Peter Chardon Brooks

Peter Chardon Brooks (January 6, 1767 – January 1, 1849) was a wealthy Massachusetts merchant and politician. He was said to be the richest man in New England at his death. A major part of his wealth derived from insuring the vessels engaged in the slave trade.

Early life Brooks was born in North Yarmouth, Massachusetts Bay, on January 6, 1767. His parents were the Rev. Edward Brooks and Abigail Brown. In 1769, the family moved to Medford, Massachusetts, his father's native town, where Brooks' boyhood was spent working on the family farm.

In 1781, after his father's death, the 14-year-old Brooks was apprenticed to a trade in Boston. He walked to the city, a distance of seven miles, every day.

Career In 1789, Brooks engaged in the business of marine insurance, often for ships involved in the kidnapping and sale of African people through the trans-Atlantic slave trade, and accumulated a large fortune. He kept with his own hand very accurate accounts, a rare thing in those days, and made it a rule never to borrow money, never to engage in speculation of any kind, and never to take more than the legal rate of interest. He retired from business in 1803, and, until 1806, devoted himself to the settlement of all the risks in which he was interested.

Personal life

On November 26, 1792, Brooks was married to Ann Gorham (1771–1830), a daughter of Nathaniel Gorham (1738–1796), the 14th President of the Continental Congress, and sister of Benjamin Gorham, a U.S. Representative from Massachusetts. They were the parents of 13 children, of which the following survived to adulthood:

Edward Brooks (1793–1878), who married Eliza Root

Brooks died January 1, 1849, in Boston, Massachusetts, bequeathing what was believed to be the largest estate in Boston, about two million dollars, to his seven surviving children.

Descendants Brooks was a grandfather of historians Peter Chardon Brooks Adams and Henry Brooks Adams great-grandfather of Washington philanthropist Charlotte Everett Hopkins, and great-great-grandfather of Massachusetts governor and senator Leverett Saltonstall. Brooks' fourth great-grandson, Dr. Patrick Graves Jackson, is the husband of Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown-Jackson.

Legacy He is considered to have been one of the 100 wealthiest Americans, having left an enormous fortune. The town of Chardon, Ohio is named for him.