Background
James Willis Nesmith was born on July 23, 1820 in New Brunswick, Canada, while his parents were visiting there. Descended from James Nesmith, a Scotch-Irish founder of Londonderry, New Hampshire, he was the son of William Morrison Nesmith, of Washington County, Maine, and Harriet Willis, who died before he was a year old. His father's extensive holdings in New Brunswick were destroyed in 1825 by a forest fire from which the family barely escaped, the step-mother dying from resulting exposure. James then lived with various relatives in New England, learning at a tender age to earn his own living. He loved books, mastered their contents almost without effort, and retained what he had learned, an aspiring spirit in a superb body.