Not sure if this relates but I see a NY connection, so hoping it might help you further. found at: http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nscumber/bio/purdyje.html
James E. Purdy, Register of Deeds and a well known and highly esteemed resident of Amherst, was born at Fort Lawrence, Cumberland County, N.S., in 1830, son of Gilbert and Tina (Bent) Purdy. His paternal grandfather, Henry Purdy, a native of New York, was one of the Loyalists who settled in Nova Scotia after the termination of the Revolutionary War in favor of the colonists. Henry Purdy, who was accompanied by his wife, Mary Kniffen, and his brothers Gabriel and Gilbert, settled first at West Chester, Cumberland County, whence he removed later to Fort Lawrence. He held the rank of Colonel in the militia. He had seven children, five sons and two daughters, the youngest son being Gilbert, second, father of the subject of this sketch. None of them are now living. Henry Purdy died when between seventy and eighty years of age.
