memorable cruise. Robert Brooke was captured on his voyage to America and carried to New York, from whence he was sent back to England by Lord Howe, the British Admiral. From England, Robert Brooke went into Scotland and from thence again got over to France, and returned to Virginia in a French frigate that brought the arms supplied the continentals by the French government. Burning with patriotic ardor, he joined at once a volunteer troop of cavalry commanded by Captain Larkin Smith, was captured in January, 1781, in a charge of dragoons by a Captain Loller, of Simcoe's Queen's Rangers at Westham, six miles above Richmond (which raid is mentioned in the preceding sketch of Governor Jefferson); but was soon exchanged, returning to the service. After the war he entered upon the practice of his profession, in which he soon acquired distinction. In 1794 he represented the county of Spotsylvania in the House of Delegates of Virginia, and in the same year was elected Governor of the State by the Legislature, entering upon his duties December 1st and serving until December 1, 1796, when he was succeeded by James Wood. In 1795 he was elected Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Ancient Free and Accepted Masons of Virginia (having previously served as Deputy Grand Master), and served until 1797. In 1798 he was elected Attorney-General of Virginia over Bushrod Washington, the nephew of George Washington, and who was afterward a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Robert Brooke died in the office of Attorney-General in 1799, aged thirty-eight years. His grandson, Robert T. Brooke, Esq., an estimable citizen of Richmond, is the Treasurer of the Virginia Historical Society. The county of Brooke, formed in 1797 from Ohio county, commemorates the name of the Governor. The third son of Richard Brooke, John, was a Lieutenant in the Revolution and a pensioner of the State for gallant service. The fourth son, Francis T. (born August 27, 1763), at the age of sixteen was appointed a first Lieutenant in Colonel (afterward General) Charles Harrison's Regiment of Artillery, serving first in the campaign of General Lafayette during the invasion of Lord Cornwallis. He was soon after placed in command of the Magazine and Laboratory at Westham, six miles above Richmond, with a force of seventy-five men. Although so young an officer, Captain Brooke acquitted himself with skill and gallantry throughout the war, winning encomiums uniformly from his several Generals, Harrison, Lafayette and Greene. In 1788 he commenced the practice of Law in the counties of Monongalia and Harrison, and was soon appointed Attorney for the Commonwealth of the District Court of Morgantown. In 1790 he removed to Essex county, which county he represented subsequently in the House of Delegates, and in 1791 married Mary Randolph, the daughter of General Alexander Spotswood and a grand niece of General Washington. Mrs. Brooke died in 1803, leaving four children, and

Captain Brooke married secondly Mary Champe Carter, by whom he had two children. Captain Brooke was a member of the State Senate in 1800, and in 1804 Speaker of that body, and in the latter year was elected a member of the General Court of Virginia. In 1811 he was elected Judge of the Supreme Court of Appeals, of which he was long President. By successive promotions he was appointed General of the first Brigade of the State forces in 1802. He was the last Vice-President and presiding executive of the Virginia Branch of the Order of Cincinnati, the funds of which, some $20,000, ultimately went, by the vote of the few surviving members of the Order, about the year 1820, to the endowment of Washington College, now Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Va. Judge Brooke died March 3, 1851, widely revered for his sterling worth, and deeply lamented. A scarce little memorial, "A Narrative of my Life; For my Family, by Francis T. Brooke," privately printed in 1849, has furnished many of the facts in this sketch. The name Brooke is of much earlier dating in Virginia than as above stated. Nicholas Brooke, "the younger, merchant," being a patentee of 500 acres in Middle Plantations, York county, August 13, 1646.

The names of Henry, Humphrey, Paulin and George Brooke subsequently appear as grantees of land, and the name has been frequently represented in the Legislative bodies of Virginia and in the army and navy of America. It has been asserted that all of the name of Brooke as severally represented in Virginia, and by Roger Brooke in Maryland, the ancestor of the eminent jurist, Roger Brooke Taney, are of the same lineage from the parent stock in England.

JAMES WOOD.

James Wood, the son of Colonel James Wood, the founder of Winchester, Virginia, was born about the year 1750, in Frederick County, which he represented in the Virginia Convention of 1776, which framed the State Constitution. He was appointed by that body, Nov. 15, 1776, a Colonel in the Virginia line, and rendered gallant service in the cause of Freedom, as well as in the defence of the frontiers of Virginia from the Indians. He was long a member of the State Council, and by seniority in that body, Lieutenant-Governor of Virginia. He was elected Governor of the State, December 1, 1796, serving until December 1, 1799, when he was succeeded by Governor James Monroe. Governor Wood was subsequently commissioned a Brigadier-General of State troops. He was also, for a time, President of the Virginia branch of the Order of Cincinnati. He died at Richmond, June 16, 1813. The county of Wood, formed in 1799 from Harrison county, was named in commemoration of his patriotic services. The wife of General Wood, who was Jean, daughter of Rev. John Moncure, a Huguenot refugee, who fled from religious persecution to Virginia, early in the eighteenth

