SAMUEL BRADFORD-HIS PRESS.

5

ence over so wide a circle as the Bradfords exerted through the press. From December 2, 1742, until 1791, or for half a century, The Pennsylvania Journal was devoted with a fearless patriotism to the cause of our country during the continuance of three great wars, the old French War (1739 to 1748), the French and Indian or Seven Years' War (1757 to 1765), and the American Revolution (1776 to 1783).

Thomas Bradford, LL.D., was the youngest of three brothers, all of whom became printers. Samuel, the eldest, was a leader among men, a Grand Master of the Free Masons, the publisher of The Portfolio, the Spectator of its period, and of Rees' Encyclopedia; the founder of three bookstores, each in a large city; and the friend of Talleyrand, while that diplomatist was in Philadelphia. Thomas, on leaving the University of Pennsylvania, at the close of the Junior year, by the request of his father, at fifteen years of age, learned the art of printing in his father's office. At the age of eighteen, with his father's consent, he engaged in legal studies, and became a member of the bar in 1802. In May, 1805, he married Elizabeth, the eldest daughter of Vincent Loockerman, Esq., of Dover, Delaware, who died before him, April 12, 1842, and by whom he had four sons and one daughter.

In 1842, President Tyler sent the name of Thomas Bradford, LL. D., to the United States Senate as Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The Senate, contrary to all expectations, refused to confirm him, exclusively on political grounds, because Mr. Bradford had opposed in a public meeting the plan of Mr. Clay to re-charter the Bank of the United States. In 1813, Thomas

6

THOMAS BRADFORD'S PHILANTHROPY.

Bradford, LL. D., publicly joined, as a professing Christian, the Second Presbyterian Church, of which his paternal grandfather, Colonel William Bradford, the patriot printer, was one of the founders, and in which, while an infant, Thomas had been baptized. Under the watchful care of a pious mother, he was religiously trained, and during the ministry of the Rev. Thomas H. Skinner, D. D., associate pastor of the Second Church, he withdrew with a colony and founded the Fifth Presbyterian Church, Arch Street, west of Tenth. Of this church he was an elder for twenty years, often commissioner to the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, and honored by it with frequent marks of respect and confidence. For several years he was director in the Theological Seminary at Princeton, a member of the Board of Publication, and trustee of the Old School Presbyterian Church Assembly.

Thomas Bradford was an active Christian. In 1818 he was engaged, with Francis Markoe, Esq., in gathering on the east side of Juniper Street, below Walnut, "a ragged school," which for several winters they taught in letters and the doctrines of Christianity. During his rural residence in Hamilton Village (now West Philadelphia), from 1817 to 1822, he conducted public worship once or twice every Sabbath in the academy of that village; and this activity was instrumental in forming two churches of different denominations, now prominent in West Philadelphia. As far back as 1815, Thomas Bradford advocated the principle of solitary confinement, with moral and religious instruction, as the remedy for the evils attendant upon the indiscriminate association of prisoners, night and day, and labored to promote its adoption by

WIDE SCOPE OF HIS USEFULNESS.

7

the Legislature of Pennsylvania. These efforts led to the appointment of a Board of Commissioners, of which he was one, for the erection of the Eastern Penitentiary at Cherry Hill (Twenty-second and Fairmount Avenue), Philadelphia, of which he was appointed, until his death, one of the inspectors, by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. For forty years, he was the "Prisoner's Friend," and expressed with earnestness his conviction that the gospel of Christ, accompanied by the agency of the Holy Spirit, was the only power to reform men, and that solitary confinement, or any other penitentiary discipline, were powerless without these aids. Prior to the transfer of the prisoners to Cherry Hill, Thomas Bradford was a member of the Board of Inspectors of the old Penitentiary at the corner of Sixth and Walnut Streets.

