In 1800, John Brickwood owned all the land in the ECCO area outside Croydon Common. Because he was a wealthy man, there are many documents in public record offices that mention him. Some of them have been consulted in bringing together this account of his life. Many others have not and their contents may well alter the narrative published here https://eastcroydon.org.uk/the-history-of-east-croydon/john-brickwood-1744-1822/
Brickwood was a merchant, colonial agent and banker. Although none of the documents consulted indicate that he owned or traded enslaved people, he certainly supported those that did. He was also instrumental in the enclosure of publicly accessible common land in Croydon. He was a bit of a chancer, misrepresenting his expenses on a government initiative and massively overestimating the value of his estate. However, he also helped Joseph Banks get specimens for Kew Gardens and enabled the colonisers of Canada to develop a lucrative hemp industry.
No image of John Brickwood has yet been discovered, although one was left in his will to his close friend, John Grantham. The latter is likely to be the civil engineer of that name who had helped make a plan of the route of the Croydon Canal in 1811. However, he is best known as the surveyor of the Shannon Navigation inland waterway. It is possible that Brickwood’s portrait may still belong to one of Grantham’s descendants.
John Brickwood’s will can be viewed on The Public Records Office website https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/D153945. A transcript has been attempted , but is far from complete. If you can make out any of the missing words, please let us know at mail@eastcroydon.gov.uk. transcript-of-john-brickwood-will-v1Download
Many thanks for their help to the staff of the Public Records Office, London Metropolitan Archive, Surrey Records Office, Kew Gardens Archives and Croydon Archives. All Saints Church kindly provided some valuable information about the Brickwood memorials within and Tony Skrzypczyk some much needed images.
East Croydon Community Organisation 
It is stated above that the common land in Croydon was publicly owned. Is there any evidence for this, as it would surely be very unusual? And it seems to be contradicted here: https://london-road-croydon.org/history/sources/enclosure/croydon-enclosure.
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Thanks, Mike. This is helpful and the wording has been change. We intend to research the enclosure of Croydon Common before our next East Croydon History Walk in September and have a copy of Corbet Anderson’s book. If you know of any other useful sources of information about the topic, please let us know.
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