Monday, September 19, 2011

Did You Know # 39

Susan B. Anthony, raised in a Quaker family and a strong anti-slavery proponent, is best known for her long career as an advocate for the right of women to vote.

Born near Adams, Massachusetts on February 15, 1820. The family relocated to New York state where her father established a school, where Susan and her siblings received their formal education. When she was about 17 her father enrolled Deborah Moulson's Female Seminary in Philadelphia, in 1837. It was about this time that the Anthony family, like so many others, suffered a catastrophic economic loss in the Panic of 1837.

Later, Susan would go on to become a teacher herself at Eunice Kenyon's Friends' Seminary in New Rochelle, New York. But when her father entered the insurance business Susan relocated to the family farm near Rochester, NY.  It was here that Susan B. Anthony joined a woman's rights group, the Daughters of Temperance (1848). However, when she was not allowed to speak at an event in Albany, NY, because she was a woman, she left this group and formed her own group, the Woman's New York State Temperance Society.

As the Civil War approached much of her attention was directed toward anti-slavery rallies and after the war she, and many other like-minded people, was instrumental in the passing of the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution.

So, how is our family related to Susan B. Anthony? As the chart below demonstrates, Grandpa Bragg and Susan B. Anthony were 8th cousins 4 times removed. Their common relative was Henry and Agnes Butler Sherman. This couple was Susan B. Anthony's 7th great-grandparents and Grandpa Bragg's eleventh great-grandparents.


Henry and Agnes Butler Sherman
Henry Sherman b.1546
Edmund Sherman b.1548
Samuel Sherman b.1571
Edmund Sherman b.1572
Philip Sherman b.1610
Esther (or Hester) Sherman b.1606
Edmund Sherman b.1641
Esther Ward b.1623
David Sherman b.1680
Daniel Burr b.1660
Hannah Sherman b.1727
Elizabeth Burr b.1696
Hannah Lapham Nathaniel Hull b.1726
Daniel Anthony
Ezekiel Hull b.1765
Susan Brownell Anthony b.1820
Platt Hull b.1787

Ezekiel Hull b.1813

Rebecca L. Hull b.1841

Frank Martin Bragg b.1867

Orval Bishop Bragg b.1895