Sacramento
County
Biographies
George Alexander
McDonell, farmer, was born April 23, 1829, four miles east of Cornwall, Canada,
and went to Brighton, on Lake Ontario, about eighty miles from East Toronto,
when eight years of age. His parents
were Duncan McDonell, merchant, born in Canada, of Scotch parents, who was in
the war of 1812 and was a half-pay officer at the time of his death, in 1852,
and Mary (Chisolm) McDonell, also a native of Canada, daughter of Colonel
Chisolm, who was at one time a Member of Parliament. She died February, 1877.
In 1859 G. A. McDonell was in Kansas freighting goods by wagon across
the plains from Atchison and Fort Leavenworth to Pike’s Peak, where he was at
the time of the excitement there and witnessed some strange things. Returning to Canada, he went to the Cariboo
mines in British Columbia, going by steamer to St. Thomas and to Victoria, and
there took river boats up the Fraser River to Fort Douglas; thence he packed
across the mountains, following the river, crossing two or three small lakes on
the way, and arriving at the mines about the middle of July. Finding there that the cost of a square meal
was $3.50 and everything else proportionately dear, and not having much money,
he concluded not to remain; September 5, 1862, he reached San Francisco with
$1.50 in his pocket. He found that city
full of discontented men seeking for work.
He went to an employment office for a job and was sent to Alviso, above
Red Wood City, where he went to work bailing hay; then cooked for awhile for
$40 a month; next went to pitching hay.
After finishing there he returned to San Francisco, saw an advertisement
in the paper for a wood-chopper, obtained a letter of introduction from a
friend in this city and came to Sacramento.
He took a contract for chopping wood along the line of the Valley
railroad, from Mr. Robinson. That
winter he cut 800 cords of wood, and the next hauled 1,600 to the railroad
track for shipment. Next he followed
teaming over the mountains for several years, until the railroad was built past
Reno, Nevada. In 1869 he purchased his
present farm, which is about eleven miles east of Sacramento. He has 160 acres devoted to grain and ten
acres in vineyard and orchard. He was
married April 23, 1873, to Eliza Fisher, daughter of Philip Fisher, who was
born in Sacramento County, April 4 1856.
They have six children, three sons and three daughters: Mary, born March
15, 1874; Ida, May 15, 1876; George, July 8, 1881; Archie, July 22, 1882;
Grace, February 7, 1885; and Eddie, July 2, 1887.
Transcribed
by Karen Pratt.
Davis, Hon. Win. J., An Illustrated History of
Sacramento County, California. Page 498-500. Lewis Publishing Company.
1890.
©
2005 Karen Pratt.