Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 3.djvu/818

760 the Confederacy for the plan of the now celebrated Virginia, and I only wish you could have been with us to witness the successful operations of this new engine of naval warfare, fostered by your care and watched over by your inventive mind. It was a great victory, though the odds were nearly seven to one against us in guns and numbers. But the iron and the heavy guns did the work, handled by such a man as glorious Buchanan, and with such officers and men as we had." Lieutenant Brooke continued to render services of great value in the ordnance department and was promoted to the rank of commander and made chief of naval ordnance and hydrography. In 1863 he proposed that a thirteen-inch Blakely rifle of novel construction should be fired with the powder charge placed wholly in front of the chamber, an experiment which, when made, led to the discovery of the utility of what is now known as the air-space, admittedly one of the most important discoveries in the history of ordnance. Upon the evacuation of Richmond, Commander Brooke joined the Confederate forces at Greensboro, N. C., where he was paroled. He then returned to Richmond, and went with his little daughter to Lexington, where upon his arrival he was asked by General Smith, superintendent of the Virginia military institute, to accept a professorship in the faculty of that school. The appointment was promptly made and he has since then continued in this honorable public service.

Captain John L. Brooke, a gallant soldier of the Thirteenth Virginia infantry, was born in Gloucester county, Va., in October, 1824. With his family he removed to Culpeper county in 1855, and became the owner of an estate of about one thousand acres. He lived the life of a planter until the spring of 1862, when he organized a company in Culpeper county, which was mustered into the Confederate service as a part of the Thirteenth Virginia infantry. He commanded a company at Cedar Mountain, Winchester, the Second Manassas, and minor engagements, until his capture in October, 1863. He was held as a prisoner of war at Point Lookout, and Old Capitol prison until the end of the year. During the following eight months he was released on parole, owing to his enfeebled health, and he was incapacitated for further service. February 20, 1869, he died, at Fox Neck, the family estate in Culpeper county, which had been sadly devastated by the war. Warner L. Brooke, son of the foregoing, was born in Fauquier county, October 12, 1854. In 1878 he made his home at Norfolk, and from the following year until 1887 was connected with the Ocean View hotel and railroad company. Subsequently he became engaged in business at Norfolk, as a broker, the enterprise soon developing into a wholesale grocery business under the firm name of Brooke, Campbell & Co. By changes in the partnership the business title became Brooke Brothers, and finally W. L. Brooke & Co. Mr. Brooke has taken much interest in the State military service, serving five years, from 1883 to 1888 as color bearer of the Norfolk Light Artillery Blues, and subsequently for five years as a member of the Lee Rifles. He is a communicant of St. Luke's Episcopal church and a member of the fraternity of the Royal Arcanum. On February 26, 1884, he was married to Miss Maria Fassman, of Nashville, Tenn., and they have one child, Douglas Shelby.