Some Brock Family Miniatures

Notes¹ by Miss Mary E Guille on some Brock portraits. Written Nov: 29 1902 when she was aged 81. William Brock, Henry Brock, and Harriet Brock were children of William Brock (1725-1768) and Judith de Beauvoir.

[Edith Carey's note: These notes were by Mary E Guille, granddaughter of Mr and Mrs William Brock, her mother having been their daughter Judith De Beauvoir Brock, and her father the very Revd William Guille, Dean of Guernsey.]

Harriet Brock Miniature 2 represents Henriette [Harriet] Brock (d. of William and Judith de Beauvoir) who was born in 1763. She married Sir Thomas Saumarez, brother of the 1st Lord de Saumarez. He d. March 4th 1845, she died Feb. 15th 1858 in her 96th year. They built Beaumont Lodge, Queen’s Road, Guernsey (since called Saumarez Lodge) about 1816, and there both died. Mary Mourant

No. 3 miniature represents Mary Mourant, d. of Peter Mourant of Candie, and wife of Henry Frederick Brock. They built Paradise in the Grange in 1811, but her husband died there the following year; in the same year he planted the “Turkey Oak” now (1902) spreading its branches over the railings in the Grange⁴.

It is to be noticed that the 2 brothers, William and Henry Brock married 2 sisters, Anne and Mary Mourant of Candie. The other daughter [Martha] married Mr Peter Dobrée of the Plaiderie and Beauregard and was the mother of Mr Peter Bonamy Dobrée, died in 1807. His only son, also Peter [Mourant Jnr.], married Sophia², daughter of John Carey Esq. [Edith Carey's note: My father always told me that she never wanted to marry him, but she wanted to marry some officer who was quartered here, I think his name was Teesdale, but he was then poor and Mourant was rich, so her brother made her take the latter. She was most charming and greatly beloved.] He [Peter Jnr.] died childless in 1828, and his widow died Sept 18th, 1862. The house, now, 1902, altered to suit the requirements of Candie Library is the same that was built by Mr Peter Mourant Sen^r, when the Candie Estate, besides its present extent, also consisted of the Candie Cemetery, the ground on which the Arsenal is built, and the row of houses on the upper part of Candie road, dos-à-dos to it, and the strip of ground opposite the Arsenal, the site of the Victoria Tower, which was given for this purpose by his grandchildren.

The landed property of William Brock in Guernsey was – Granite House at the Carrefour at the top of High Street; Brockhurst, Grange Road. He also inherited half of De Beauvoir Estate - green fields extending from the enclosure entered by the Ivy Gates to the road leading from the Rohais Road to the Croutes and bounded on the other side of the valley by the lane at the back of the Hermitage. The site of St Stephen's Church and Vicarage was given by his surviving children and grandchildren, and, since 1860, the fields have been intersected by roads and built over.

These miniatures were painted by Philippe Jean, who was born in Jersey, and brought up for the navy, but after 1782 practised miniature painting. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1787-1802 when he died at Hampstead on Sept 12th aged 47. He was miniature painter to George III.

¹ These notes were copied by Edith Carey in her Scrapbook, Vol. I., in the Library collection.

² Sister of Mary Carey, wife of Major-General Le Marchant. Miss Guille is confusing the Dobrée connections here; Marthe Mourant married not Peter but Bonamy Dobrée of Beauregard, Rachel's brother, but she was Peter Bonamy Dobrée's mother; see the link below.

³ For more miniatures, see The Mystery of the Ostrich-Feather Hat.

⁴ "The next remarkable dwelling is called "Paradise", the property of Mrs Brock, widow of the late Matthew Brock, magistrate of the Royal Court; there is a neat green plat before the door, surrounded by a shrubbery; this place is adnmired by many in preference to any other, from its convenient distance from the road, and its cool sequestered appearance." Cochrane, J. T. Guide to the Island of Guernsey: Guernsey, Cochrane, 1826, p. 85.