David Patten Kimball (August 23, 1839 – November 21, 1883) was an early Mormon leader and one of the three young men of the Sweetwater handcart rescue.
In the winter of 1856, Kimball helped a company of handcart pioneers stranded near the Sweetwater River,[1] in response to a request from Brigham Young. Several accounts of the event imply that Young promised Kimball and others a guaranteed place in heaven for their efforts, although no direct evidence attributing this statement to Young exist.[1]
Kimball served as president of the Bear Lakestake in Utah before moving to Arizona in 1877. He was a teamster, and when he died he was first counselor in the St. Joseph stake.
In November 1881, Kimball was making a freight run between Maricopa railroad station and Prescott when he was caught in a snowstorm near Prescott and contracted pneumonia. On the return trip, he became separated from his traveling companion and wagon and got lost in the Salt River valley south of Wickenburg.[2] He spent four days in the desert with no food or water. During this time, he reported seeing a vision in which his deceased father warned him to get his life in order, and that he had only two years to live. Kimball had doubted Mormonism for over a decade.[3] His traveling companion assembled a search party, and they found Kimball near present-day Surprise.
Kimball died at the age of 44 on November 21, 1883, in St. David, Arizona.
