Francis Brerewood
| Francis Brerewood | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Francis Brerewood 1694 Chester, England |
| Died | 1781 London |
| Nationality | British |
| Known for | Painter |
| Notable work | Benedict Leonard Calvert |
| Patron(s) | Benedict Calvert, 4th Baron Baltimore |
Francis Brerewood (1694-1781) was an English painter, translator and architect. He enjoyed the patronage of Benedict Calvert, 4th Baron Baltimore, painting portraits of Lord Baltimore's son Benedict, and decorating the apartments of the Calvert family seat at Woodcote Park. He became embroiled in unsuccessful litigation in 1746 following his father's death, and he died in poverty in 1781.
Brerewood was born in Chester, the son of Thomas Brerewood (c.1670 - 22 December 1746), and the great-grandson of Sir Robert Brerewood, a wealthy landowner whose rents at the time of his death amounted to some £8,000 a year, an enormous sum at the time.
By the time Francis was born, the family fortunes were somewhat diminished. His father Thomas Brerewood was a business entrepreneur and fraudster who was involved in the notorious Pitkin Affair of 1705. Along with his partner Thomas Pitkin, Thomas Brerewood plotted a bankruptcy fraud that, when discovered, was only eclipsed by the later financial disaster of the South Sea Bubble in 1720. Unravelling the scam required three large insolvencies and four acts of Parliament over the course of more than forty years. Despite this, Thomas Brerewood was pardoned in 1709, and he was thus permitted to rebuild his fortunes, which he seems to have done with some success.
Like his older brother Thomas, Francis received a gentleman's education. In 1716 his sister Henrietta was married to the theatre impresario John Rich, known as the originator of English Pantomime. In the same year Thomas, then in his early twenties, made a highly advantageous marriage to Charlotte Calvert, the fourteen-year-old daughter of the fourth Lord Baltimore, Benedict Calvert, 4th Baron Baltimore. The marriage may not have been sanctioned by her family, for the couple had a clandestine wedding in the Fleet Prison - a so-called "Fleet Marriage" - which was not publicly announced until February of the following year.
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