Michael Gryffin or Gryffen (died 1467) was an English-born

judge A judge is a person who wiktionary:preside, presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a judicial panel. In an adversarial system, the judge hears all the witnesses and any other Evidence (law), evidence presented by the barris ...

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

. He spent many years attempting to exercise his right to hold the office of

Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer The Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer was the Baron (judge) who presided over the Irish Court of Exchequer. This was a mirror of the equivalent court in England, and was one of the four courts which sat in the building in Dublin which is still ...

, which was also claimed by his Irish-born rival, John Cornwalsh.Ball, F. Elrington ''The Judges in Ireland 1221-1921'' John Murray London 1926 Vol. I p.101 Little appears to be known of his background, but Griffiths states that by 1440 he already had a long record of good service to the

English Crown This list of kings and reigning queens of the Kingdom of England begins with Alfred the Great, who initially ruled Wessex, one of the seven Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which later made up modern England. Alfred styled himself king of the Anglo-Sax ...

, and Elrington Ball describes his social rank as a "gentleman". In consideration of his "long and loyal service to the Crown", he was, in 1441, appointed Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer for life.Griffiths p.417 This led immediately to a clash with John Cornwalsh, whose father

James Cornwalsh James Cornwalsh (died 1441) was an Irish judge who held the office of Chief Baron of the Irish Exchequer. He was a political figure of considerable importance in fifteenth-century Ireland, and a supporter of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, James Bu ...

, recently deceased, had held the same office; John claimed that he had been granted in reversion the right to be Chief Baron. This dispute quickly merged into the wider and long-running dispute between the two main political factions in Ireland, the Butlers and the Talbots. With the backing of the Talbots, headed by

John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury, 1st Earl of Waterford, 7th Baron Talbot, KG (17 July 1453), known as "Old Talbot" and "Terror of the French" was an English nobleman and a noted military commander during the Hundred Years' War. He was t ...

, The Crown, now siding with Griffin made an inquiry into the basis on which Cornwalsh had "outthrust" Gryffin from office."Patent Roll 20 Henry VI'' Gryffin managed to keep his rival out of office for 5 years; but in 1446 Cornwalsh, backed by his powerful patron

James Butler, 4th Earl of Ormonde James may refer to: People * James (given name) * James (surname) * James (musician), aka Faruq Mahfuz Anam James, (born 1964), Bollywood musician * James, brother of Jesus * King James (disambiguation), various kings named James * Prince James ...

, obtained a declaration that Gryffin's

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling discl ...

of office had been obtained "surreptitiously and illegally". How a patent issued at the command of the King himself could be "illegal" is unclear: the use of the word "surreptitiously" perhaps implies that it was a

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. The

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accordingly passed a statute annulling Gryffin's patent of appointment.Statute 25 Hen. 6. c. 6 (I) In justice to Cornwalsh, it must be said that he was professionally undoubtedly the better qualified of the two rivals, having studied law at the

Inns of Court The Inns of Court in London are the professional associations for barristers in England and Wales. There are four Inns of Court: Gray's Inn, Lincoln's Inn, Inner Temple, and Middle Temple. All barristers must belong to one of them. They have s ...

in the 1430s, whereas Gryffin, judging by the references to him in a memorandum of 1442, had no legal qualifications at all. Further, the lack of learning shown by the Barons of the

Court of Exchequer (Ireland) The Court of Exchequer (Ireland), or the Irish Exchequer of Pleas, was one of the senior courts of common law in Ireland. It was the mirror image of the equivalent court in England. The Court of Exchequer was one of the four royal courts of jus ...

as a body was a long-standing cause of concern to the

. The memorandum of 1442 which referred to Gryffin's lack of legal qualifications proposed a series of reforms which included a requirement that the Chief Baron (if not the ordinary Barons) should always be a qualified lawyer. John Gough, who served as second Baron for some twenty-five years, and like Gryffin was praised for his "good service" to the Crown, might have been an acceptable compromise candidate, but this was evidently not considered.Ball p.179 The following year Gryffin was accused of "diverse offences" but he refused to give up the struggle to remain in office as Chief Baron: in 1449 he sat as a judge on a commission of

oyer and terminer In English law, oyer and terminer (; a partial translation of the Anglo-French , which literally means 'to hear and to determine') was one of the commissions by which a judge of assize sat. Apart from its Law French name, the commission was also ...

, which his enemies promptly declared illegal. In 1454, after conditions in Ireland had become more settled, he was exonerated of any wrongdoing. He died in 1467.

References

1467 deaths Year of birth unknown Chief Barons of the Irish Exchequer {{Ireland-law-bio-stub