Henry B. Bradford, Marker E-79 - North Carolina Historical Markers on Waymarking.com

Henry Bradford fought as a private in the War for American Independence and also in 1812 along with four of his sons as part of the Halifax Militia which was mustered to help defend Baltimore. He had his military pay beat into silver tablespoons which still exist. Bishop Francis Asbury's journal records several visits to the Bradford home in 1801-04 and in 1815 and compliments Bradford's work as a Methodist preacher.

Bradford's Meeting House was one of the oldest places of worship in North Carolina, organized in the late eighteenth century and deeded to Bishop Asbury and the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1792. Originally log huts for camp meetings before the first permanent structure was built, Bishop Asbury preached there on Sunday, March 15, 1801. After meetings of the Roanoke Union Society to discuss the reform issues in 1824-25 of which he was an early reform member and for which he was brought to trial with a group of Methodist ministers, the congregation moved into the new branch of Methodism in 1828. It remained a thriving church with a large congregation during the middle and latter part of the nineteenth century but by 1912 membership at Bradford's church had decreased and the building was sold and subsequently torn down. In 1824 Henry Bradford advertised the "Bradford's Female Academy" which subsequently became the Bradford Public School.

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