William Blackwell Welch was born in 1828 in Scottsville, Kentucky, graduated from the University of Tennessee Medical School in 1849, married Alabama native Laura F. McClellan in 1851, and moved with her to Cane Hill in 1855, where they constructed a small vernacular Greek Revival-style house. The Welch House stood on this site, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982, later fell into severe disrepair, and was destroyed by fire before the property was acquired by Historic Cane Hill, Inc. From 1862 through 1865, Dr. Welch served as regimental surgeon for the 34th Arkansas Infantry Company B alongside fellow Cane Hill soldiers Major Fontaine Richard Earle and Zebulon Edmiston. After the war, he returned to Cane Hill, practiced medicine as a country doctor, dedicated his life to the professionalization of medicine in Arkansas, and trained many other doctors in the area, including his nephews Dr. Thomas Welch Blackburn and Dr. John Lacy Bean, whose houses still stand in Cane Hill today.