Joseph Bridger

Joseph Bridger (baptized February 28, 1632– April 15, 1686) emigrated to the Virginia colony from England where he became wealthy and known for supporting Governor William Berkeley and his successors.

Bridger also served in the legislature's upper house, the Virginia Governor's Council, and led troops against the rebels during Bacon's Rebellion in 1676 as well as in 1682, when he helped suppress the tobacco cutters (although he had sympathetized with a similar solution nearly two decades earlier).

[1][2][3] Born in Woodmancote manor in Gloucestershire, England in the winter of 1631/2 and baptized in Dursley parish in late February, he was the third son of Samuel Bridger, auditor for the College of Gloucester, who died in 1650.

[1] He also probably became one of the ten wealthiest Virginians of the era, and built a 15 room manor house on the Whitemarsh plantation in Isle of Wight County, where he lived.

Berkeley refused to call for elections for 15 years), Bridger participated in boundary discussions between Virginia and the neighboring Maryland and North Carolina colonies.

He returned and according to an official report "was very active & Instrumental" in "Reducinge to their obedience the south part of James River" despite plundering of his own property "to a good value.

[1] In 1683, the year in which he wrote his will eventually admitted to probate, Bridger was building houses in Jamestown, presumably reflecting the royal decree requiring councillors to do so, and on November 25, 1692 (long after his death), the Council of State met in one of those accommodations.

Their children were: Bridger died in mid-April 1686, on his plantation in Isle of Wight County, about a year after executing a codicil to his will which disinherited his namesake eldest son for his profligate lifestyle.

[1] His great grandson (William's son) Joseph Bridger (burgess 1758-61) docked the entail at Whitemarsh and Curawayoak in order to sell the property and use the proceeds to purchase slaves.

[17] Only about one-fifth of the corpse was unearthed, so in 2023, family members gave permission for another exhumation, this time of Anne Randall, who was originally buried next to Joseph Bridger on his plantation.