Bridgeman family, Earls of Bradford

John Bridgeman (1577-1652), Bishop of Chester, acquired estates at Great Lever and elsewhere in Lancashire. His son, Sir Orlando Bridgeman, 1st baronet (1609-74), Keeper of the Great Seal, married in 1628 Judith Kynaston, through whom the Morton (Shropshire) estate was inherited. He purchased further lands in Shropshire (Knockin, Ness etc.) and Warwickshire (Castle Bromwich). His son, Sir John Bridgeman, 2nd bt. (1631-1710), married in 1663 Mary Cradock of Caverswall (Staffordshire), who brought property in Stafford; and Sir John Bridgeman, 3rd bt. (1667-1747) married Ursula, daughter and heir of Roger Matthews of Blodwell (Shropshire).

Sir Henry Bridgeman, 5th bt. (1725-1800), married in 1755 Elizabeth Simpson of Stoke Hall (Derbyshire), and in 1762 succeeded to the Weston (Staffordshire) estate on the death without issue of his maternal uncle the 4th (Newport) Earl of Bradford. He was created Baron Bradford in 1794. (Other estates of the Newport family, Earls of Bradford, in Shropshire and elsewhere were acquired by the Pulteney family, and later descended to the Vane family, Earls of Darlington and Dukes of Cleveland).

The 2nd Baron Bradford (1762-1825) married in 1788 Lucy Byng, co-heir of the 4th Viscount Torrington, and was created Earl of Bradford in 1815. He succeeded in 1802 to property in Norfolk (Weeting) on the death of his cousin Charles Coote, Earl of Mountrath, but the Weeting estate was sold to John Julius Angerstein (1735-1823). The 2nd Earl bought the St. Catherine's estate, Applethwaite (Westmorland) from Miss Ann Agnes Parker in 1830-1.

Estates in 1883: 10,883 acres in Shropshire, 6,843 acres in Staffordshire, 1,958 acres in Lancashire, 1,906 acres in Warwickshire; 62 acres in Westmorland; 13 acres in Worcestershrie; 6 acres in Leicestershire; 24 acres in Denbighshire and 15 acres in Montgomeryshire, worth a total of £41,982 a year.