San Joaquin County
Biographies
ENOCH PEYTON
ENOCH PEYTON, a resident of
San Joaquin County with brief exceptions since 1850, was born in Stafford
County, Virginia, in 1831, a son of William Washington and Lucy (Mason) Peyton,
both natives of that county, the father born in 1799, and the mother in 1801.
The father owned several hundred acres, and three or more country stores. The
mother died in 1838, leaving ten children, of whom eight grew to maturity, and
of these three are living in this State in 1890: Valentine M., of this city;
Miss Mary E., of San Francisco, and the subject of this sketch. After the
mother’s death the father moved to Mississippi, settling on a cotton plantation
near Jackson, where he died in 1847. Grandfather Valentine Peyton, M. D., an
English emigrant, joined the patriots of the Revolution and served as a surgeon
in the army of Virginia during the struggle for independence, and was married
in that State after the war, to a Miss Washington, a relative of General
Washington. Grandfather Enoch Mason was a planter at Clover Hill, Stafford
County, Virginia, and was married to Miss Lucy Roy, both dying in that State a
few years apart, aged about fifty.
The subject of this sketch received a
limited education in his youth in Virginia and Mississippi, and at about the
age of fifteen went to work for his brother, William W., a commission merchant
in New Orleans. With another brother, John R., and his comrade, William Crow,
Enoch Peyton came to California across the Isthmus in 1850, arriving in San
Francisco August 21, 1850. All three went to mining on the north fork of the
American river remaining about two months, gathering each about an ounce a day
in gold dust. After a brief stay in Martinez, they came to Stockton, whence he
went with Mr. Crow to Sonora, but soon returned to this city and went to
teaming to the southern mines for wages one year. He then bought his own team
and continued freighting on his own account about twelve years. He remembers
selling a span of mules in 1855 for $1,100. In 1863 he went to Idaho with two
mule teams, having sold the rest of his stock before leaving, returning to this
city every winter but one during his stay in that section. The venture in Idaho
in 1868, he went to farming on his place during the year 1869. He owned also
320 acres on the French Camp road, a few miles within the eastern limits of
this county, and on that ranch he went into the business of sheep-raising in
1870, driving his flocks to the mountains in summer, and grazing them on his
ranch and other rented pastures in winter, sometimes owning as many as 6,000
head. In the fall of 1875 he closed out his sheep industry and embarked in the
public house business at his present stand, 232 Main street.
Mr. Enoch Peyton was married in Stockton
in 1868, to Miss Mary V. Bateman, born here about 1851, a daughter of Dr.
Bateman and his wife, by birth a Miss Kimberlin. Mr. and Mrs. Enoch Peyton have
two living children: Edmund Randolph, born in 1874, and Harry Mason, born in
1878. Mr. Enoch Peyton is a member of the San Joaquin Valley Society of California
Pioneers.
Transcribed by: Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
An Illustrated History of San Joaquin County, California,
Pages 633-634. Lewis Pub. Co. Chicago,
Illinois 1890.
© 2009 Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
Golden Nugget Library's San Joaquin County
Biographies
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