Polly wrote: Who added generations 5 through 1 (Harris through Richard) to the information that my cousin sent? I have been trying for years to verify the connection between our John (who married Matilda Wray) to Harris Bradford without success. Greetings Polly, Great to hear from you. Am not sure but expect I did the connection to Harris. A good bit of what I 'see' is done by deduction..... elimination..... no one else available in that particular line. Not very scientific but sometimes..... most times impossible to get help with paper work/proofs or even corrections. I generally also look at the maternal family - in this case Prewitt/Pruitt - her mother was also a Bradford of the Richard line (May Court 1786- Will of THOMAS BRADFORD lends to his daughter ELIZABETH PREWIT) {Two of Elizabeth (Bradford) Prewit's brothers also went to TN, David Bradford to Stewart Co & probably Ephraim of whom nothing is known; Elizabeth also had an Uncle Richard Bradford b. abt. 1738 who could have gone to TN after 1785 but nothing known of him at all.}.... Mary (Prewit) Bradford's brothers Joseph, John Bradford & Thomas J. Pruitt, all went to the same area of TN..... Several of Harris's siblings went to TN also. Remember these families were! 'family' (Pruitt's & Bradford's) before the marriage of Mary & Harris. I also looked at the Wray's, they were early settler's of TN, in the Davidson/Wilson Co area, looks like they came from VA to TN - but nothing really gleaned from their info. The only paper I note is the 1820 census and a paragraph out of the Bradford's of Charles City Co. Sometimes there just is no paper connection we can put our hands on. Do you have an alternative for the father of your John? Once again the beauty of genetics raises its head. 20875 has the 'modal' markers of the Richard line so that eliminates every other Bradford ancestor in the country but descendants of Richard. Since JOHN was born in ABT 1801 in TN, the next step would be to determine which Richard descendants were in TN and available to be his father. Then you eliminate them one by one, some had wills, some had bible records, etc. so their children can be determined. (At the moment I can't remember who I found or looked at.) As we get more Y-DNA results from the different Bradford families it just keeps narrowing down the possibilities. ie. the Fauquier Co, VA results that just came in indicate that you need not look at any of that family who was in TN or KY. We need several more results from that line to confirm the numbers but the one we have is totally unique and kin to no other Bradford lines in the project. (Am interested to see the results of 58679, my line, because historically they have tried to connect through Fauquier Co VA, to Maryland, to Plymouth Colony. My Grandma said so!!! ...not to mention NC History books, etc.) Anyway that's about it... I don't know if Harris is correct or not but do know that I try to look at the entire picture and all probabilities as far as possible. It was an independant conclusion so its interesting that you have been trying to make that connection. I'll also make it clearer on the Participant page that anything above the dotted line is my deduction and not what the participant sent in. Regards, Becky NOTES: 1820 Smith Co., TN Census [26 total Bradford's in TN] BOOKER BRADFORD - brother of HARRIS THOMAS BRADFORD - ID? maybe another line; Orange? THOMAS BRADFORD - ID? maybe another line JOSEPH BRADFORD - could be son of Booker HARRIS BRADFORD - subject 1830 TAX LIST, Gibson Co., TN Harris with sons, Levi, James C. HARRIS and most of his sons ended up in Gibson Co..... but Henderson Co where John ended up is just a few miles further east. They all seem to have migrated west within a few years of each other. James Wray was given the right to operate a ferry at the mouth of Wartrace Creek, and this shows further that that section was then in Smith County. “Ordered that James Wray be allowed to keep a ferry at the mouth of Wartrace Creek on Cumberland River, and that he be allowed the sum of 12 ½ cents for each man and horse; 6 ¼ cents for a single man or a single horse; 12 ½ cents for each pack horse, and for each head of horned cattle 6 ¼ cents; and for all other livestock, two cents for each. For each wagon and team, one dollar; for each cart and team, 50 cents; for each four-wheeled carriage of pleasure, for the conveyance of persons, one dollar; and for each two-wheeled carriage of pleasure, 50 cents, who came into Court and gave security according to law.” This shows the boundary line between Jackson County and Smith County in the year 1802 to have been above the mouth of Wartrace Creek, which is above the present Fort Blount location. ========================================= THIS IS THE GRANDSON OF HARRIS... THIS BIO IS INTERESTING AS IT IS SAYS THE SAME THING I SAID ABOVE ABOUT waiting on the results of my line because they thought that they descended from the Governor. I have Absolem's wife name as MARGARET WARREN.... and Robert's as MARY BAKER - there don't seem to be any Bradford's in her line, so assume Goodspeed mixed up things with Elizabeth, Mother of Mary Pruitt, w. of Harris. (I had not heard any Richard descendants say this but the 'JOHN' line from Richard. All others have a fairly secure paper trail back to Richard, so did not need to 'invent' an ancestor.) ===================================== Goodspeed Bibliographies, 1887, Gibson County, TN Robert D. Bradford is of English descent, and was born in Bedford County, Tenn., July 23,1833, son of Absalom and Margaret (Warren) Bradford, who were North Carolinians, and moved to Middle Tennessee when young. Here they married and became the parents of twelve children. They came to Gibson County in 1836, where they followed agricultural pursuits and spent the remainder of their days. Absalom Bradford was a Democrat, and was a soldier in the War of 1812, and was with Jackson on his Seminole campaign. He was a man of broad mind and liberality, and died in 1849. His widow continued to reside on the old homestead, and died in 1878. Her mother's maiden name was Bradford and she was a relative of Gov. Bradford, of Plymouth Colony. Robert D. Bradford's early days were spent on a farm, and while growing up, his education was wholly neglected. At the age of sixteen he began to battle his own way in the world. He delighted in gaming and horse-racing, but at the same time carried on! farming. In 1853 he married Mary Baker, who was born January 8, 1830, and to their union were born eleven children. In 1855 Mr. Bradford located in the woods on the present side of Bradford, and here has since made his home. When the railroad was built, a town sprang up and took the name of Kimble; but was afterward changed to Bradford in honor of our subject. Mr. Bradford owns eighty acres of land adjacent to the town and in addition to farming, trades to some extent in stock. In 1861 he joined Capt. Walker's company of Twelfth Tennessee Confederate Infantry and was so severely wounded at Shiloh, that he was disabled for further service. He is a Democrat, and a member of the Christian Church. His wife is a Missionary Baptist. P.S. It won't be myself who figures this out ... but as upgrades to 59 markers come in it MIGHT be possible (for Adam) to discern when lineages split in some instances. This would narrow things considerably.