Sacramento County Biographies

JEROME C. DAVIS

Transcribed by: Nancy Pratt Melton

This file is part of the California Genealogy & History Archives 
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cagha/index.htm      

SACRAMENTO TOWNSHIP.
Page 282.
 
	who resides on N Street, between Sixth and Seventh, Sacramento 
City, his Post Office, was born in Ohio in 1822, and remained there till 1845, 
engaged in farming, merchandising and hotel-keeping. He joined a government 
exploring party under John C. Fremont, and left for California, arriving at 
King's River December 26, 1845. Shortly after Mr. Davis was sent East in company 
with Kit Carson and General Beals with dispatches. He remained in St. Louis till 
summoned to Washington, D. C., to give evidence in behalf of John C. Fremont, 
accused of insubordination. In 1848 a second expedition was fitted out, and Mr. 
Davis was sent to St. Louis to procure the necessary outfit, but wearied with 
the delay of the Government, he left the service and went to work in St. Louis. 
Early in 1849, in company with nine men, he started overland; the company sold 
goods enough to the Mormons at Salt Lake to pay all the expense of the trip. 
Soon after the arrival in California, Mr. Davis joined Captain Owens' company 
and went to the mines, but, taking sick, soon returned to Sacramento. After his 
recovery he and J. B. Childs (his father-in-law) started dairy business, 
opposite Sacramento. The present town of Washington was laid out by these 
gentlemen. Mr. Davis and Mr. Childs bought the "Laguna de Santos Calle" ranch, 
on which, for many years, large crops of grain and great numbers of cattle were 
produced. Mr. Davis built the first grist mill in that section. The California 
Pacific Railroad runs through his ranch, and the town of Davisville is named in 
his honor. Mr. Davis married Mary A. Childs, a native of Missouri, in 1850; they 
have had one daughter, now deceased. 

Source: History of Sacramento County, California With Illustrations 1880 by 
Thompson & West.