Albert Peabody (1806-1879) and John Eagleston were Salem, Massachusetts merchants who sailed to California in the last months of 1848 to exploit the market for Eastern goods among the miners. Early voyages to California (1874) reprints two pieces from the Historical Collections of the Essex Institute. In the first, Peabody describes his December 1848 sailing with a cargo of foodstuffs and mining tools for the California gold camps, where he remained until 1851. Highlights include a voyage round the Horn and business life in San Francisco and Sacramento. In the second, Eagleston recounts his voyage in October 1848 and his brief stay in San Francisco to sell his cargo before returning east in the summer of 1849.