Hugh Holmes QC (17 February 1840 – 18 April 1916) was an Irish Conservative Party, then after 1886 a Unionist Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom Parliament and subsequently a Judge of the High Court and

Court of Appeal in Ireland The Court of Appeal in Ireland was created by the Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland under the Supreme Court of Judicature Act (Ireland) 1877 as the final appellate court within Ireland, then under British rule. A l ...

Background and education

Holmes was born in

Dungannon Dungannon (, ) is a town in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It is the second-largest town in the county (after Omagh) and had a population of 16,282 at the United Kingdom Census 2011, 2021 Census. The Dungannon and South Tyrone Borough Counci ...

County Tyrone County Tyrone (; ) is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the thirty-two traditional counties of Ireland. Its county town is Omagh. Adjoined to the south-west shore of Lough Neagh, the cou ...

, the son of William Holmes of Dungannon and Anne Maxwell. He attended the

Royal School Dungannon The Royal School is a mixed boarding school located in Dungannon, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It was one of a number of 'free schools' created by James I of England, James I (otherwise known as James VI of Scotland) in 1608 to provide an ed ...

and

Trinity College Dublin Trinity College Dublin (), officially titled The College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Queen Elizabeth near Dublin, and legally incorporated as Trinity College, the University of Dublin (TCD), is the sole constituent college of the Unive ...

. He was called to the English bar in 1864 and to the

Irish Bar The Bar of Ireland () 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 Bar of Ireland, commonly c ...

in 1865.

Legal and judicial career

Holmes became a

Queen's Counsel A King's Counsel (Post-nominal letters, post-nominal initials KC) is a senior lawyer appointed by the monarch (or their Viceroy, viceregal representative) of some Commonwealth realms as a "Counsel learned in the law". When the reigning monarc ...

(QC) in 1877. He was appointed

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 r ...

on 14 December 1878 and served until the Conservative government was defeated in 1880. He served as

Attorney General for Ireland The Attorney-General for Ireland was an Kingdom of Ireland, Irish and then, from 1801 under the Acts of Union 1800, United Kingdom government office-holder. He was senior in rank to the Solicitor-General for Ireland: both advised the Crown on ...

from 1885 to 1886 and again from 1886 to 1887. He was made a member of the

Privy Council of Ireland His or Her Majesty's Privy Council in Ireland, commonly called the Privy Council of Ireland, Irish Privy Council, or in earlier centuries the Irish Council, was the institution within the Dublin Castle administration which exercised formal executi ...

on 2 July 1885. He was MP for

Dublin University The University of Dublin (), corporately named as The Chancellor, Doctors and Masters of the University of Dublin, is a research university located in Dublin, Republic of Ireland. It is the degree-awarding body for Trinity College Dublin, whi ...

from 1885 to 1887. Holmes resigned from the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of ...

on his appointment as a judge in 1887. He was a Justice of the

Common Pleas A court of common pleas is a common kind of court structure found in various common law jurisdictions. The form originated with the Court of Common Pleas at Westminster, which was created to permit individuals to press civil grievances against one ...

Division of the

High Court of Justice in Ireland The High Court of Justice in Ireland was the court created by the Supreme Court of Judicature Act (Ireland) 1877 to replace the existing court structure in Ireland. Its creation mirrored the reform of the courts of England and Wales five years ...

until 1888 when he became a Justice of the Queen's Bench Division. He was promoted to be a

Lord Justice of Appeal A Lord Justice of Appeal or Lady Justice of Appeal is a judge of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales, the court that hears appeals from the High Court of Justice, the Crown Court and other courts and tribunals. A Lord (or Lady) Just ...

in 1897. Ill health caused his retirement in 1914. He appeared to be a stern judge, who did not suffer fools gladly and often imposed exceptionally severe sentences in criminal cases. Although the story is often thought to be apocryphal,

Maurice Healy Maurice Healy (3 January 1859 – 9 November 1923) was an Irish nationalist politician, lawyer and member of parliament (MP). As a member of the Irish Parliamentary Party, he was returned to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom of Great ...

maintained that Holmes once sentence a man of great age to 15 years in prison, and when the prisoner pleaded that he could not do 15 years, replied "Do as much of it as you can". His judgments did, however, display some good humour and humanity, and the sentences he imposed often turned out to be less severe in practice than those he announced in Court. The quality of his judgments was very high and Holmes, together with Christopher Palles and Gerald FitzGibbon, is credited with earning for the

Irish Court of Appeal The Court of Appeal in Ireland was created by the Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland under the Supreme Court of Judicature Act (Ireland) 1877 as the final appellate court within Ireland, then under British rule. A l ...

its reputation as perhaps the strongest tribunal in Irish legal history. His retirement, followed by that of Palles (FitzGibbon had died in 1909), caused a loss of expertise in the Court of Appeal from which its reputation never recovered. Among his more celebrated remarks is that the Irish "have too much of a sense of humour to dance around a

maypole A maypole is a tall wooden pole erected as a part of various European List of folk festivals, folk festivals, around which a maypole dance often takes place. The festivals may occur on May Day, 1 May or Pentecost (Whitsun), although in some co ...

". His judgment in ''The SS Gairloch'' remains the authoritative statement in Irish law on the circumstances in which an

appellate court An appellate court, commonly called a court of appeal(s), appeal court, court of second instance or second instance court, is any court of law that is empowered to hear a case upon appeal from a trial court or other lower tribunal. Appel ...

can overturn findings of fact made by the trial judge.

Family

In 1869 Hugh Holmes married Olivia Moule, daughter of J.W. Moule of Sneads Green House, Elmley Lovett,

Worcestershire Worcestershire ( , ; written abbreviation: Worcs) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It is bordered by Shropshire, Staffordshire, and the West Midlands (county), West ...

and Jane Harvie; she died in 1901. Her sister Elizabeth married another prominent Irish judge, John Monroe. Hugh and Olivia had seven children, including Hugh junior, Sir Valentine Holmes QC (1888-1956), who like his father was a very successful barrister, and a noted expert on the law of

libel Defamation is a communication that injures a third party's reputation and causes a legally redressable injury. The precise legal definition of defamation varies from country to country. It is not necessarily restricted to making assertions ...

, Violet (died 1966), who married Sir Denis Henry, 1st Baronet, the first

Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland The Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland is a judge who presides over the courts of Northern Ireland and is the head of the Northern Ireland, Northern Irish judiciary. The present Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland is Siobhan Keegan, Dame ...

, Elizabeth, who married the politician and academic Harold Lawson Murphy, author of a well known ''History of Trinity College Dublin'', and Alice (died 1942), who married the politician and judge Edward Sullivan Murphy,

Attorney General for Northern Ireland The Attorney General for Northern Ireland is the chief legal adviser to the Northern Ireland Executive for both civil and criminal matters that fall within the devolved powers of the Northern Ireland Assembly. The Attorney General for Northern Irel ...

and Lord Justice of Appeal in Northern Ireland. Hugh Holmes died at his home in Dublin on 18 April 1916.

References

* ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography''

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Holmes, Hugh 1840 births 1916 deaths Alumni of Trinity College Dublin Attorneys-general for Ireland Irish Conservative Party MPs Irish barristers Irish Unionist Party politicians Members of the Middle Temple Members of the Privy Council of Ireland Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for Dublin University People from Dungannon Solicitors-general for Ireland UK MPs 1885–1886 UK MPs 1886–1892 Lords Justice of Appeal for Ireland Judges of the High Court of Justice in Ireland 19th-century Irish judges 19th-century Irish lawyers 20th-century Irish judges People educated at the Royal School Dungannon