Francis Taliaferro Brooke (August 27, 1763 – March 3, 1851) was a

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

lawyer, soldier, politician and judge. He served in both houses of the

Virginia General Assembly The Virginia General Assembly is the legislative body of the Commonwealth of Virginia, the oldest continuous law-making body in the Western Hemisphere, the first elected legislative assembly in the New World, and was established on July 30, 161 ...

before fellow legislators elected him to the Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals (which later became the

Supreme Court of Virginia The Supreme Court of Virginia is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It primarily hears direct appeals in civil cases from the trial-level city and county circuit courts, as well as the criminal law, family law and administrative ...

), where he served decades and became that body's fourth President (now called Chief Justice).

Early life and education

Brooke was born in Spotsylvania County,

. His parents were Richard Brooke of Smithfield and Ann Hay Taliaferro (of one of the First Families of Virginia). They were the uncle and aunt of Major General

Dabney Herndon Maury Dabney Herndon Maury (May 21, 1822 – January 11, 1900) was an officer in the United States Army, instructor at West Point, author of military training books, and a major general in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. E ...

. His elder brother Robert Brooke would become governor of Virginia, and another brother, Lawrence Brooke, was the surgeon of the ''Bon Homme Richard'', commanded by John Paul Jones. Like his brothers, Brooke received a private education from tutors and in private grammar schools in Fredericksburg. During the

American Revolution The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revolut ...

Brooke was active in the

militia A militia () is generally an army or some other fighting organization of non-professional soldiers, citizens of a country, or subjects of a state, who may perform military service during a time of need, as opposed to a professional force of r ...

and served on General Greene's staff with the rank of lieutenant. At the end of the war he studied medicine for a year, but then decided to study law in his brother Robert’s office. Francis T. Brooke was a member of

the Society of the Cincinnati The Society of the Cincinnati is a fraternal, hereditary society founded in 1783 to commemorate the American Revolutionary War that saw the creation of the United States. Membership is largely restricted to descendants of military officers wh ...

of the State of Virginia.

Career

After admission to the bar in 1788, Brooke traveled westward to the

Ohio River The Ohio River is a long river in the United States. It is located at the boundary of the Midwestern and Southern United States, flowing southwesterly from western Pennsylvania to its mouth on the Mississippi River at the southern tip of Illino ...

and practiced in Monongalia and Harrison counties (in what after the American Civil War would become

West Virginia West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian, Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States.The Census Bureau and the Association of American Geographers classify West Virginia as part of the Southern United States while the Bur ...

). However, Brooke returned to the Chesapeake bay area and was elected Commonwealth’s Attorney (prosecutor) for Essex County, Virginia, where he also had a private legal practice and would be was elected to the House of Delegates in 1794. Two years later he moved nearer his family's home in Fredericksburg and won election to the State Senate in 1800. After the Revolution, Brooke remained active in the Virginia militia and was promoted to the rank of major in 1796, lieutenant colonel in 1800 and brigadier general in 1802. He was an original member of the Virginia

Society of the Cincinnati The Society of the Cincinnati is a fraternal, hereditary society founded in 1783 to commemorate the American Revolutionary War that saw the creation of the United States. Membership is largely restricted to descendants of military officers wh ...

. In 1811, fellow legislators elected Brooke a judge of the Supreme Court of Appeals, his fellow judges made his president of that court for eight years, from 1823 to 1831. The legislature re-elected Brooke as judge in 1831, and he continued in office until his death on March 3, 1851.

Personal life and death

Judge Francis Brooke married twice, and survived his eldest son, who died in Macau. In 1791, Francis Brooke married Mary Randolph Spottswood Brooke (1775–1803) and their children who survived to adulthood included John Francis Brooke (1795–1849), Robert Spotswood Brooke (1800–1851) and Mary Randolph Spotswood Brooke Berkeley (1803–1875). The widower remarried in 1804, to Mary Champe Carter Brooke (1788–1846), who bore John Brooke (b. 1805), Francis Edward Brooke (1813–1874) and Helen Brooke Forman (1821–1899). Judge Brooke was buried at the Brooke family cemetery in Spotsylvania County, where he joined his first wife, and would be joined by other family members. His grandson, also Francis Taliaferro Brooke (1846-1913), would join the Confederate States Army as a private and survive the American Civil War, in which the family lost all their enslaved property.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Brooke, Francis Taliaferro 1763 births 1851 deaths Virginia state senators Justices of the Supreme Court of Virginia Virginia lawyers Taliaferro family of Virginia People from Spotsylvania County, Virginia Virginia militiamen in the American Revolution