biography
| name: |
Erskine, Thomas Erskine, Baron
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1750–1823)
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| biography:
| Lawyer, born in Edinburgh, EC Scotland, UK. In 1764 he was sent to sea, in 1768 he bought a commission in the army, then took up law. His success was immediate with a brilliant defence (1778) of Captain Baillie, Lieutenant-Governor of Greenwich Hospital, who was threatened with a criminal prosecution for libel, and in 1781 he secured the acquittal of Lord George Gordon. In 1783 he became a KC, and an MP for Portsmouth. His sympathy with the French Revolution led him to join the ‘Friends of the People’, and to undertake the defence in many political prosecutions of 1793–4. His courtroom speeches are remembered for their vigour and literary merit. In 1802 he was appointed chancellor to the Prince of Wales, an ancient office revived in his favour. In 1806 he was appointed Lord Chancellor, but resigned the following year and gradually retired into private life. Erskine did much to mould English commercial law, an almost new department of jurisprudence. |
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