During November of the same year, Lt. Col. Peter Hansbrough Bell recruited him to serve in a Ranger company protecting Texas' western frontier. He remained with the Rangers until September 30, 1848 when he joined the California Gold Rush. Brady returned to the Texas Rangers in 1850, serving as a company's first lieutenant. Frontier entrepreneur Brady left the Texas Rangers in 1853 to become captain of Andrew Gray's survey team searching for a railroad route between Indianola, Texas and San Diego, California. When the team disbanded the next year in San Francisco, he formed the Arizona Mining & Trading Company and returned to the Gadsden Purchase, settling Tucson. In addition to his work as a miner, Brady became an interpreter for the Boundary Commission in 1855. The following year he signed a petition seeking territorial status for Arizona. In 1859, Brady married Juanita Mendibles. The marriage produced four sons before her death in 1871. Agent for the Union With the outbreak of the American Civil War, Brady found himself one of the few Union supporters in the area. He spent much of the war in Sonora gathering supplies and intelligence for Union forces, including providing vital intelligence for the Battle of Picacho Peak. At the end of the war he returned to Tucson where he served as an Indian interpreter and two terms as sheriff. Governor Anson P.K. Safford also appointed him a military adviser at the rank of major. In 1871, Brady represented Pima County, Arizona as a Council member during the 8th Arizona Territorial Legislature. Later the same year he ran for Territorial Delegate to the United States House of Representatives but was narrowly defeated by Richard Cunningham McCormick. Rancher and territorial official Following the creation of Pinal County in 1875, Brady moved from Tucson to Florence. There he engaged in farming, ranching, and mining. Brady remarried in 1878. The second marriage, to María Antonia Ochóa, produced three sons and a daughter. Brady served briefly as chairman of the board of prison commissioners in 1889. The same year, he was appointed a special agent by the United States Department of the Interior to help with investigation of James Reavis' land grant claim. He later returned for two additional terms in the territorial council, being elected to both the 16th (1891) and 19th (1897) sessions. Brady moved back to Tucson in 1899. He remained there till his death on