John Brooke

Who was John Brooke?

John Brooke was a Warwickshire politician who developed the Ashted estate near Birmingham and is principally known for his role during and after the Priestley Riots of 1791.

Brooke was born in 1755 in Daventry. He was admitted to the King’s Bench at Westminster and practiced in Birmingham. As an attorney, he acted as secretary to various organizations in Birmingham, most notably, to the Foundation of the Schools of King Edward VI.

In 1787, Brooke purchased the estate of Dr. John Ash and developed the hamlet of Ashted. The development included a grid of streets featuring a main thoroughfare, Great Brooke Street, and a crescent known as Ashted Row. A chapel was created from Dr. Ash’s house, known as Ashted Chapel or St. James the Less, which opened on October 9, 1791.

As Under Sheriff of the County of Warwickshire, together with magistrates Joseph Carles and Dr. Benjamin Spencer, Brooke had responsibility for public order in Birmingham during the Priestley Riots in 1791. Unable to stop the violence, which erupted at a dinner commemorating the French Revolution on July 14, Brooke reported to the Home Office of “this most ungovernable mob.”