Edward VI's reign, he received the coif, the degree of serjeant-at-law having been bestowed on him as one of the last acts of Henry VIII. On 25 Nov. 1551 he was appointed king's serjeant, and when, two years later (1 Sept. 1553), Sir Henry Bradshaw was removed, he succeeded him as lord chief baron of the exchequer. On 2 Oct., the day after Queen Mary's coronation, Brook and others, according to Machyn, ‘were dobyd knightes of the carpet.’
Notices of his judgments continue to occur in Dyer's reports until Hilary term 1557–8, and he died apparently in the course of that term. In March he was succeeded by Sir Clement Heigham. His character is highly praised by Lloyd. He seems to have been a man of strong common sense, and is said to have been especially fond of the maxim, ‘Never do anything by another that you can do by yourself.’ He was twice married: first to Katherine, daughter of John, lord Chandos; secondly, to Margaret, daughter of Mr. Richard Butler of London, who had already survived two husbands, Mr. Andrew Fraunces and Alderman Robert Chertsey, and, surviving Brook, married Sir Edward North, first baron Guilford, and was buried in the chancel of the church of St. Lawrence Jewry, London. By neither wife had he any issue.
[Foss's Lives of the Judges; Fuller's Worthies, ii. 283; Collins's Historic Peerage, iv. 458; Machyn's Diary, 335 n.]
BROOKBANK, BROOKSBANK, or BROOKESBANKE, JOSEPH (b. 1612), minister and schoolmaster, was the son of George Brookbank of Halifax, and was born in 1612, for at Michaelmas term 1632, when he entered as a batler at Brasenose College, Oxford, he was aged twenty. He graduated B.A. and took orders. In the Bodleian is the printed petition to the king, in September 1647, from John Brookbank and thirty-three other ministers, expelled from Ireland by the rebels. This John is probably identical with the subject of this article, who is called John on the title-pages of his 'Vitis Salutaris' (1650) and 'Compleat School-Master' (1660). In 1650 Brookbank describes himself as 'at present preacher of the word' at West Wycombe (he spells it Wickham). Buckinghamshire. It is probable that be was settled at Wycombe at the date (1648) of his sermon on the 'Saints' Imperfection,' and possible that he was placed there in the room of Peel, silenced either at High or West Wycombe on 16 Jan. 1640 ('absolutely the first man of all the clergy whom the party began to fall upon.' Walker). Brookbank in 1651 was 'presbyter and schoolmaster in Vine Court, in High Holborn.' where his books were to be bought. At this date he speaks of Sir Edward Richards, knt., and his wife as having been 'pleased to intertain me, when the whole world (as far as I was at that time discoverable thereunto) had thrown me off.' In 1654 he was 'minister and schoolmaster in Jerusalem Court, in Fleet Street.' By 1657 he had lost both employments, and on 4 July 1660 (while living in George Alley, Shoe Lane) he expressed his gratitude to Sir Jeremiah Whitchcot, bart., 'in that, had your good will prevailed without interruption, I had now enjoyed a competent subsistance.' It is possible that he was the I. B. who, early in 1668, published 'A Tast of Catechetical-Preaching-Exercise for the instruction of families, &c.' The writer speaks of himself as being in his 'decaying age,' and proposes a plan of religious services for the young. His name appears as Brookbank in his earliest publication; afterwards as Brooksbank, Brooksbanke, Brookesbanke, and on one of his title-pages as Broksbank. He latinises it into Riparius. His christian name is sometimes printed Jo., and this is expanded into John by mistake. The explanation which he gives of his distance from the press may account for some of the variations in his title-pages. His catechism gives the impression that he was an evangelical churchman: his educational works are careful and clever.
He published:
- 'Joh. Amos Comenii Vestibulum Novissimum Linguæ Latinæ, &c. Joh. Amos Comenius His Last Porch of the Latin Tonpo, &c.,' 1647. 16mo (the Latin of Comenius is given on alternate pages with an English version from the Dutch of Henry Schoof compared with the original).
- 'The Saints' Imperfection.&c.,' 1646 (but corrected by Thompson to 19 Dec. 1648), 16mo (sermon on Heb. v. 12; the title-page is otherwise faulty; it was reissued with new title-page in 1656).
- 'Vitis Salutaris: Or, the Vine of Catechetical Divinitie, and Saying Truth, &c.,' 1650, 16mo (a catechism dedicated to parishioners of West Wycombe; a reissue in 1658 has a new title-page, and omits the dedicstion).
- 'An English Monosyllabary.' 1651, 16mo (a singular little book, dedicated to Susan, wife of Edward Trussell, and her sister Philadelphia, daughters of Sir Edward Richards; containing in rhythmical form 'all the words of one syllabl, in our English tongue drawne out into a legibl sens;' at the end are a few prayers in monosyllables).
- 'Plain. Brief, and Pertinent Rules for the Judicious and Artificial Syllabification of all English Words, &c.,' 1654, 16mo (the account of the author's
