1ST

BARON

See also:

• THOMAS
• THOMAS (c. 1654-1720)
• THOMAS (d. 110o)
• THOMAS, ARTHUR GORING (1850-1892)
• THOMAS, CHARLES LOUIS AMBROISE (1811-1896)
• THOMAS, GEORGE (c. 1756-1802)
• THOMAS, GEORGE HENRY (1816-187o)
• THOMAS, ISAIAH (1749-1831)
• THOMAS, PIERRE (1634-1698)
• THOMAS, SIDNEY GILCHRIST (1850-1885)
• THOMAS, ST
• THOMAS, THEODORE (1835-1905)
• THOMAS, WILLIAM (d. 1554)

THOMAS

See also:

• 1ST BARON THOMAS DENMAN (1779-1854)

DENMAN (1779-1854)  , English judge, was born in London, the son of a well-known physician, on the 23rd of July 1779 . He was educated at Eton and St John's College, Cambridge, where he graduated in 1800 . Soon after leaving Cambridge he married; and in 18o6 he was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn, and at once entered upon practice . His success was rapid, and in a few years he attained a position at the bar second only to that of Brougham and Scarlett (Lord Abinger) . He distinguished himself by his eloquent defence of the Luddites; but his most brilliant appearance was as one of the counsel for Queen Caroline . His speech before the Lords was very powerful, and some competent judges even considered it not inferior to Brougham's . It contained one or two daring passages, which made the king his bitter enemy, and retarded his legal promotion . At the general election of 1818 he was returned M.P. for Wareham, and at once took his seat with the Whig opposition . In the following year he was returned for Nottingham, for which place he continued to sit till his elevation to the bench in 1832 . Hi3 liberal principles had caused his exclusion from office till in 1822 he was appointed common serjeant by the corporation of London . In 1830 he was made attorney-general under Lord Grey's administration . Two years later he was made lord chief justice of the King's Bench, and in 1834 he was raised to the peerage .

As a judge he is most celebrated for his decision in the important

privilege case of Slockdale v . Hansard (9 Ad . & El . I.; 11 Ad . & El . 253), but he was never ranked as a profound lawyer . In 1850 he resigned his chief justiceship and retired into private life . He died on the 26th of September 1854, his title continuing in the direct line . The HoN . GEORGE DENMAN (1819-1896), his fourth son, was also a distinguished lawyer, and a judge of the Queen's Bench from 1872 till his death in 1896 . See Memoir of Thomas, first Lord Denman, by Sir Joseph Arnould (2 vols., 1873) ; E . Manson, Builders of our Law (1904) .