As a corporate member of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions at Boston, and as a founder of the American Sunday-school Union, Mr. Bradford's religious activity shows a wide-spreading charity which embraces Christians of all denominations. On the twenty-fifth day of October, 1851, he passed away, loved and honored by all who knew him. His beloved wife, and partner in life for thirty-seven years, had been taken from his side nine years previously. He was beloved and venerated in the church, at the bar, and in all the walks of private and public life.

Such was the paternal ancestry of Vincent L. Bradford. His maternal lineage dates back to the foundation of the colony of New Amsterdam (New York). The first ancestor was Govert Loockerman, who came over with Vouter Van Twiler, governor of the New Netherlands, in April, 1633, from Holland, and married Maria Jansen (daughter of Roelf Jansen and Anetetje Jans),

8

MATERNAL LINEAGE. THE LOOCKERMANS.

and thus was brother-in-law of Oloff Stevenson Van Courtland, whose son founded the Van Courtland Manor, in New York. He held high civil and military offices. Govert Loockerman died in 1670, leaving five children: 1. Elsie; 2. Cornelis; 3. Jacob; 4. Johannes; 5. Maritjie. Elsie married Cornelis P. Vandexven; and for second husband, Jacob Leisler, the martyr patriot of New Amsterdam. Maritjie Loockerman, daughter of Govert Loockerman, married Balthazar Bayard (step-son to Governor Stuyvesant), and had children: 1. Anna Maria Bayard, who married Augustus Jay (grandfather of Governor Jay); 2. Arietta Bayard, who married Samuel Verplank; 3. Jacobus Bayard, who married Hellegonda DeKay; 4. Judith Bayard, who married Gerardus Stuyvesant, grandson of the last Dutch Governor, Peter Stuyvesant. There are no families more prominent than these in the history of the Empire State.

Jacob Loockerman, the son of Govert, was born at New Amsterdam, in 1650, and married, January 29, 1677, Helena Ketin. About 1681 he emigrated to Eastern Maryland, and died August 17, 1730. His son Nicholas, born November 10, 1697, married Sally Emerson, daughter of Vincent Emerson, in 1721, and died March 6, 1769, leaving one child, who was Vincent Loockerman, and was born near Dover, Delaware, in 1722, and married, as his second wife, Elizabeth Pryor, daughter of John Pryor, of Dover, February, 1774, who had two children, Elizabeth and Nicholas. Elizabeth Loockerman, his daughter, born December 23, 1779, married Thomas Bradford, LL.D., of Philadelphia, and thus became the mother of Vincent L. Bradford, the subject of this memoir.

CHAPTER II.

His Birth.-Childhood.-Some Persons who were then Prominent, and Some who were Not.-A Bird's-eye View of Philadelphia in his Boyhood.-His Precociousness.-Early Familiarity with the Doctors in the Temple, and their Doctrines.-His Schoolmasters and School Training in Classical Learning, and its Effect on Character.-His University Course, and its Honors.-Home Life.-Ministry of Rev. Thomas H. Skinner, D.D.-His Edwardean Theology.-Strength and Influence of the Fifth Presbyterian Church.-Visit of the Marquis de Lafayette. His Salutatory Address to that Noble Guest.-Student at Law.-Admission to the Bar of Philadelphia.-His Marriage.

VINCENT L. BRADFORD was born in the old city of Philadelphia, September 24, 1808. His childhood and youth were spent, with short periods of recreation in summer, between South and Vine Streets, and between the Schuylkill and Delaware. The family occupied three residences, Sixth below Chestnut, west side; Spruce, west of Sixth, south side, and for forty years, 705 Sansom Street. When he was five years old his father united, by profession of his faith, with the Second Presbyterian Church, and, when Vincent was ten, led out a colony from the Second, which became the Fifth Presbyterian Church. The early influences which moulded his childhood were most favorable in Church and State.

Great changes have occurred in Philadelphia since that day, but there is great reason to doubt whether the moral and religious training of our children is more desirable than in that era. If we compare dates, history informs us that during his youth George IV. was King of England, and Queen Victoria was not born; that Napoleon the Great was a prisoner at St.