After practising medicine in Plymouth, Massachusetts, for three years, Dr Merritt, at Daniel Webster's urging, decided to join the California gold rush.

He borrowed heavily from his brother Isaac, bought a 140-ton brig Reindeer, filled it with general supplies, and embarked on his voyage in 1849 as the navigator.

[2]: 12–14 He went back to Bath, Maine, a center for shipbuilding, to visit family in 1853, and commissioned two new barks (including his namesake, Samuel Merritt, 1855),[8] built to his model designed specifically for the coastal lumber trade.

When he was called back to Bath, Maine, in 1862 to settle his brother Issac's estate, he contracted for three more sailing ships (Deacon, 1863; Vidette, 1865; Oakland, 1865), all built to his design for trading.

To achieve this goal, he and his contemporaries resolved complicated and long-standing disputes over tideland ownership through legal maneuvering, negotiated with the railroads, and navigated a series of compromise waterfront arrangements in spring 1868.

[18] Merritt resigned from the board after a two-month investigation by the California State Assembly's public building committee which held him responsible for the young university's very first corruption scandal.

[24][25] His yacht was commanded by Captain Colcord and his party included a photographer, J. W. Taber, a journalist, T. T. Dargie of the Oakland Tribune, and four lady guests.

[27] Robert Louis Stevenson, who chartered Merritt's Casco ($750/month plus expenses) from Summer 1888 to Spring 1889, was delighted with the sailing qualities of the schooner yacht in the South Seas.

She, her fine lines, tall spars and snowy decks, the crimson fittings of the saloon, and the white, the gilt, and the repeating mirrors of the tiny cabin, brought us a hundred visitors.