California Biographies

Source:
History of Napa and Lake Counties
San Francisco, Slocum, Bowen & Co., Publishers. 1881

Transcribed by Peggy Hooper 2011

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


JAMES GILES.  Was born in Rockport, Essex County, Massachusetts, June 16, 1817, where he resided 
until the age of thirteen years. He then followed a sea-faring life for fifteen years, until he was 
twenty-eight years of age. He next settled in Boston, until he came to California, which was in 
November, 1849. He sailed on the schooner " Savilion," via Cape Horn, having the stern boat filled with 
onions. The vessel was owned by the passengers. He sold his onions for fifty cents each, on their 
arrival in San Francisco, where they landed in March, 1850, after a passage of four months and fifteen 
days. He immediately proceeded to the mines, and embarked in mining in the vicinity of Hangtown 
and Georgetown, which he followed until November, 1850. He then, on account of ill health, shipped 
for the Marquise Islands, but went to Valparaiso, where he remained two months. He then once more 
returned .to San Francisco, arriving hi July, 1851. Here he stopped until December of that year, when 
he returned East via the Isthmus of Panama, locating in Boston, where he engaged in the manufacture 
of piano-fortes, which business he followed until 1859. He then returned to San Francisco with his 
family, where he sojourned for six months, and then came to Napa City and engaged in the cabinet 
business, in which he has been steadily engaged since that time, and is the . oldest furniture dealer in 
this city. The subject of this sketch was married October 12, 1849, to Hannah Elizabeth Lange, who was 
born in Whitefield, Maine, in 1829, and by this union they have three living children.  George F., born 
February 22, 1855 ; Antoinette, born June 6, 1859; Dody, born August 4,1866.