BRETT, John (d. 1672), of New Ross, co. Wexford.

John Brett’s origins are obscure. He may have been the son of Edward Bray Nicoll Brette, mentioned in the Down Survey as a Protestant with a modest landholding in the barony of Iffa and Offa in co. Tipperary, as the entry for the baptism of the lieutenant-colonel’s youngest son, Nathaniel, in Warwick in 1653, notes that he was born at Clonmel in co. Tipperary on 24 September 1642.13Down Survey website; Warwick St Nicholas par. reg. It is thus at least plausible that the Brett family had fled to the relative safety of Clonmel after the outbreak of the Irish rebellion. Placing Brett in Ireland during this period also makes sense of his involvement in moves to secure relief for the ‘pre-1649’ officers after the Restoration.14CSP Ire. 1666-9, p. 109. It is only in 1649 that Brett’s career emerges from the shadows, as in that year he was serving in Ireland as lieutenant-colonel in Colonel Solomon Richards’ foot regiment under the overall command of Oliver Cromwell* and (from 1650) Henry Ireton*.15SP28/70/4, f. 679. In 1650 and 1651 Brett was on active service with his regiment, and probably took part in the siege of Limerick.16SP28/75/2, f. 218; SP28/77/1, f. 36; SP28/81/5, f. 787. By virtue of his military office, he became involved in the administration of Ireland in the early 1650s. Brett and Richards were appointed to a commission to set up the high court of justice against the Irish rebels in November 1652, and Brett sat on the council of officers which advised about disbanding a proportion of the Irish forces in the summer of 1653.17Eg. 1761, f. 51; Ire. under the Commonwealth, ii. 365. Richards’ regiment was not itself disbanded, surviving at least until March 1656, when Brett supported attempts to gain payment of arrears for the unit’s officers.18CSP Dom. 1655-6, pp. 240-1. He may have continued as Richards’ subordinate until the army was re-ordered in July 1659, at which point he was nominated as lieutenant-colonel of Thomas Sadleir’s regiment, based in Galway.19CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 12.

Brett’s association with Sadleir may have dated from earlier in the 1650s. Sadleir had been governor of Wexford, the area in which Richards’ regiment was allotted land, and later evidence suggests that Brett’s own allocation was indeed in this county.20Eg. 1762, f. 204v; Irish Census, 1659, 639. This prior connection between the two men might explain Brett’s election as MP for Galway and Mayo – where Sadleir served as governor from 1655 – in the autumn of 1656; although it is far from clear that he shared Sadleir’s political views. Brett was named to the Committee of Irish Affairs on 23 September 1656, and was named to only three other committees, including those on bills for the attainder of the rebels in Ireland (30 Mar. 1657) and to settle the postage in the three nations (29 May).21CJ vii. 427a, 445a, 515a, 542a. His inclusion in the list of those who voted to make Cromwell king on 25 March 1657 suggests that he did not subscribe to the political agenda of many of the senior officers in Ireland.22Narrative of the Late Parliament (1657), 23 (E.935.5). Brett owed his election for Carlow, Wexford, Kilkenny and Queen’s Counties for Richard Cromwell’s* Parliament in 1659 to his own land-holdings in Wexford and the position of his former colonel, Solomon Richards, as governor of the city of Wexford. He may also have benefited from the support of his fellow MP, another army officer who had settled in the area, Daniel Redman*, who had fought alongside Brett at Limerick and had also voted for kingship in 1657. In the 1659 session Brett’s parliamentary career was unimpressive: he was appointed to only one committee.23CJ vii. 637b.

It was only after the collapse of the protectorate, that Brett was to emerge, albeit briefly, on to the national political stage. Although he was chosen to serve as Sadleir’s lieutenant-colonel in July 1659, according to Edmund Ludlowe II* he and Redman were discharged ‘for their zeal to the usurpation of Cromwell’, with Brett being replaced by the Baptist, William Walker.24CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 12; Ludlow, Mems. ii. 203; Clarke, Prelude to Restoration, 63-4. Thereafter, Brett and Redman seem to have moved to London, where they offered their services to the Rump Parliament against the army radicals. In early January 1660, as political tensions reached their height, a pro-Rump Irish brigade (made up of the regiments of Colonels Jerome Sankey* and Daniel Axtell*), which had been stationed in England since Sir George Boothe’s* rebellion in the previous year, was ordered to take control of York. On 2 January Brett and Redman arrived in the north, with letters from the Speaker giving them command of the Irish brigade, a move which was accepted by the soldiers, despite their new commanders’ reputation as ‘sticklers for a protector’.25CSP Dom. 1659-60, p. 294. Once the remaining officers had been purged, General George Monck* ordered Redman to march the brigade into Cheshire, en route for Ireland.26Clarke Pprs. iv. 251-2. Monck was impressed by Brett’s behaviour during the York incident, telling the Speaker that ‘Lieutenant-Colonel Brett, whom you sent down with Colonel Redman to command the foot under him, is an honest, stout, able officer, and one that is faithful to you; I humbly request you to be mindful of him for a regiment of foot in Ireland’.27Clarke Pprs. iv. 252.

Brett’s loyalty to Parliament, and his cooperation with Monck and other moderates in 1660, no doubt helped smooth his path after the restoration of the monarchy. In October 1660 he was included in the list of officers to be continued in the king’s army in Ireland, and, having taken a pledge of loyalty to Charles II, in early 1661 he was commissioned as lieutenant-colonel in Sir John Clotworthy’s regiment.28CSP Ire. 1647-60, p. 289; 1660-2, p. 315; 1663-5, p. 474. Brett does not appear to have held his field command for long, however: by the end of 1661 he was resident in Wexford, where he acted as poll-money commissioner.29Irish Census, 1659, 639. He was also returned as MP for Thomastown, co. Kilkenny, in the Irish Parliament of 1661.30CJI, i. 591, 693; ii. 131, 440. In July 1662 Brett was commissioned by the new lord lieutenant, the duke of Ormond, as captain (though salaried as a full colonel) of a foot company and a horse troop, garrisoned at New Ross, co. Wexford.31HMC Ormonde, o.s. i. 242, 245, 252, 269, 275. Brett continued in command of New Ross until he was discharged on 11 August 1663.32HMC Ormonde, o.s. i. 281. Thereafter, he seems to have divided his time between England and Ireland. He received licence to travel to England in November 1663, but had returned to Ireland by March 1666, when he was again active in the Irish Parliament.33HMC Ormonde, o.s. i. 286; CJI, ii. 440. In the following May he was acting as agent for the pre-1649 officers in their continuing efforts to secure arrears of pay incurred while fighting the Catholic rebels in the years after 1641.34CSP Ire. 1666-9, p. 109. Brett’s daughter, Dorothy, had married the celebrated physician, Hugh Chamberlen, in Westminster in May 1663, and Brett was living in Middlesex when he drafted his will in January 1672.35Oxford DNB, ‘Hugh Chamberlen, the elder’; PROB11/38/386. In it he left his property in England and Ireland to his wife, to be divided after her death among his three sons: John, Thomas and Nathaniel. Brett had died by the end of March 1672.36PROB11/338/386.