BRODREPP (BRADREPP), Richard (c.1639-1707), of Mapperton, Dorset.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1660-1690, ed. B.D. Henning, 1983
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

Family and Education

b. c.1639, 1st s. of Christopher Brodrepp of Mapperton by Catherine, da. and coh. of John Davy of Harnham, Wilts. educ. Dorchester g.s.; Christ’s, Camb. matric. 29 Dec. 1656, aged 17; L. Inn 1657. m. 13 Jan. 1663, Catherine (bur. 29 May 1679), da. of Robert Hunt of Compton Pauncefote, Som., 4s. suc. fa. 1658.1

Offices Held

Commr. for assessment, Dorset 1679-80, 1689-90, j.p. 1680-7, June 1688-d., dep. lt. May 1688-?d.2

Biography

Brodrepp was a second cousin of John Trenchard. His grandfather, a scion of a minor Somerset family, partitioned the Mapperton estate with Sir Thomas Trenchard in 1617. A committeeman during the Civil War, he was of a markedly eirenical disposition, and does not seem to have attracted the odium which was lavished on his colleagues.3

Brodrepp inherited 1,200 acres in Dorset, Somerset and Worcestershire, besides his mother’s property in Holderness. His wife came from a royalist family, and it may be significant that he took no part in public affairs till after her death. Even then he seems to have been regarded as a court supporter during the exclusion crisis. But he stood for Bridport in the Whig interest with John Michell II in 1685. Their petition against the successful Tory candidates was never heard. No doubt this was the cause of Brodrepp’s dismissal from the commission of the peace in 1687, and probably Hugh Hodges was the instigator. But in 1688 Hodges himself was dismissed, and Brodrepp was proposed by the regulators as justice of the peace and deputy lieutenant. He was not, however, named as a court candidate for Bridport, unlike Michell.4

Returned at the general election of 1689, Brodrepp made two applications for leave in the first session of the Convention and was probably absent for most of it, including the vote on the vacancy of the throne. He was a little more active after the recess, serving on four committees. He must have felt strongly about the manufacture of cane-bottomed chairs to get himself added to the committee to prevent it on 8 Jan. 1690; but the only committee of political importance to which he was named was the one for reversing the judgments of scandalum magnatum obtained by the Duke of Beaufort ( Henry Somerset) against Sir Trevor Williams, John Arnold and John Dutton Colt. He did not support the disabling clause in the bill to restore corporations, nor is he known to have stood again. He was buried at Mapperton on 4 Feb. 1707, the only member of his family to sit in Parliament.5

Ref Volumes: 1660-1690

Author: John. P. Ferris

Notes

  • 1. Som. and Dorset N. and Q., xxviii. 203; N. and Q. (ser. 11), vi. 178, Northumberland (Alnwick) mss 552, f. 31.
  • 2. Dorset RO, KG 1147, 1148, 1496.
  • 3. Hutchins, Dorset, ii. 159; PCC 86 Wootton.
  • 4. Dorset RO, 9691; CJ, ix. 717; PC2/71/365.
  • 5. Hutchins, ii. 159.