Myth and Mystery

Content: Myths, they crop up everywhere. Sometimes it is a birth date of a significant person in a genealogy which gets picked up from someplace or estimated and someone records it. Others see it, assume it is true and record it in their data. After a while it becomes "fact" because everyone has the same date. As these myths become identified and either proven false or replaced with supported fact, they will be recorded here to help researchers. Please keep an open mind about any "fact" or "myth". You may find evidence which contradicts other evidence and the really serious effort to determine what is correct begins. That's genealogy at its greatest.

Mysteries are those puzzling questions about major events or people in a genealogy. This is not where queries about finding ancestors should be because there are much better places for those such as message boards and mail lists. When a mystery is satisfactorily solved the result can easily migrate to the Life and Legend page.

Myths

• Robert Bradish's parents are John Bradish and Elizabeth Denham of London, England.
  • John Bradishe and Elizabeth Denham were married in London on 24 June 1576. They had 5 children recorded as christened, the 5th being Robert on 4 Nov 1593. Robert was recorded as buried 8 Jan 1593/4. See London letter to Curleys.
• Robert Bradish came over on The Defence landing in Boston on 3 October 1635.
  • Paige's "History of Cambridge...", page 35, does not specifically state Robert Bradish came with Thomas Shepard if you read it carefully taking into account punctuation. At first the wording would lead you to think he may have come with Shepard.
  • Hotten's "The Original Lists of Persons of Quality;..." does not contain any entries in the passenger registers for the Defence which contain Robert Bradish or a group which reasonably fits what we currently know about Robert's family.
  • Robert Bradish bought all of John Steele's land in New towne (Cambridge) on 28 August 1635 (over a month before "The Defence" landed in Boston).

Mysteries

There is no doubt that Robert Bradish (first heard of in Cambridge, Mass., in 1635) is a major figure in the genealogies of those who have proven descent from him. Here are some questions which still remain.

1. What proof exists beyond circumstantial about his place of origin?
   • Evidence in America of Robert's age?
   • Evidence in America of Robert's wife Mary's maiden name?
   • Evidence of Robert and his family coming to America? Ship's port of debarkation? Passenger list?
2. Once the first question is satisfied, who were his parents?
3. When and where did he actually die?