Edward Pennefather
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Edward Pennefather PC, KC (22 October 1774 – 6 September 1847) was an Irish barrister, Law Officer and judge of the Victorian era, who held office as
Lord Chief Justice of Ireland The Court of King's Bench (or Court of Queen's Bench during the reign of a Queen) was one of the senior courts of common law in Ireland. It was a mirror of the Court of King's Bench in England. The Lord Chief Justice was the most senior judge ...
.


Early life

Pennefather was born in
Tipperary Tipperary is the name of: Places *County Tipperary, a county in Ireland **North Tipperary, a former administrative county based in Nenagh **South Tipperary, a former administrative county based in Clonmel *Tipperary (town), County Tipperary's na ...
, the second son of William Pennefather of Knockeevan, member of the
Irish House of Commons The Irish House of Commons was the lower house of the Parliament of Ireland that existed from 1297 until 1800. The upper house was the House of Lords. The membership of the House of Commons was directly elected, but on a highly restrictive fran ...
for Cashel, and his wife Ellen Moore, daughter of Edward Moore,
Archdeacon of Emly The Archdeacon of Emly was a senior ecclesiastical officer in the Diocese of Emly and its successor amalgamated dioceses.Fasti Ecclesiae Hibernicae Vol I pp101-105 Cotton, H.: Dublin, Hodges & Smith 1851 Notable archdeacons included Garrett Fit ...
and Ellen Dobson. He went to school in Clonmel and graduated from the University of Dublin. He was called to the
Irish Bar The Bar of Ireland ( ga, Barra na hÉireann) is the professional association of barristers for Ireland, with over 2,000 members. It is based in the Law Library, with premises in Dublin and Cork. It is governed by the General Council of the Ba ...
in 1795. He lived at Rathsallagh House, near
Dunlavin Dunlavin () is a village in County Wicklow, Ireland, situated about south-west of Dublin. It is centred on the junction of the R412 and R756 regional roads. It was founded around the end of the 17th century and became a prominent town in ...
, County Wicklow. His brother Richard Pennefather (1773-1859) had a longer and more successful career as a judge: appointed a Baron of the Court of Exchequer in 1821, he served for nearly 40 years and was held in universal regard; with the general support of the profession he remained on the Bench until shortly before his death at eighty-six, by which time he was blind. Edward and Richard, "the two Pennefathers", were leading practitioners in the
Court of Chancery (Ireland) The Court of Chancery was a court which exercised equitable jurisdiction in Ireland until its abolition as part of the reform of the court system in 1877. It was the court in which the Lord Chancellor of Ireland presided. Its final sitting plac ...
. Edward was generally regarded as more gifted, a master of the
law of equity Equity is a particular body of law that was developed in the English Court of Chancery. Its general purpose is to provide a remedy for situations where the law is not flexible enough for the usual court system to deliver a fair resolution to a cas ...
and also a skilled libel lawyer. In 1816 he was one of the lead counsel in the celebrated libel case of ''Bruce v. Grady'', which arose from the publication of a scurrilous poem called "The Nosegay", written by a barrister Thomas Grady about his former friend, the notably eccentric banker George Evans Brady of Hermitage House,
Castleconnell Castleconnell (, historically ''Caisleán Uí Chonaing'') is a village in County Limerick on the banks of the River Shannon. It is from Limerick city and near the boundaries of counties Clare and Tipperary. History The ruins of the ' Castle ...
. The quarrel is said to have arisen from a dispute over money which Bruce had loaned to Grady. The plaintiff claimed £20000; the jury awarded £500.


Law officer and judge

He was made a King's Counsel by 1816. He was very briefly
Attorney-General for Ireland The Attorney-General for Ireland was an Irish and then (from the Act of Union 1800) United Kingdom government office-holder. He was senior in rank to the Solicitor-General for Ireland: both advised the Crown on Irish legal matters. With the ...
in 1830, and was made Third
Serjeant-at-law (Ireland) This is a list of lawyers who held the rank of serjeant-at-law at the Irish Bar. Origins of the office of serjeant The first recorded serjeant was Roger Owen, who was appointed between 1261 and 1266, although the title itself was not commonly ...
in the same year. He became Second Serjeant and First Serjeant in the two following years. He was
Solicitor-General for Ireland The Solicitor-General for Ireland was the holder of an Irish and then (from the Act of Union 1800) United Kingdom government office. The holder was a deputy to the Attorney-General for Ireland, and advised the Crown on Irish legal matters. On ra ...
in the
First Peel ministry Sir Robert Peel's first government succeeded the caretaker ministry of the Duke of Wellington. Peel was also Chancellor of the Exchequer while the Duke of Wellington served as Foreign Secretary. A young William Ewart Gladstone held office as a ...
in 1835 and again in the
Second Peel ministry The second Peel ministry was formed by Sir Robert Peel in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in 1841. History Peel came to power for a second time after the Conservative victory in the General Election caused the Whig government ...
in 1841. In the latter year, he was appointed Lord Chief Justice of the Queen's Bench for Ireland and held the position until he resigned on health grounds in 1846.


