THE BROME FAMILY. 
295 
modes of officering tlie Royal Artillery. * 1 2 As ; however, the pages of 
the “ Proceedings ” of the II. A. Institution are read far and wide out¬ 
side of the regiment, it is necessary to remark that the careers of the 
two founders of the Brome family are types of the artillery of the past, 
and are impossible in the Royal Artillery of to-day. 
The Bromes were of an ancient and honorable pre-Norman family, 
who “ came over with the Blood,” and the Aryan roots of the name 
B(a)r—OM, signify “ Sun’s son ” from bar, son, and OM, the sun or 
“ fire principle” 3 —an appropriate name for the Boanergian “ son of a 
gun,” or gunner ; but the immediate ancestors of this artillery family 
were Flemish skilled artificers settled in the Royal Dockyard at Wool¬ 
wich and the art/ienal 3 at Greenwich, where 2000 artificers were 
employed, among whom Peter the Great was at this time enrolled; and 
although the Woolwich branches have disappeared, 4 some families of 
the name are still residing in Greenwich and Deptford. The father 
of Charles Brome was probably employed in the gunpowder magazine 
and Royal Laboratory at Greenwich, which was then “ the chiefest in 
Our Kingdom;” 5 and when Albrecht Borgard was, in 1698, commis¬ 
sioned to superintend the transfer of the Greenwich Laboratory to the 
Warren at Woolwich, the lad Charles Brome (then in his 16 th year of 
age), in April 1698, became one of BorgarcFs “powder boys.” 6 This 
service was reckoned as artillery service in the Royal Warrant of 13th 
July, 1761, which recites that “ Whereas Charles Brome, Esquire, a 
“ Captain in Our Royal Regiment of Artillery, hath served well sixty- 
“ three years in Our said regiment. . . .”—evidently because of 
his having been sent on actice service soon after enlistment; and, as for 
some years the record of his life is one with that of the great Master of 
Artillery (Borgard), he must have been attached to the^r^pn^^orvicp 
or staff of that distinguished Commander. 
In 1698 (when Brome enlisted) there were noj& iVthe . 
--- L —o 
1 The remaining modes were (5th) by graduating through the Roya^Mi&ary Academy as r T^.\G.t). 
Cadet ; and (6th) by obtaining commissions for raising a certain num^t^AL 1 ^Ai^ifcl^^uringAar, 
or for passing a public competitive examination in scholastic subjects. 
2 “ Origin of Language” (Kavannagh). “ Science of Language ” (Max Muller). 
3 Arsenal, derived from the Romaunt Anthenal or “ naval citadel.” Camden’s “ Britannica,” 
published 1695, names Deptford, Woolwich, Chatham, Sheerne-s, as “ the arthenals of the Royal 
‘ ‘Navy in Kent.” See also “ Historical Notes on Royal Arsenal,” p. 247, by Lieut. Grover, R.E. 
4 The last of the Bromes, whom I can trace, in Woolwich were John, brother of Charles, married 
at St. Mary’s, Woolwich, in 1714; and his two children, Mary (born 12/16/1715), and George 
(born 25/1/1718), who were baptised at St. Mary’s. 
The V\ oolwich parish registers of 17th century are curious, and contain li&ts of Woolwlchers (a) 
who were certified to have been buried in woollen (prior to general interment in coffins)—under 
Statute of Charles II., which was repealed in 1834. (“ England in the 18th Century,” Vol. III., 
pp. 504-6) ; and (b) who were sent to Westminster to be touched by the King for the “ King’s 
Evil.” 
6 Board of Ordnance letter book, anno 1700. At this period 50C0 barrels of gunpowder were 
magazined at the Greenwich Arsenal, from the fleet, ibid.— in replacement cf the 6000 barrels 
removed in October 1694 to Gravesend and Tilbury, the estiirate fcr a new Eoyal Laboratory, at 
Woolwich Warren, having been sanctioned only in 1694. Purfleet replaced Greenwich, in 1769, 
as the principal powder magazine of the kingdom, on complaint of the Greenwich inhabitants of 
the danger to their Town, only a quarter mile distant. Seconds of Woolwich, Vol. VII., jo. 320. 
6 Henry Maudslay, the eminent Engineer, was also a 1 
Seconds of Woolwich, Vol. V., £>. 214, 
: powder boy ” at Woolwich, 1780.- 
