Many researchers on ancestry.com who have Mary McFarland Bradford, wife of Benjamin Bradford, in their tree show her death date as July 4, 1838. This date is based on a RICE family tree
and a findagrave record that states that she is buried in Witt, Tennessee. This finding is predicated on a supposition that after Benjamin�s death in 1819, Mary moved to Jefferson
County, TN and remarried almost immediately. These researchers believe that Mary married Augustus Rice on April 4, 1821 and had these additional children:
Harriett Newell Rice 1822 � 1885
Eliza Elvira Rice 1823 � 1834
Edwin Augustus Rice 1824 � 1827
Rufus Eldridge Rice 1826 � 1882
Unknown Rice 1828 � 1829
Amanda Malvina Rice 1831 �
If you subtract the date of the birth of Mary�s first �rice child� (1822) from her birth date (1781), you find that she was 41, and 51 when her last �rice child� was born. Nutrition and
fertility on the frontier being what it was, I don�t believe that these researchers have the right Mary McFarland.
A more likely scenario is the one that supports this findagrave record. The discoverer of this grave literally dug up this headstone in the Roach Cemetery in Jackson County, AL.
What evidence is there that this grave is the grave of Mary McFarland Bradford, wife of Benjamin Bradford, son a Joseph Bennett Bradford?
1. That is what the headstone says� Mary Bradford, Wife of Benjamin Bradford.�
2. The dates are very close. The widely accepted birth date for Mary is January 5, 1781. Jan 1781 to June 1835 is 54 years. Her headstone says she was 55. I have the family Bible
record but it does not include Mary�s date of birth.
3. The obituary for her son General James F. Bradford of McMinn County, TN indicates that she did not return to Jefferson City, TN. The Benjamin Bradford family was living in Tennessee
at the time of Benjamin�s death. The earliest of their children can be documented as born in Jefferson County, but later children were probably born elsewhere in Tennessee. After Benjamin�s death, the family moved with the second son William F. (James?) to McMinn County, Athens, TN to study law with Charles Fleming Keith, his uncle by marriage (brother of Catherine Keith, wife of Benjamin�s brother James), where �the care and responsibility of sustaining a widowed mother and providing for the care and education of a large family of brothers and sisters� is cited in his obituary. Please see the obituary attached to James F. Bradford in this same tree.
Obituary Secondary Source: Bettye J. Broyles, �Excerpts of Obituaries from The Athens Post 1839-1869� Tennessee Ancestors (August 1999), pp. 128-129.
4. Two of Mary�s children and at least three of her nephews moved to the same area of Jackson County, AL where her grave is found.
A. Son Jacob Tipton Bradford
This item about son Jacob Tipton�s marriage to Louisa Taul of Winchester, TN is found in the National Banner in 1829.
Mr. Tipton Bradford of Bellefonte, Ala., married in Winchester on the 17th inst. to Miss Louisiana Taul. NATIONAL BANNER (Sat. Nov. 21, 1829)
Jacob Tipton Bradford is found in Alabama in the 1830 census as well. And according to the History of Alabama and Dictionary of Alabama Biography by Thomas McAdory Owen, LL.D (1933), pp. 196-198:
Gen. Bradford was reared on farms in Morristown and McMinnville , Tenn. He was well educated, and settled in Jackson County as a merchant in 1827. In 1832 he was appointed register in the land
office at Montevallo for the Tallapoosa Land District, by President Jackson, and was still holding the position when the office was moved to Mardisville. He was elected major-general of the Eighth
division of Alabama militia in 1836. By act of the general assembly, passed that same year, Gen. Bradford and Gen. Crabb were appointed to digest and prepare a military code which they submitted in
the fall of 1837. The code was adopted and was known as Bradford's and Crabb's Digest. When the land office was transferred to Lebanon in 1842, he made the transfer also, but returned to Talledega
County in 1845.
So it can be documented that Jacob lived in Jackson County full-time between 1827 and 1832, if not longer.
B. Daughter Sarah Bradford Roach
According to �The Bradford Family of Fauquier County, Virginia� by Mrs. Philip Wallace Hiden, Sarah, daughter of Benjamin and Mary, married Charles Roach. Charles and his second wife Margaret are
buried in the Roach Cemetery in Jackson County, AL, the same cemetery as Mary McFarland Bradford. It is assumed that Sarah�s headstone has disappeared over time. Like Mary's headstone, it was not
part of the cemetery census. Sarah died at age 26 and Charles remarried.
C. Nephew Alexander Hamilton Coffey
Alexander is the son of Benjamin�s sister Sara Bradford Coffey. The Coffeys were already well-established in Jackson County by 1830. Further evidence of the fact that these families lived in the
same geographical area is found in the fact that Alexander and his family are also buried in the Roach Cemetery.
D. Nephew Benjamin Bradford Coffey
Benjamin is the son of Benjamin�s sister Sara Bradford Coffey. The Coffeys were already well-established in Jackson County by 1830. Further evidence of the fact that these families lived in the same
geographical area is found in the fact that Alexander and his family are also buried in the Roach Cemetery.
E. Nephew John Reid Coffey
General John Reid Coffey is the son of Benjamin�s sister Sara Bradford Coffey. The Coffeys were already well-established in Jackson County by 1830. John Reid Coffey was a sheriff of Jackson County and
together with cousin Jacob Tipton Bradford who served as land agent, bought large tracts of land in Jackson County. John Reid Coffey is buried in the Cross Cemetery with his wife 's (Mary Ann Cross') family.
Therefore, it seems likely that single young man Jacob Tipton and his cousins moved to Alabama first, ahead even of the 1832 Treaty of Eschota. Jacob married in 1829. Perhaps at this time, his mother
and sister Sarah followed him to Jackson County, where Sarah married a Jackson County man, Charles Roach. Jacob Tipton moved to Talladega in 1832, but Sarah and Mary remained in Jackson County. Mary
died in 1835, and Sarah in 1840.
***Children that have grave records on Findagrave.com:
