Brooking & Co.

Brooking & Co. was a St. John's-based mercantile firm, with branches in Trinity and Greenspond between 1850 and 1869. The firm was a successor to Robinson Brooking & Co., a major mercantile company in St. John's in the early 1800s.

Thomas Holdsworth Brooking (b. 1790) came to Newfoundland in 1806-7 as a mercantile clerk in the firm of Hart, Eppes, Gaden & Robinson of St. John's and London. In 1818, when the Newfoundland partner George Richard Robinson (nephew of George Garland) retired to the head office in London, Brooking became the resident partner in Newfoundland. Subsequently, the company traded as Hart, Robinson & Company. In 1838 Robinson & Brooking leased the Garland premises at Trinity.

Following the retirement and death of Robinson in 1850, Brooking continued the firm under the name of Brooking & Co., with William Lockyer as agent at Trinity. The firm relinquished its lease on the Garland premises in 1869, the year in which Brooking died, and the Garland premises were taken over by Grieve & Bremner. Expensive litigation between Brooking's two sons resulted in the rapid demise of the company.

Created - April 22, 2013

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