Southampton County Virginia USGenWeb Archives Obituaries.....Bradshaw, James M., 1921 

************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/va/vafiles.htm
************************************************

JAMES MADISON BRADSHAW

   James M., son of Goodwin and Elizabeth Bradshaw, was born in Southampton 
county, Virginia May 31, 1847. 

   He was the fourth of a family of eleven children, ten of whom lived to 
maturity. He spent his entire life and died in the county of his birth.  His 
career extended through those scenes of distress and poverty which followed 
the Civil War.  His mother was left a widow during the war and upon him 
devolved much of the responsibility for the care of her and the dependent 
members of the family. 

   He acquired an education superior to that of the most of his acquaintances 
in that he attended Westtown Boarding School in 1869 and 1870. 

   When Black Creek Friends completed their new meeting house at the old site 
they shared the joy of the occasion of the first service held therein, January 
4, 1872, with two of their young friends, James M. Bradshaw and Geneva M. 
Babb, who in that first service in that new meeting house took each other for 
husband and wife according to the custom of Friends, and the family then 
established has been ever since linked so closely with the affairs of Black 
Creek monthly meeting that it is almost impossible to recount the history of 
the one without telling of the principle events of the other. 

   For more than 25 years he was superintendent of the Sabbath school. He had 
been treasurer, overseer, elder and was head of the meeting for more than 20 
years and held that responsibility at the time of his death. He also served as 
clerk of Black Creek Preparative meeting throughout the entire existence of 
that body. 

   Soon after their marriage they bought the farm on which they established 
their home and they lived there continuously for more than 47 years.  In this 
home eight children were born, six of whom lived to be grown. 

   The work of James and Geneva Bradshaw, which stands out as a paramount 
service to the community has been their unflagging devotion to the cause of 
the education of their own and their neighbors’ children.  For years and years 
they were the leaders in the support of Friends’ Black Creek school.  They 
helped in securing refined and well equipped teachers.  They helped pay the 
salaries necessary to serve them.  They encouraged parents to send their 
children to school.  Many times they boarded these same teachers in their own 
home at very small cost to the teachers.  They cared for them in sickness, 
took them to school in inclement weather, to the far-off trading centers on 
shopping trips on Saturdays.  In other words, they took these young ladies 
into their hearts and their home and furnished them with the Christian support 
and encouragement which made them the blessing they have been to the many who 
have grown up in old Black Creek school.  Not only can these services to 
education to Southampton county be recorded to the credit of James and Geneva 
Bradshaw, but they also provided their own daughters with sufficient 
educational advantages so that they have been equipped as faithful and 
efficient teachers in this and other communities. 

   James Bradshaw was a man who accepted and performed many and varied 
responsibilities.  Much of the time of his active business career he assumed 
the care of other families and individuals besides his own and carefully 
administered financial responsibility in the care of unfortunate ones in the 
neighborhood. 

   He was active in the cause of temperance and prohibition and worked 
energetically in the interests of that reform for many years.  In his last 
months he had expressed great concern for the welfare of the community, his 
neighbors and the church of which he was a birth-right member and a life-long 
supporter. 

   He peacefully fell asleep April 4, 1921, age 73 years, 10 months and 6 
days.  He is survived by five children, Mrs. Lindley D. Clark, Washington, 
D.C.; J. Jasper Bradshaw, Norfolk; Miss Lizzie B. Bradshaw, Washington, D.C.; 
John D. Bradshaw, Sedley and Mrs. Charles T. Lupton, Denver, Col., and by 
their mother who lives with the satisfaction of having shared in a long and 
useful life and in the hope of a beautiful and happy resurrection. 

   Beautiful and impressive funeral services were held from Friends Black 
Creek Church Thursday morning conducted by Rev. A.E. Cloud of Corinth and Rev. 
Nathan Pickett.  Burial was made in Corinth cemetery and he was laid to rest 
under a bower of many lovely flowers, the last token of love, highest respect 
and esteem his friends could bestow. 


James Madison BRADSHAW, farmer, 
b. 31 May 1847, Southampton Co., d. 4 Apr 1921, Southampton Co., 
interred in Corinth Cemetery, 7 Apr 1921, 
"The Tidewater News" (Franklin, VA), Apr. 8, 1921, p. 1 

*Southampton County Historical Society {SCHS} Cemetery Project, 
   Miscellaneous Cemeteries, Vol. 1 (I-2): 
   http://files.usgwarchives.net/va/southampton/cemeteries/miscvol1.txt 

His widow's obit ("Tidewater News," Apr. 22, 1927, p. 1) is posted at: 
   http://files.usgwarchives.net/va/southampton/obits/b632g1ob.txt 


Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by 
Mrs. Bruce Saunders (bs4403@verizon.net), 
and re-formatted by File Manager Matt Harris. 

file at: 
http://files.usgwarchives.net/va/southampton/obits/b632j1ob.txt