It is a mystery to me why and how Isaac Dakin grew to manhood, decided to leave Digby and head southwest. All that I know is that Isaac was born in 1826 in Digby and by the 1850's was a blacksmith in Tuleburg, California. Tuleburg, later known as Stockton, was a port that supplied central California from ships traveling up the Stockton River from the San Francisco Bay. The area exploded with activity as would-be goldminers known as '49ers' descended on the area surrounding Sutter's Mill. Isaac worked in a blacksmith's shop when he met Laura Marie Jameson.
Stockton is to the northwest from Knights Ferry about 45 miles Farmington is about half way to Stockton
Contested Dates
It is a bit fuzzy exactly what happened here, because there is more than one source of information. According to John Criswell, writing about Knights Ferry history, Laura and Isaac were married in Tuleburg, gathered all their belongings and moved to Knights Ferry in 1853. He writes: "On April 2, 1853, two ox-powered freight wagons pulled into Knight's Ferry and stopped in the plaza on Main St. One wagon, loaded with blacksmithing equipment and supplies, was driven by Isaac Dakin. The other, containing personal articles was driven by Isaac's new bride, the former Laura Jameson." The Dakin Family Bible contests this dating. The Bible was given to Laura on January 21, 1861 and records in a flourishing hand that Isaac and Laura were married December 31, 1859. Irene Paden, daughter of Isaac & Laura's first child, Wilbur, writes in Big Oak Flat Road to Yosemite that Isaac and his family built and occupied their house in Knights Ferry in the late '50's. All this is to say, when there is more than one source there is likely a controversy. Gratefully, the rest of the story only briefly interupts John Criswell's Knight's Ferry's Century Old Structures, 1981.
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