San Joaquin County
Biographies
GEORGE WASHINGTON TRAHERN
GEORGE WASHINGTON TRAHERN, a
rancher, residing in Stockton, was born in Mississippi, April 15, 1825, a son
of Wesley and Delilah (Braschear) Trahern. The father, a native of Virginia,
moved to Mississippi, where he became owner of a plantation on Pearl river,
seven miles below Jackson, the State capital. There he raised cotton and corn
chiefly, besides dealing in stock. He was married at the home of his bride, on
the Tombigbee, in Alabama. They had three sons and two daughters, the latter
still living in Texas; of the sons only the subject of this sketch survives. In
his youth he acquired some knowledge of cattle on his father’s place, and
afterward from a brother-in-law in Texas, where he also handled some cattle on
his own account. He joined the Texas rangers in the struggle for separation
from Mexico, and with them enlisted for the Mexican war, serving to the end,
and is a pensioner of that war. With fourteen others he set out for California
in 1849, coming by way of Chihuahua, Mexico, and arriving in Wood’s Diggings,
near Sonora, he gathered a little gold in a brief trial of that industry. He
then pushed on for the plains, and in the fall settled in this county, near
what is now Linden, and engaged in the cattle business. In 1850 he was joined
by John McMullen, one of his companions on the trip from Texas, and they
located 160 acres each on the Calaveras, about three miles north of Linden. In
1851 they formed a partnership, and in 1852 bought 400 acres adjoining the 320,
making a compact body, which they made headquarters for their stock business.
In 1852 Mr. Trahern went East and drove 1,000 cattle across the plains. They
also had free range of large tracts in those days, reaching sixteen miles south
to the Stanislaus and as far to the east, to the limits of the county, shared
in, however, by other cattle dealers. At the death of his partner, in 1868,
they owned 21,000 acres in different parts of the county, which were divided
between himself and the McMullen heirs in the spring of 1869. Mr. Trahern has
continued in the stock right along, being thus engaged in this county for forty
years. He owns 8,600 acres in Castoria Township, at the mouth of the
Stanislaus, and 3,342 acres on “the west side,” in Tulare Township. Of the
former tract he farms 3,300 acres, and of the latter, 1,500, raising wheat
chiefly, but also considerable barley and rye.
Mr. Trahern was married March 1, 1860, to
Miss Henrietta B. Childers, born in Missouri, in 1842, a daughter of Johnson
and Margaret (Blair) Childers. The father, a native of Kentucky, had moved to
Missouri, and thence to California in 1852. He mined for a time at Volcano, in
Amador County, and afterward settled in Calaveras County, where he carried on
the Half-way House on the Mokelumne Hill road for a few years. About 1855 he
settled in this county, where he died at the age of forty-seven, leaving six
children, of whom five are living.
Mr. and Mrs. Trahern are the parents of
five living children: Laura Trahern; Rachel C., the wife of N. C. Farnam, a
merchant of Bantas, in this county, has one child, Henrietta Hazel, born June
19, 1887; Bessie Lee, now Mrs. Percy Williams, of Union Island, has one child,
Thomas Hansford Williams, born in November, 1889; Lydia Trahern and David
Douglass Trahern.
Mr. G. W. Trahern is a member of the San
Joaquin Valley Society of California Pioneers since 1868.
Transcribed by: Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
An Illustrated History of San Joaquin County,
California, Pages 650-651. Lewis Pub.
Co. Chicago, Illinois 1890.
© 2009 Jeanne Sturgis Taylor.
Golden Nugget Library's San Joaquin County
Biographies
Golden Nugget Library's San Joaquin County
Genealogy Databases