George W. Kirk was born in Greene County, Tennessee on June 25, 1837. A colonel in the U.S. Army during the Civil War, Kirk gained a reputation as a skilled guerilla fighter and cavalry man. In June 1870 Governor William Woods Holden commissioned Kirk to lead the North Carolina State militia against the Ku Klux Klan, and he promptly began arresting suspected Klan members. Although many whites who opposed equal rights for African Americans accused him of treating his captives poorly, his prisoners testified they received fair treatment. When Governor William W. Holden was impeached state democrats briefly tried to try Kirk as well, but the charges were quickly dropped. After going back home to Tennessee, he eventually went to Washington D.C. to become an officer on the police force. He died in Gilroy, California, on February 17, 1905.