3-052-429 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The late Sir W. Erle, 1880. Engraving from a photograph by T. and J. Holroyd, of Harrogate. 'This distinguished lawyer, born in 1793, was the son of a Dorsetshire clergyman, and was educated at Winchester and at New College. Having graduated B.C.L. in 1818, Mr. Erle was called to the Bar in the following year, and went the Western Circuit, where he soon secured a large practice. In 1834 he married the eldest daughter of the Rev. Dr. Williams, Warden of New College and Prebendary of Winchester. Soon afterwards he became a King's Counsel. In the Parliament summoned in 1837 he represented the city of Oxford in the Liberal interest, but he did not offer himself for re-election in 1841. In 1844 he was appointed one of the Judges of the Court of Common Pleas, was transferred to the Queen's Bench two years later, and in 1859, upon the elevation of Sir Alexander Cockburn as the successor to Lord Campbell, Sir W. Erle was appointed Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, a post from which he retired on Nov. 26, 1866. After his retirement from the Bench he was selected to preside over the sittings of the Royal Commission on Trades' Unions. In 1870 he was elected Honorary Fellow of New College, Oxford'. From "Illustrated London News", 1880.