Sonoma County Biographies

JAMES WATSON

Transcribed by Sally Kaleta, July, 2007.

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

                   The subject of this sketch, whose portrait appears in this 
volume, was born in county Donegal, Ireland, on Christmas Day of the year 1811, 
and there received his early education. He emigrated to America in 1833, first 
arriving in New York, but soon after moved to New Jersey, and there engaged in 
teaming for two years. Mr. Watson next entered into farming operations in 
Illinois, containing at this until 1853, when, accompanied by his wife and five 
children, he crossed the plains to California, and directly proceeded to Sonoma 
County, and on the 25th day of September of that year located two and a half 
miles east of Bodega Corners, where he farmed until November, 1877, at which 
time he settled on his present place, in Analy township, near Freestone. He 
married, March 9, 1835, Hannah Jackson, a native of England, who was born June 
16, 1817, by whom he has had eleven children, there being now living, John, 
Samuel, James, Sarah, Mary, Hannah, Josephine, and Valentine.
 
Source: "History of Sonoma County, Cal.," Alley, Bowen & Co., San Francisco, 
1880, pp. 481-482.