President Andrew Jackson. He joined the army as a Lieutenant of Artillery, but quickly resigned his commission. He gained employment as an engineer for railroad companies. In 1838 he married Clara Churchill Jones Crittenden (1820-1881), and they had fourteen children altogether, but only eight lived to adulthood.