Biography
Patrick Breen was born in Ireland circa 1805. In 1828 he emigrated to Canada and sometime thereafter moved to Iowa territory, where he became the owner of a farm. In about 1831 he married Margaret (maiden name unknown). Breen was naturalized in 1844. Patrick and Margaret had seven children -- John, Edward, Patrick, Simon, Peter, James, and Isabella. In the spring of 1846, the Breen family joined a party of emigres bound for California. The party's ill-fated journey across the Sierra Nevada Mountains was partially documented in the diary Breen kept while stranded in a mountain camp at Donner (then called Truckee) Lake. After their rescue, the family arrived at Sutter's Fort, New Helvetia, in March of 1847. The Breens then lived for a short time on the Consumnes River and then in San Jose. In February of 1848 they settled in San Juan Bautista -- becoming its first non-Spanish-speaking residents -- where Breen would live as a rancher for the remainder of his life. Patrick Breen died in 1868.
Though of little formal education, Patrick Breen was able to read and write -- abilities which were considered a mark of distinction for an Irishman of his time in this country --and thus could document one of the more tragic events of the nineteenth-century overland journeys.
From the guide to the Patrick Breen Diary, 1846 November 20-1847 March 1, (The Bancroft Library.)
