Mr. Edmiston was born in Washington county, Arkansas, March 29, 1849, a son of Alexander E. Edmiston, who was a native of Virginia and removed to Arkansas early in the nineteenth century. He was a veteran of the Mexican war, serving as a lieutenant in his company under Colonel Yall. A forceful man of unquestioned integrity, he won a substantial financial success and left a valuable estate to his widow and four children, of whom James E. Edmiston was the eldest. A few years prior to his death, becoming convinced that the principle of slavery was wrong, he liberated all of his bondsmen. During the Civil war the vicinity of his home was the scene of great atrocities by both northern and southern renegades. He died in the year 1858.
James E. Edmiston, when a lad of fourteen years, enlisted in 1863 in the Confederate army, in which he had five uncles fighting for the cause. After the close of hostilities he returned to his home in Arkansas and remained long enough to assist in putting the plantation again into shape. He then went to Bentonville, Arkansas, where he attended the Bentonville College for two years, and while a student there he also taught school. In 1870 he went to Omaha, Nebraska, whence he made his way to the Pacific coast. He taught school for a time in Oregon and also pursued a course in the Corvallis College, from which he received his degree in 1873.
On the 13th of March of the same year Mr. Edmiston was united in marriage to Miss Helen E. Lacey, a native of Clackamas county, Oregon, and a daughter of Lewis A. Lacey, who was of French-Huguenot stock, his ancestors having fled to the new world because of religious persecution early in the seventeenth century. The paternal grandfather of Mrs. Edmiston was an officer under Washington and Lafayette in the Revolutionary war and he lost two of his fingers in the battle of Bunker Hill. His son, Lewis A. Lacey, came to the northwest in 1852, making his way to Oregon accompanied by his wife, Leonora (Herring) Lacey, who was a native of Swansea, Wales, their marriage ceremony having been performed at Mount Morris, New York. The services were completed about fifteen minutes before they started on their westward journey to Indiana and from there they traveled with ox team and wagon to Oregon. Mr. Lacey's brother, his brother's wife and child died of mountain fever while en route and many other members of the party were buried by the side of the trail. They suffered on account of hostile Indians and the journey was a most hazardous and difficult one. On reaching the Willamette valley Mr. Lacey took up a donation claim and gave his attention to farming and stock raising, spending his remaining days upon the old homestead at Springwater in Clackamas county, where he passed away in 1899, at the notable old age of ninety-four years. His widow died on the 1st of March, 1900, at the age of seventy-one years.