century, and was long the rector of Overwharton parish, Stafford county, survived her husband several years. Mrs. Wood was a lady of great benevolence of character, and was gifted with both poetic and musical talents. Of her poetry, examples are preserved in the Southern Literary Messenger. She also frequently contributed to the newspaper press, and left in MS. a volume of unpublished poetry and sketches. Mrs. Wood spent the close of her life in pious works of charity and usefulness. A noble monument to her philanthropy, is a society for the assistance of indigent widows and children, which she founded with the assistance of Mrs. Samuel Pleasants, and a Mrs. Chapman. It was styled the "Female Humane Association of Richmond," and was incorporated by the Legislature of Virginia, in 1811. Mrs. Wood was the first President of the Society, and untiringly performed the somewhat arduous duties of that responsible station until her death, in 1825, at the age of sixty-eight years. Her grave is in the cemetery of the Robinson family, a little beyond the western limits of Richmond, near the banks of James river. Soon after the death of Mrs. Wood, the Rev. John H. Rice, President of Hampden-Sydney College, instituted an association of ladies for the purpose of working for the benefit of poor theological students of the College, and which, in compliment to Mrs. Wood, he called the Jean Wood Society.

JAMES MONROE.

James Monroe succeeded James Wood as Governor of Virginia, December 1, 1799, and served until December 1, 1802, when he was succeeded by John Page. He was again governor from January 4, 1811, to December 5th following, when he was succeeded by George William Smith, Lieutenant-Governor of the State. An extended account of the career of James Monroe will be found in Volume II. of this work, in the serial of biographical sketches of presidents of the United States. The period of the first service of James Monroe as Governor of Virginia was, however, marked by an event, tragical in its sequence, which though frequently referred to as "Gabriel's Insurrection," but few of the present generation have any definite knowledge of, as there has been no circumstantial account of it published, since that which contemporaneously appeared in the newspapers, of which but few files have been preserved, and they are practically inaccessible to the public. Some notice of it, therefore, in these pages, can not but prove interesting.

In a message of Governor Monroe to the General Assembly of Virginia, dated December 5, 1800, he states that on the 30th of August preceding, about two o'clock in the afternoon, Mr. Mosby Shepherd, a reputable citizen of Henrico county, who resided about three miles north of the city of Richmond, beyond a small stream known as the Brook, called upon him and informed him that he had just received advice from two of his slaves that the negroes in the neighborhood mentioned intended to rise that night, kill their masters and their families, and

proceed to Richmond, where they would be joined by the negroes there, and would seize all the public arms and ammunition, murder the white inhabitants and take possession of the city. Thereupon Governor Monroe took immediate measures to avert the threatened fell design by stationing guards at the state penitentiary, where the public arms were deposited; at the magazine, and at the state capitol, and by disposing the city troop of cavalry (commanded by Captain Moses Austin, then conducting a shot tower in the city of Richmond, and who was subsequently noted as a Texan pioneer) in detachments to patrol the several routes leading to the city from the suspected neighborhood. "The close of the day, however, was marked by one of the most extraordinary falls of rain ever known in our country. Every animal sought shelter from it." The brook was in consequence so swollen in its volume as to be impassable, thus interposing a bar to the execution of the plan of the negroes. Nothing occurred during the night of the alarming character suspected, to disturb the tranquillity of the city, and the only unusual circumstance reported by the patrolling troopers in the morning following, was, that all negroes passed on the road, in the interval of the storm, were going from the city, whereas it was their usual custom to visit it on that night of the week (Saturday), which circumstance was not unimportant, as it had been reported that the first rendezvous of the negroes was to be in the country. The same precautions being again observed the succeeding night without developments of the alleged design, Governor Monroe was on the point of concluding that the alarm was groundless, when from further information from Major William Mosby and other gentlemen, residents of the suspected neighborhood, he was fully satisfied that the insurrection had been planned by the negroes, and that they still intended to carry it into effect. He therefore convened the Executive Council of the State, on Monday, September 1, who took such measures that in the afternoon of the same day twenty of the. negro conspirators were apprehended on the estate of Colonel Thomas H. Prosser, a prominent and influential gentleman, and from those of others in the suspected neighborhood, and brought to Richmond. "As the jail could not contain them, they were lodged in the penitentiary." The ringleaders, or chiefs, had fled and were not then to be found.

Every day now threw light on the diabolical plot and gave it additional importance. In the progress of the trials of the conspirators, it was satisfactorily demonstrated that a general insurrection of the slaves in the State was contemplated by the originators of the plot. A species of organization had taken place among them, and at a meeting held for the purpose, they had elected a commander, one Gabriel, the slave of Colonel Prosser, and to whom they had given the title of General. They had also appointed subordinate officers, captains, sergeants, etc.