Benjamin Watrous

Benjamin Watrous was the son of Jeremiah Watrous and Sarah Lanphear. His father was by occupation a farmer. Benjamin also had a brother, Leonard, born in 1828, and a sister Sarah Maria.

Benjamin received a common-school education and helped on his father's farm until he set out for California in 1850. He left New York April 30, by the steamer Georgia to Havana, thence by the steamer Falcon to Chagres, then by boat to Gorgona, and from that point overland to Panama, whence he came by a sailing vessel to San Francisco, arriving on the 6th of August, 1850. He went to mining in Tuolumne County and continued in that line of work seven years. Among other ventures he embarked with fifteen others in quartz mining at Carson Hill, Calaveras county, and lost money in the enterprise. He then engaged in raising hay, below Chinese Camp, about seventeen miles from Sonora, and sold some of his product at good prices. He once saw some hay sold there at $150 a ton. About 1860 he engaged in hog-raising, which he continued for several years, together with other stock, in the later years. Meanwhile he went East by the Nicaragua route in 1863, and was married in Three Rivers, Massachusetts, September 2 of that year, to Miss Ellen Maria Goff, born in Ware, Massachusetts, September 7, 1846, a daughter of Benjamin Franklin Goff and Amelia Calkins. Amelia was the sister to Abel H. Calkins who married Benjamin's sister Sarah Maria Watrous.

Mr. and Mrs. Watrous set out for California a few weeks after their marriage, leaving New York in October, and arriving by way of Panama and San Francisco in Chinese Camp, Tuolumne County, November 13, 1863. Here Mr. Watrous resumed his stock-raising pursuits, and in November, 1870, took up his residence in Stockton, San Joaquin County, still continuing to trade in hogs and sheep for a few years. He also bought and sold lands in San Joaquin County as well as in Stanislaus, Merced, Fresno, Tulare and Kern counties including 640 acres, mostly in Merced County, which was farmed by renters, and 6,000 acres in Kern County, not under cultivation. He was a member of the San Joaquin Valley Society of California Pioneers.

Biography extracted from: An Illustrated History of San Joaquin County California, The Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago 1890, pp. 321-322.

Benjamin and Ellen had five children: Willie, born Sept. 10, 1865, died May 8, 1866 Frederick, born March 29, 1867 Emma, born October 26, 1869 Alice Maria, born June 11, 1872 Benjamin Franklin, born May 18, 1875 Sketches of his later years Left - Ben Watrous at his home on Union Street in Stockton, California

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