Welcome to the Briery Genealogy Resource Site
(last updated 12Dec98)
Almira & John Gardner Briery
After 33 years of intermittent research, the wonders of computer software and  the internet have made it possible for me to begin putting family history together in some kind of logical order.  Before computers, the immensity of the project seemed overwhelming and I was frankly daunted by it all.  (For anyone who has FamilyTreeMaker, I will be happy to e-mail you the complete file.)  I hope all Brierys will find this site useful and interesting.  It's not my site, it's a site for all Brierys and anyone else interested in the Briery family.   I foresee this as a living, evolving site to which I hope many will contribute.  Your involvement is essential: your photos, documents, stories, etc. will make it personal and engaging.

To very briefly summarize what I know, the earliest records I've found are church records from Staffordshire, England in the mid 1500s, using the name Brierhurst.  The first proven Briery ancestor of us all (no gaps in the succession) is John Brierhurst, who married Elizabeth Lees in 1734.  (However, we can also trace direct ancestors through the wife of Thomas Brieryhurst, Susannah Gardner, to her great grandfather, James Gardner I, born 1659.)  John Brierhurst's fourth child, Thomas, christened in Middleton Green, Staffordshire, Oct 1750, came to America in the 1770s as an English soldier to put down the American Revolution; he chose to stay in Maine and married there in 1780.  His name shows up in the first US Census in 1790 as Thomas Brieryhurst.  His sons all dropped the "hurst" and used Briery, except for one who used Briry.  Today all known Brierys (except for a few in France for which I haven't found a link) are descendants of his grandson, John Gardner Briery.  (It's easy to see, then, just how closely related we all are.  For example, he was my 2nd great grandfather and Link's grandfather.)  John Garner Briery left Maine for California in the '49 Gold Rush, "busted out", worked his way back to Maine on a whaling vessel, tried homesteading in Wisconsin in the 1850s and 1860s, ran a post office in Twin Creek, Kansas by 1870 and remained there until he died in 1892.  From there, the family has branched out into at least 13 states. 

The Briery Boys Baseball Team 1880s
L to R Top Row: John, Osgood, Perry, Warren
Seated: Frank, Lincoln, Nathaniel
For many branches of the Briery family, mine included, it's as if we all carry a Briery anti-social gene.  Ralph Briery, who recently died in Oregon, would have called it "typical Briery."  Though we're all closely related,  few of us have ever met.  My dream is that through learning about each other, someday soon we'll actually want to meet each other -- after all, we are one of rarest families in the world, with no more than 150 living Brierys.  And like any family, we've much to be proud of, and much that shows we're just human.

I dedicate this site to Veda (Pat) Briery Rucker, my dear friend and cousin, who died earlier this year in Nacogdoches, Texas, at the age of 90.  I "found" her (or she found me) in the mid 1960s; she gave me many leads as no one knew more about the Brierys than Pat.  She made me promise that someday I would write a book of the Briery Family History.  What follows, Pat, is just a start of a promise I hope to keep.
 

David Briery
16 rue des Hirondelles
67800 Bischheim
France
011.33.388.8391.33
brieryd@eccola.com

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