My Genealogy Hound

WILLIAM H. BRADLEY, traveling salesman for the firm of Thompson, Wilson & Co., of Paducah, is a native of Georgia, and was born in 1836. His father, Willard Bradley, was a native of Connecticut. His mother, Eliza A. (Rhea) Bradley, was born in Virginia, but reared in Chapel Hill, N. C. These parents moved from Georgia, in 1837, and settled in west Tennessee, where William H. spent his boyhood. When fourteen years old, he became employed as salesman in the dry goods house of William H. Thompson, in Paris, Tenn., and remained with him for eight years. He then went to Paducah and for a time served the wholesale grocery firm of J. W. Sheerer & Co. as book-keeper, but remained only a brief period, when he returned to Paris, where he effected a partnership with his former employer, W. H. Thompson. In 1858, he again went to Paducah, this time as traveling sales man for the house of J. W. Sheerer & Co. They were favored with his services until the fall of 1861, when the results of the war placed an embargo on all business enterprise and Mr. Bradley espoused the cause of the South and entered the Confederate Army, under Gen. Breckinridge, with the commission of captain. Soon after the battle of Shiloh, in which he participated, he was transferred to Forrest’s command and shared in the victories and defeats of that daring leader. In 1866, Mr. Bradley married Miss Lucy C. West, of Paducah. Their children, four in number, are Geven W., Lizzie Y., William C. and Henry L. Bradley. As a business man, Mr. Bradley has rare qualifications, social qualities of a high order and enjoys unlimited confidence. He has traveled for the firm of Thompson, Wilson & Co., since the organization of that house.