Reputation

According to Elrington Ball, Pennefather was considered to be one of the greatest Irish advocates of his time, and one with few rivals in any age, but he did not live up to expectations as a judge, due largely to his age and increasing ill-health. As a judge he is remembered mainly for presiding at the trial of
Daniel O'Connell Daniel O'Connell (I) ( ga, Dónall Ó Conaill; 6 August 1775 – 15 May 1847), hailed in his time as The Liberator, was the acknowledged political leader of Ireland's Roman Catholic majority in the first half of the 19th century. His mobilizat ...
in 1843 for sedition, where his alleged
bias Bias is a disproportionate weight ''in favor of'' or ''against'' an idea or thing, usually in a way that is closed-minded, prejudicial, or unfair. Biases can be innate or learned. People may develop biases for or against an individual, a group ...
against the accused damaged his reputation: he was accused of acting as prosecutor rather than judge, and his summing-up was described as simply an extra speech for the prosecution. Further damage to his reputation was done by the majority decision of the
House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminste ...
quashing the verdict in the O'Connell case: while many of the errors were the fault of the prosecution, the
Law Lords Lords of Appeal in Ordinary, commonly known as Law Lords, were judges appointed under the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876 to the British House of Lords, as a committee of the House, effectively to exercise the judicial functions of the House of ...
did not spare Pennefather for his conduct of the proceedings, and in particular for his summing-up. The Law Lords commented severely that the course of the trial, if condoned, would make a mockery of
trial by jury A jury trial, or trial by jury, is a legal proceeding in which a jury makes a decision or findings of fact. It is distinguished from a bench trial in which a judge or panel of judges makes all decisions. Jury trials are used in a significan ...
in Ireland.Geoghegan pp. 190-191 The related trial of Sir John Grey descended into farce when the Attorney General, Sir
Thomas Cusack-Smith Sir Thomas Berry Cusack-Smith PC (1795 – 13 August 1866) was an Irish politician and judge. He was nicknamed "TBC Smith" or "Alphabet Smith". Family and education He was the younger son of Sir William Cusack-Smith, 2nd Baronet, Baron of the ...
, who was noted for his hot temper, challenged one of the defence counsel Gerald Fitzgibbon to a duel, for having allegedly accused him of improper motives. Pennefather told the Attorney General severely that a man in his position had no excuse for such conduct, whereupon the Attorney General agreed to let the matter drop. The public noted with interest that Fitzgibbon's wife and daughter had been present in Court during the contretemps.


Family

In 1806 he married Susannah Darby, eldest daughter of John Darby of
Leap Castle Leap Castle (; ga, Caisleán Léim Uí Bhánáin) is a castle in Coolderry, County Offaly, Ireland, about north of the town of Roscrea and south of Kinnitty on the R421. History There are varied accounts as to when exactly the main t ...
, County Offaly, and his wife Anne Vaughan, and sister of
John Nelson Darby John Nelson Darby (18 November 1800 – 29 April 1882) was an Anglo-Irish Bible teacher, one of the influential figures among the original Plymouth Brethren and the founder of the Exclusive Brethren. He is considered to be the father of moder ...
, one of the most influential of the early Plymouth Brethren. They had ten children, including Edward, the eldest son and heir;
Richard Richard is a male given name. It originates, via Old French, from Old Frankish and is a compound of the words descending from Proto-Germanic ''*rīk-'' 'ruler, leader, king' and ''*hardu-'' 'strong, brave, hardy', and it therefore means 'stro ...
,
Auditor General of Ceylon The Auditor General of Sri Lanka ( Sinhala: ශ්‍රී ලංකා විගණකාධිපති ''Śrī Laṃkā viganakādhipathi''; Tamil: இலங்கை கணக்காய்வாளர் தலைமை) is appointed by th ...
; Ellen, who married James Thomas O'Brien, Bishop of Ossory, Ferns and Leighlin, and Dorothea, (Dora) (1825-1859), who married in 1850, as his second wife,
James Stopford, 4th Earl of Courtown James Thomas Stopford, 4th Earl of Courtown (27 March 1794 – 20 November 1858), known as Viscount Stopford from 1810 to 1835, was an Anglo-Irish peer and Tory Member of Parliament. Courtown was the third but eldest surviving son of James Stop ...
, and had three sons. Two of Dora's sons, General Sir
Frederick Stopford Lieutenant General Sir Frederick William Stopford, (2 February 1854 – 4 May 1929) was a British Army officer, best remembered for commanding the landing at Suvla Bay in August 1915, during the Gallipoli Campaign, where he failed to orde ...
, commander at the
Landing at Suvla Bay The landing at Suvla Bay was an amphibious landing made at Suvla on the Aegean coast of the Gallipoli peninsula in the Ottoman Empire as part of the August Offensive, the final British attempt to break the deadlock of the Battle of Gallipol ...
, and Admiral Walter Stopford, became famous.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pennefather, Edward 1775 births 1847 deaths Irish barristers Solicitors-General for Ireland Members of the Privy Council of Ireland Lords chief justice of Ireland People from County Tipperary Serjeants-at-law (Ireland)