Swiss Germans, at Sutter's Fort March 1847.

While at Sutter's Fort, the Donner party was starving in the mountains. The Donner children all survived, but were left orphans. Christian and Mary Brunner took Eliza Donner and Georgia Donner to live with them.

"A few months later [they] moved to Sonoma where they opened a butcher shop and dairy. The dairy on Second Street East, about two blocks south of the plaza. The butcher shop on First Street East, a few doors north of where First joins Napa Street" (Robert Parmalee, "Pioneer Sonoma")

During the Gold Rush "At the Christian Brunner home, two blocks or so from the plaza, Mrs. Brunner opened Sonoma's first hospital where under the oak trees she attempted to care for the miner's ills. Eliza Donner was by this time about seven and able to help her adopted grandmother by bringing water to the sick and in other ways assisting around the informal hospital." (Robert Parmalee, ibid)

From an anonymous article published in the Alta California 7 Oct 1859 (as reported by Robert Parmalee, ibid) "[Of the pioneers who came to Sonoma in 1846] [Christian] Bruner is in the State Prison, for murder, committed while under the crazing influence of strong drink."