Yolo County Biographies


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


WILLIAM J. De FRIES, M.D.
 
            WILLIAM J. De FRIES, M.D., a physician and surgeon of Woodland, is a 
son of John William and Susanna (Hergenga) De Fries, natives of Monroe County, 
New York.  His father was born August 31, 1816, graduated at Leyden, Holland, 
Europe, when twenty-two years of age; was a physician by profession, and died in 
Paineville Center, New York, in 1817; and the subject�s mother, who was born 
September 15, 1818, died in 1871.
            Dr. De Fries was born February 5, 1841, in Monroe County, New York, 
and at the age of twenty-one years graduated at the Leyden Medical College of 
Holland.  He then went to Tippecanoe, Indiana, where he entered the service of 
the Second Indiana Cavalry, in 1863, enlisting as a surgeon.  Serving until 1866 
in this capacity, he entered the corresponding department in the regular army.  
While in the volunteer service he was shot several times.  His nervous system at 
length becoming somewhat affected, he was transferred to the position of 
Veterinary Surgeon, and served as such from 1867 until 1880.  He then practiced 
his profession as surgeon on the Sandwich Islands three years, and in 1884 he 
located in Petaluma, California, for one year, when he finally came to Woodland, 
where he enjoys a supremacy in the surgical practice of the county.  He takes 
great pride in his profession.
            June 15, 1882, in the Sandwich Islands, the Doctor married Miss 
Valmena Boremann, a native of Bremen, Germany, born there in 1861, and they have 
had five children, viz:  John William, born in 1883, and died the next year; 
Wilhelmine M., September 20, 1885; Fredie L., February 17, 1887; and Bertie, 
December 21, 1888.
 
Source:  Memorial and Biographical History of Northern California, Lewis 
Publishing Co. , 1891
Transcribed by:  Betty Wilson, August 2004  