When Joseph Bruce was born on 5 December 1773, in Rutland, Worcester, Massachusetts Bay Colony, British Colonial America, his father, John Bruce III, was 28 and his mother, Temperance Elizabeth Packard, was 24. He married Nancy Trow on 28 April 1799, in Hardwick, Worcester, Massachusetts, United States. They were the parents of at least 3 sons and 1 daughter. He died on 30 April 1858, in Hardwick, Worcester, Massachusetts, United States, at the age of 84, and was buried in Holt Cemetery, Keene, Keene, Essex, New York, United States.