First genealogy blog post - John Bradley

Most of my posts have been about theology or politics. My other interest for most of my life has been genealogy. So here goes.

My father got me interested in genealogy. We have a family Bible that is probably from the 1840s, and the handwritten records in it date to the time of the Revolutionary War. My father's interest over the years has been that family. Mine has been broader, but I have one family in particular that I find very interesting, and one that I would love to know more about.

John Bradley is the earliest person on this line of my mother's. According to town histories from New Hampshire, he was a schoolmaster in the 1790s. His widow remarried in 1801, so he was dead by then. According to the histories, he was an Englishman from Bermuda. I have not found any record of his birth in Bermuda; he was probably born in England. He was a schoolmaster in Stratford and Lancaster, and in Guildhall, a small town in Vermont just across the border. James Curtis of Stratford married August 30, 1801, Sarah Bradley, widow of Stratford's first school teacher, known as "Master Bradley." She was born Oct. 29, 1758. She married John Bradley in Portsmouth, New Hampshire in August 1790. Her name was recorded as Mrs. Sarah Buckley.

They had only one child, apparently. From the town records of Stratford, a Seth Hayes Bradley is recorded along with the Curtis family. Seth served in the War of 1812 (I have all the records that I have been able to find) and had several children. In the 1830s they left for Rochester, New York. He died in 1846. His widow, Ruth M. ???? survived him and lived until at least 1860. She lived with two of her children in Seneca and Tompkins Counties in New York in 1850 and later in 1860 with her daughter, Adelia Read in Chemung County.

Seth's son, Joseph Atwell Bradley served in the Mexican War, and then vanishes after an 1859 Rochester, Springfield Co., Ohio city directory entry. Seth's other son, Sylvester, was my ancestor. He married Martha Emaline Miner, who was descended from many old New England families. They moved to Jackson, Michigan where they lived out their lives. Sylvester joined the Union army (my father recently found a letter that he wrote as he was enlisting) and later died of illnesses he acquired during the war.

So questions:
1. Where do I go for more clues on John's origins?
2. Was Sarah Buckley married before? She was 32 when she married John. She was Mrs. Is there a significance to that?
3. Seth and Ruth were married around 1813. I've searched all the New Hampshire records that I can find online and through the LDS church for a marriage record. No luck. Any suggestions? Could they have been married in another state?

any other suggestions welcomed.

And all the best on your brick walls as well!