{"id":62197,"date":"2020-10-07T14:30:25","date_gmt":"2020-10-07T18:30:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.genealogybank.com\/?p=62197"},"modified":"2023-12-28T11:16:00","modified_gmt":"2023-12-28T16:16:00","slug":"quaker-trailblazers-the-unconventional-biddles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/quaker-trailblazers-the-unconventional-biddles.html","title":{"rendered":"Quaker Trailblazers: The Unconventional Biddles"},"content":{"rendered":"

Introduction:<\/em><\/strong> In this article, Melissa Davenport Berry begins a series about one of the oldest and most storied families in America: the Biddles. Melissa is a genealogist who has a blog, AnceStory Archives<\/a>, and a Facebook group, New England Family Genealogy and History<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Sydney Biddle Barrows, the notorious \u201cMayflower Madam\u201d of Manhattan, has some remarkably interesting ancestral lines \u2013 and like her ancestors, she is a \u201ctrailblazer.\u201d But before cataloging her many firebrand Mayflower<\/em> ties, I first searched GenealogyBank\u2019s Historical Newspaper Archives<\/a> for her early Biddle line and allied families, who proved just as revolutionary!<\/p>\n

\"Photo:<\/a>
Photo: Sydney Biddle Barrows; used with her permission. Credit: Lance Evans Photography.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

An article \u201cWhat Won\u2019t These Biddles Do Next!\u201d by Madelin Blitzstein, published in the Evansville Press<\/em> in 1932, clearly demonstrated that being a Biddle by tradition meant that you were bred to be unconventional \u2013 and you were expected to outrage the society circles.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
Evansville Press (Evansville, Indiana), 7 February 1932, page 23<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Blitzstein wrote:<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
Evansville Press (Evansville, Indiana), 7 February 1932, page 23<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

All the wealthy aristocrats featured in this newspaper article will be covered later, but today I start with the spark plug forerunners.<\/p>\n

Blitzstein wrote that the Philadelphia Biddle line came out of\u00a0a 500-acre plantation called \u201cMount Hope,\u201d the seat of the New Jersey Biddle family. The first Biddle to settle in America, William Biddle, was a Quaker who arrived before Pennsylvania\u2019s William Penn. William sailed over with Sarah Smith Kemp from England. The family archives note that William had been raised by his uncle Thomas Biddle and wife Esther\/Hester.<\/p>\n

A 1985 article in the San Francisco Chronicle<\/em> about the \u201cMayflower Madam\u2019s\u201d upcoming trial provided background on her Biddle family line:<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
San Francisco Chronicle (San Francisco, California), 7 January 1985, page 18<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

William Biddle was not the only jail bird in his family. Esther and Thomas appear on London\u2019s Mayor Brown prison list along with him from 1660-61 for attending \u201cnonconformist\u201d meetings.\u00a0Esther was arrested 14 times for \u201cTruth\u2019s sake\u201d and composed\u00a0\u201cThe trumpet of the Lord sounded forth unto these three nations\u201d during one of her lockups. She traveled abroad to spread her ministry, which included a trip to Newfoundland with Quakeress Mary Fisher.<\/p>\n

William was a close friend of William Penn, and helped him get out of prison in England. The evidence is in the letters and diary of Penn. According to descendant Tony Biddle of Philadelphia, when William Penn was released from prison his repayment to Biddle was land in America. Penn, paraphrased by Tony Biddle: \u201cI want to repay you, and the good news is, I have a lot of land. The bad news is, it\u2019s about 3,000 miles that way.\u201d<\/p>\n

William Biddle was a signer of \u201cConcessions and Agreements.\u201d the constitution signed by the first West Jersey proprietors. In 1952 Lydia Rickman published \u201cThe Source of William Biddle\u2019s English Fortune,\u201d and provided substantial evidence that his wife Sarah bankrolled the property in New Jersey with her inheritance from wealthy family merchants. The Biddles owned one-eighth of the providence of West Jersey, nearly 43,000 acres!<\/p>\n

William\u2019s son, William Biddle II, was prominent in the affairs of West Jersey; he was appointed by the Council of Proprietors on 2 November 1703 to treat with the Indians for lands above the Falls, and at his father\u2019s death inherited 12,905 acres of land in the Lotting Purchase.<\/p>\n

He married Lydia Wardwell, daughter of Eliakim and Lydia (Perkins) Wardwell. The Wardwells had their share of religious persecution, and Eliakim\u2019s wife Lydia is cited in a New York Journal of Commerce<\/em> newspaper article about how she addressed her discontent with the wicked Puritan rulers. She stripped down naked at the meeting house to make her point! John Greenleaf Whittier, America\u2019s \u201cQuaker poet,\u201d published a poem and story on the drama.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
New York Journal of Commerce (New York, New York), 7 February 1848, page 2<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Wardwells moved to Shrewsbury, New Jersey, and Eliakim became one of the first Quaker ministers in the town. He also served as sheriff of Monmouth County and was a member of the House of Deputies and General Assembly. The Biddle-Wardwell marriage is recorded in the Society of Friends.<\/p>\n

The family also has ties to the Salem Witchcraft hysteria of 1692. Eliakim\u2019s brother Samuel Wardwell of Andover, Massachusetts, would hang for witchcraft and Lydia’s aunt, Mary Perkins Bradbury, was jailed, but escaped the rope.<\/p>\n

Coming: Sydney Biddle Barrows\u2019 5th great grandparents, William Biddle III and his wife Mary Scull, who relocated to Philadelphia, and descendants who would comprise the first major branch of the prominent Philadelphia Biddle line.<\/p>\n

Sources & Further Reading:<\/strong><\/p>\n