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George
Wray
George Wray was an British army artilleryman and ordnance clerk who came to America during the Seven Years War.
He
married Catharina Ten Broeck in 1765. The marriage
produced at least three children who probably were
baptized in New York City. His wife was a member
of the Albany Dutch church but Wray was a communicant
and support of St. Peter's Anglican Church in Albany.
His
background and her family connections enabled Wray
to acquire extensive real estate in Albany, in more
rural regional settings, and later in other colonies
as well. Although based in Albany in a comfortable
second ward home, Wray often was in the Indian country
trading and repairing guns. He maintained his ties
to the British service through Sir William Johnson
and as a contractor at several frontier outposts.
At the outbreak of the war, he was identified as
a British adherent and fled to New York leaving his
wife and family in Albany.
Albany
leaders knew he would not return and listed "Catharine Ray" as the owner of Wray's property on the assessment rolls for 1779. From New York City, travelled around North America on British army business. By the 1780s, he had founded a settlement on lands he had patented at Fort Ann. He apparently had given his estranged wife his power of attorney for she was able to sell some of his Albany property.
Wray
prospered in the new Washington County. In 1790,
his household in the Westfield district included
eleven men, a boy, five females, and seven slaves.
He reportedly took another women there as his wife.
In
1789, he was named Fort Ann town clerk. Over the
next decade, he served several times as town supervisor.
George
Wray filed a will in March 1803. He died in October
1804. His tombstone is in Fort Ann, New York where
he spent much of the last two decades of his life.
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Sources: The life of George Wray is CAP biography number
6945. This profile is derived chiefly from community-based
resources. He may have been born in England about
1728! Biographical information assocoiated with
the "George Wray Papers" at the William L. Clements
Library complicates sorting out his life.
By Stefan Bielinski, Colonial Albany Social History Project [http://www.nysm.nysed.gov/albany]
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