Author: Bradfield, Henry Joseph Steele
Biography:
BRADFIELD, Henry Joseph Steele (1804-52: ODNB)
He was born on 18 May 1804 in Derby Street, Westminster, and baptised “Joseph Henry Steele” on 23 Jan. 1805, the son of Thomas Bradfield, coal merchant, and his wife Sarah Lowe, who had married at St. Bride’s, Fleet Street, in 1803. He later published as Henry J. Bradfield. He trained as a surgeon and followed an itinerant military career. He was a member of Lord Cochrane’s expedition to Greece in 1826. On his return he published The Athenaid, or Modern Grecians (1830), and Tales of the Cyclades (1830). He was commissioned in the foreign battalion of the Belgian army in 1832 and published Poems (Brussels 1834). He married Mary Biscoe, a widow, on 28 May 1835 at St. Margaret’s, Westminster. They had two daughters. He was appointed stipendiary magistrate in Tobago in Dec. 1831 and was later transferred to Trinidad in May 1836 and to the Cedros district in 1839. He was then dismissed (a not uncommon occurrence depending on patronage). He returned to the West Indies in 1841 as private secretary to Colonel Macdonald, lieutenant-governor of Dominica. In 1842 he acted as colonial secretary of Barbados. He was dismissed again and returned to England. Thereafter he lived in straitened circumstances and felt deep resentment about his treatment by the colonial office. He applied to the RLF three times for assistance (1842-45) and received a total of £90. A further application in Dec. 1850 was referred and no award was made. In 1851 he was living with his wife and their daughter Florence at Feltham Hill, Surrey, but he appears to have separated from his wife and his final days were spent in the Waterloo Road, South London, where his goods were seized for rent arrears. He committed suicide by drinking prussic acid on 11 Oct. 1852 in the coffee-room of the St. Alban’s Hotel, Charles Street, St. James’s, London. He left two letters: one to his friend George Goodwin, thanking those who had previously helped him, and one to Charles Dickens, which appears not to have survived. His widow applied to the RLF in Apr. 1857 and received £20. (ODNB 20 May 2023; RLF, 1/1061; Morning Post 13 and 15 Oct. 1852 [Inquest]; SJC 16 Oct. 1852; GM Jan. 1853, 102; GRO death cert.) AA
Other Names:
- Henry J. Bradfield