James was born in 1844 in Islington, England to James CRAIG and his wife Jane TAYLOR. It is not known when he first arrived in Australia, but he married Fanny RICHARDS in 1869 at Graytown, Victoria. Fanny was born in 1852 at Forest Creek to Thomas RICHARDS and Grace GILBERT.

James and Fanny were married at Spring Creek on November 18 1869, the day her father Thomas died.

After they married they lived in the Costerfield, Heathcote area before moving to Clunes and then to Prahran, a suburb of Melbourne, where they lived until they moved to Western Australia in 1894.

They had eleven children: Isabella, Grace, Thomas, Elizabeth, William, James, Ellen, John, Alice Maud, Alice May and Frances. All of the children were born in Victoria.

Isabella, who was born in 1870, married John EDMONDS. Grace married Arthur THOMAS. Thomas, born in 1874, married Bridget GOONAN. Elizabeth married James Edgar GOSNELL. William married Catherine McPHERSON. James married Annie HEAL. Ellen married Clement PIDGEON. John married Rosina GOULD. Alice Maud CRAIG, who was born in 1888, died shortly after her birth. Alice May CRAIG, born in May 1890, died at the age of 20 months in February 1892. Then Frances, born in Prahran in 1893, married Albert George COOPER in 1913.

James Alexander CRAIG died in North Fremantle in 1907 and Fanny died in Perth in 1935, both are buried at the Karrakatta Cemetery in Perth.