24th September 1842

Former bailiff Daniel de Lisle Brock died

Daniel de Lisle Brock was a staunch supporter of Guernsey’s rights in the face of encroaching influence from London. He was the island’s Bailiff from 1821 until his death on 24 September 1842.

Brock was born in St Peter Port and educated in Guernsey, in Alderney and on the mainland in Richmond. He spent some time in France and was elected a jurat of the Royal Court following his return to Guernsey.

The Royal Court chose him to represent Guernsey’s interests at the Houses of Parliament. There, he argued that the island’s privileges and status should be maintained at a time when England was trying to interfere with Guernsey’s trade.

A tireless defender of Guernsey’s rights

He travelled to London four times on official business between 1804 and 1810. No doubt his efforts – and successes – would still have been in locals’ minds when, 11 years later, he was elected Bailiff. In this new capacity, he returned to London to argue that Guernsey should be exempted from restrictions on the import of corn.

That wasn’t the end of his struggles with the mainland, though. In 1832 he once again went to the capital to demand that Guernsey residents should only be tried in Guernsey courts and, in 1835, to protest against a sudden restriction on the Channel Islands exporting corn to the mainland duty-free.

Few other Bailiffs can be said to have stood up for their homeland quite so vociferously as Brock.

Island improvements

Daniel de Lisle Brock oversaw the printing of Guernsey’s first banknotes, the construction of roads across the island and the Market Building in Town.

He was given a public funeral following his death and was succeeded as Bailiff by John Guille, who continued to defend the rights of the Royal Court throughout his term. Daniel de Lisle Brock appears on the £1 banknote introduced in March 1980, which has an image of the Market Building on the reverse.