Stafford

The Stafford family came to Albany following the War for Independence. The Staffords were New Englanders initially from Plymouth, Rhode Island, and then Cheshire, Massachusetts. They were the children of Joab Stafford and his wife, Susanna Spencer Stafford. Albany businessman Thomas Spencer was her nephew.

Two of their younger sons, John and Spencer Stafford, became Albany residents and prominent Yankee businessmen in the decades following the war. Spencer Stafford, in particular, was able to enhance his status through his marriage in 1790 to a daughter of the Hallenbeck family - owners of a large section of the south side of the city.

In 1813, the Lydius Street residences and business of John and Spencer Stafford were listed in the first city directory.

In little more than a generation, the Staffords were an embodiment of how New Englanders changed and carried Albany into the nineteenth century. Their path forward was aided by fortunate marriages with daughters of more mainline Albany families.

Sources: This sketch is derived chiefly from family and community-based resources. The principal family-based resource was presented by Joel Munsell in volume 3 of his Collections series (pp.440-58). It includes a comprehensive genealogy of the family in America. At this point, it appears most accessible online following this link. Most of our presentation on the NA aspects of this family's history is taken from that traditional source. As with many New England families, that history is well documented on the Internet.