Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Brooke, Henry (1738-1806)

by Gordon Goodwin

BROOKE, HENRY (1738–1806), painter, was born in Dublin in 1738. He chiefly practised historical painting, and, upon coming to London in 1761, gained both fame and fortune by the exhibition of his pictures. Seven years later, in 1767, he had married and settled in his native city, where he lost the whole of his savings in some foolish speculation. Thenceforward his art was principally displayed in the decoration of Roman catholic chapels, but in 1776 he sent a mythological painting to the Society of Artists. Brooke died in Dublin in 1806.

[Redgrave's Dictionary of Artists (1878), p. 57; A. Graves's Dict. of Artists, 1760-80, p. 31.]

G. G.