Family and Education

b. between 1674 and 1678, 1st s. of George Bruere, alias Brewer, of M. Temple, London, dep. auditor of the excise, by Mary, da. of Alexander Weld of Widbury Hill, Herts. m. (2) bef. 1700, Frediswede, 1st. da. of Sir William Gulston, M.P., of Wyddial, Herts. 11ch.  suc. fa. 1713.1

Offices Held

Biography

George Bruere's father came from Hoddesden, near Ware, altering the spelling of his name, probably about the time of his marriage in 1673. Originally an apothecary in Covent Garden, Bruere acquired an estate in Great Marlow, which he represented as a Tory under Queen Anne on the interest of his mother-in-law's second husband Sir James Etheridge, M.P. for that borough and owner of Harleyford there. At the Hanoverian succession he was removed from the commission of the peace for Buckinghamshire, but was returned as a Tory for the third time at Great Marlow.2 A petition against him alleging his lack of a property qualification, though backed and paid for by the young Marquess of Wharton,3 was unsuccessful. In Parliament he voted against the Government till 1719, when he voted for the peerage bill, receiving from Sunderland over £800 from the King's bounty in 1720-21.4 He did not stand in 1722, when, on Etheridge's instructions, he supported Edmund Waller, distributing £60 from Etheridge 'in dry money' and providing at his own house 'an election breakfast of dishes of cold meat, as roast beef, ham and fowls'. It was said that 'Mr Waller with all his money ... could never have been elected without Bruere's interest'.5 In 1727, although the Duke of Bridgwater considered that Etheridge and Bruere were 'not of the complexion of them that preside in the Government',6 Bruere was sent with £1,000 as 'pocket money' from Walpole to manage a 'flying squadron' at Great Marlow, which ensured the return of John Clavering, a government supporter.7 Before the 1741 election he twice approached Walpole as the emissary of Sir William Clayton about nominating a government candidate for Great Marlow.8 He was buried 1 Feb. 1743 at Great Marlow.

Ref Volumes: 1715-1754

Author: R. S. Lea

Notes

• 1. Cal. Treas. Bks. xxix. 649.
• 2. Licences Vic. Gen. (Harl. Soc. xxxiv), 14 May 1673; see Misc. Gen. et Her. (ser. 1), i. 326-7; (new ser.) i. 212-15.
• 3. Wharton to Paul Methuen, 24 Mar. 1717, SP Dom. 35/8, f. 36.
• 4. Sunderland (Blenheim) mss D.II, 4.
• 5. Probyn mss, Glos. RO.
• 6. Bridgwater to John Clavering, 7 Sept. 1727 (?), Cowper mss, Herts. RO.
• 7. Undated memo. Cholmondeley (Houghton) mss 68; CJ, xxi. 480-2.
• 8. Bruere to Walpole, 1 and 3 Feb. 1741, Cholmondeley (Houghton) mss.