Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 06.djvu/161

 Bradburn recorded of him saving that he well governed this church about eight years.' When he died he was indebted to the queen 1,400l. for tenths and subsidies received in her behalf from the clergy, so that immediately after his death she seized upon all his goods. The patent book of the see records that he 'had not wherewith to bury him.' He was buried in his own cathedral, on the north side of the choir near the altar, under a plain altar tomb, and around him lie his brother prelates, Bishops Marshal, Stapledon, Lacy, and Woolton. A simple Latin inscription was put over him, now much defaced, recording that he was 'nuper Exon. Episcopus.' A shield containing his arms still remains, 'Azure, a pheon's head argent.' His will is in the Prerogative Office. No portrait of him is known to exist. His register concludes his acts with the old formula, 'Cujus animus propitietur Deus, Amen.'

 BRADBURN, SAMUEL (1751–1816), methodist preacher, was an associate of Wesley, and an intimate disciple of Fletcher of Madeley. He was the son of a private in the army, and was born at Gibraltar. On his father's return to England, when he was about twelve years old, he was apprenticed to a cobbler at Chester, and after a course of youthful profligacy became a methodist at the age of eighteen, entered the itinerant ministry about three years later, and continued in it more than forty years till his death. Bradburn was, according to the testimony of all who heard him, an extraordinary natural orator. He had a commanding figure, though he grew corpulent early in life, a remarkably easy carriage, and a voice and intonation of wonderful power and beauty. By assiduous study he became perhaps the greatest preacher of his day, and was able constantly to sway and fascinate vast masses of the people. His natural powers manifested themselves from the first time that he was called upon to speak in public. On that occasion he was suddenly impelled to take the place of an absent preacher, and spoke for an hour without hesitation, though for months previously he had been trembling at the thought of such an ordeal. In the evening of the same day a large concourse came together to hear him again, when he preached for three hours, and found, at the same moment in which he exercised the powers, that he had obtained the fame of an orator. Bradburn was a man of great simplicity, generosity, and eccentricity. Of this once famous preacher nothing remains but a volume of a few posthumous sermons of no particular merit.

 BRADBURY, GEORGE (d. 1696), judge, was the eldest son of Henry Bradbury of St. Martin's Fields, Middlesex. Of his early years nothing is known. He was admitted a member of the Middle Temple on 28 June 1660, was created a master of arts by the university of Oxford 28 Sept. 1663, and was called to the bar on 17 May 1667. For some time his practice in court was inconsiderable. He first occurs as junior counsel against Lady Ivy in a suit in which she asserted her title to lands in Shadwell, 3 June 1684. The deeds upon which she relied were of doubtful authenticity, and Bradbury won commendation from Chief-justice Jeffreys who was trying the case, for ingeniously pointing out that the date which the deeds bore described Philip and Mary, in whose reign they purported to have been executed, by a title which they did not assume till some years later. But the judge's temper was not to be relied upon. Bradbury repeating his comment, Jeffreys broke out upon him: 'Lord, sir! you must be cackling too; we told you your objection was very ingenious, but that must not make you troublesome. You cannot lay an egg but you must be cackling over it.' Bradbury's name next occurs in 1681, when he was one of two trustees of the marriage settlement of one of the Carys of Tor Abbey. His position in his profession must consequently have been considerable, and in December 1688, when the chiefs of the bar were summoned to consult with the peers upon the political crisis, Bradbury was among the number. In the July of the year following he was assigned by the House of Lords as counsel to defend Sir Adam Blair, Dr. Elliott, and others, who were impeached for dispersing proclamations of King James. The impeachment was, however, abandoned. On 9 July, upon the death of Baron Carr, he was appointed to the bench of the court of exchequer, and continued in office until his death, which took place 12 Feb. 1696. The last judicial act recorded of him is a letter preserved in the treasury in support of petition of the Earl of Scarborough, 19 April 1695.