In 1850, his father moved the family to Colusa County, California, a town located in the Sacramento Valley, to begin a small ranch.

Finding there was not enough room for small ranch operations due to Spanish land grants, French's father uprooted his family once again and traveled north in the valley.

French moved southward to Jacinto, California, where he met and accepted employment as a horse breaker with Dr. Hugh James Glenn, a wealthy stockman and wheat baron.

After several years, French's small cattle operation had expanded, helped in large part by Glenn as his financier.

He and his men built fences, drained marshlands and irrigated large areas of land, broke hundreds of horses and mules, and cut and stacked native hay.

A shrewd businessman, French took advantage of the Swamp and Overflow Act, which allowed marshland to be purchased at $1.25 an acre.

In June 1878, the native Paiute and Bannock (both closely associated with the Shoshone tribes) population at the base of the Steens Mountain swooped upon the P Ranch, but not before a messenger could warn French of the impending attack.

[3] John William "Peter" French was buried in Red Bluff, California, next to the graves of his father and mother at the Oak Hill Cemetery.

Supporters of French called the trial "fixed" however, the prosecution aimed for a lesser charge of Manslaughter to counter Olivier's claim of self-defense.

It had been reported that French made it a habit to punish Olivier for his supposed trespassing in humiliating fashion.

Lifelong rancher Alva Springer testified for the defense to French's public ridicule, "Here sits a little man who has nothing to say.

Accurate news reporting for happenings in southeastern Oregon were difficult then as now; the remoteness of the region lent itself to romanticization of the frontier lifestyle, particularly in the larger cities of the west coast.

On 30 December The Oregonian ran a story that said, "He [Olivier] is a man about 30 years of age, small of stature, and looks little like a criminal."

On 29 December, the San Francisco Chronicle reported "French returned a few days ago from Chicago."

In Burns, he had Mart Brenton at the livery stable hook his team onto the buckboard, which was loaded with gifts he had brought for the children of his crew.

His daughter, Helen Biggs Rand, outs her father in her manuscript, A Few Recollections of Burns[7] catalogued in the Harney County Library.

Conflicting accounts state that French returned to Harney County from Chicago by way of Omaha, Nebraska with William Hanley around the middle of December, 1897.

In the December 15th, 1897, edition of the local newspaper, the Burns Times-Herald, it states, "Peter French was in town a few days this week on his way home from the east where he had been with beef cattle."