James Nesmith was born in what is now the Canadian province of New Brunswick (which was a British colony at the time) while his parents were on a visit from their home in Washington County, Maine, on July 23, 1820.

[1] Of Scottish and Irish heritage, his father was William Morrison Nesmith and his mother the former Harriet Miller.

[2] Nesmith planned on traveling the Oregon Trail with Elijah White in 1842, but was late to arrive and instead left the next spring with Marcus Whitman after working as a carpenter in the interim at Fort Scott in Kansas.

[2][3] He finished his term in 1846 and moved to Polk County where he took a land claim, began farming, and married Pauline Goff on June 21, with whom he would have seven children.

[2] In 1847, he was elected to the Provisional Legislature of Oregon from Polk County, and served briefly in the 1848 session before resigning.

[1] Nesmith was elected to the Forty-third Congress to fill the vacancy caused by the death of his cousin, Joseph G. Wilson, and served from December 1, 1873, to March 3, 1875.