Mother: Nancy Murphy b. 1807 d. 1848 ( unknown burial memorials I won't link to)

Joshua m Elizabeth Ann Whitsett on February 14, 1851 in Johnson County, Missouri. Joshua and Elizabeth among other kinfolk and with the James Gilmore family, journeyed West in 1852, taking the Oregon Trail, then the Applegate Trail (the wagon train reached Yreka, CA in 6 mos., 9 days) to Douglas Co., Oregon Territory.
Elizabeth Ann Whitsett died 25 August 1852 along the trail in the Nevada area. He and Elizabeth Whitsett had a daughter. who also died on the trail.

Joshua Barker acquired a Donation Land Claim in the now Dixonville, Douglas Co., Oregon area which is near Roseburg.

During the Oregon Rogue River Indian War of 1855, Joshua was in Co. E, mustered at Fort Vannoy located on the Rogue River 4 mi. west of Grants Pass on November 10, 1855 and discharged on February 1, 1856.

Joshua m. Elizabeth Brown on March 18, 1856 Roseburg, Douglas County, Oregon.

Joshua and his family moved from Oregon to Solano Co., CA in 1865, then to Santa Cruz, CA in 1868, then to Lompoc in 1874.

From his obituary:
"In March, 1852, the couple and their little daughter started across the plains with the Gilmore train, a party of 100. The trip was one of great hardships and privations, twenty-seven of the members dying enroute. Mr. Barker's wife was among the number who died and was buried in Nevada. The train was six months in making the trip from Missouri to Yreka, Cal., and had many encounters with the Indians on the way, the fiercest being at the lava beds which is now East Oregon [now known as the Lava Beds National Monument in Modoc Co., Calif.].

"He had an influential part in having the town [Lompoc] organized as a temperance colony, helped build the first school and the first church, as well as served as road overseer and laid out and built the first roads."

The family moved to Santa Barbara Co., CA in 1874 buying 475 acres in the Lompoc Valley, Mission Vieja area.

"The first 'undertaker' to help in the early colony of Lompoc was Joshua Barker. He came here in the mid-1870s." [Lompoc Chamber of Commerce]