Page:Dictionary of National Biography, Second Supplement, volume 3.djvu/99

 and from active work in 1888. He contributed ninety-nine subjects to the Academy exhibitions, and about thirty of his pictures were engraved by J. Scott, C. Mottram, and others. His portraits, almost entirely of men, are accurate likenesses, and his horses and dogs are well drawn. The earlier paintings are somewhat tight in execution, with a tendency to over-emphasis of shadow, but the later pictures are freer in style.

Pearce's somewhat naive 'Memories of the Past,' published by him in 1903, contains nineteen reproductions from his paintings, a list of subjects painted, biographical and some technical notes. He died on 31 Jan. 1904 at Sussex Gardens, W., and was buried at the Old Town cemetery, Eastbourne. A portrait of himself he bequeathed to the National Portrait Gallery. He married in 1858 Matilda Jane Cheswright, who survived him with five sons.

 PEARCE, WILLIAM GEORGE, second baronet, of Carde (1861–1907), benefactor to Trinity College, Cambridge, born at Chatham on 23 July 1861, was only child of Sir  [q. v.] by his wife Dinah Elizabeth, daughter of Robert Sowter of Gravesend. Educated at Rugby (1876–1878), he matriculated in 1881 at Trinity College, Cambridge, and graduated B.A. and LL.B. in 1884, proceeding M.A. in 1888. He was called to the bar at the Inner Temple in 1885. On the death of his father in December 1888 he succeeded him in the chairmanship of the Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company of Glasgow, an undertaking the development of which had been the principal work of his father's life. Under Pearce's chairmanship, which lasted from 1888 until his death, the company maintained its high reputation [see, Suppl. II. Pearce was returned to parliament in 1892 as conservative member for Plymouth along with Sir Edward Clarke, but did not seek re-election in 1895. He was honorary colonel of the 2nd Devon volunteers Royal Garrison Artillery. He was a keen sportsman, and his estate of Chilton Lodge, Hungerford, was noted for the excellence of its shooting. He died after a short illness on 2 Nov. 1907 at 2 Deanery Street, Park Lane, and was buried at Chilton Foliat near Hungerford.

He married on 18 March 1905 Caroline Eva, daughter of Robert Coote. There was no issue of the marriage. By his will he left the residue of his property, estimated at over 150,000l., subject to his wife's life interest, to Trinity College, Cambridge, of which he had remained a member, although he had maintained no close association with the college after his life there as an undergraduate. Lady Pearce only survived her husband a few weeks. The college thus acquired probably the most valuable of the many accessions which have been made to its endowments since its foundation by Henry VIII.

 PEARSON, CHARLES JOHN,  (1843–1910), Scottish judge, born at Edinburgh on 6 Nov. 1843, was second son of Charles Pearson, chartered accountant, of Edinburgh, by his wife Margaret, daughter of John Dalziel, solicitor, of Earlston, Berwickshire. After attending Edinburgh Academy, he proceeded to the University of St. Andrews, and thence to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, where he distinguished himself in classics, winning the Gaisford Greek prizes for prose (1862) and verse (1863). He graduated B.A. with a first class in the final classical school in 1865. He afterwards attended law lectures in Edinburgh, and became a member of the Juridical Society, of which he was librarian in 1872–3, and of the Speculative Society (president 1869–71). He was called to the English bar (from the Inner Temple) on 10 June 1870, and on 19 July 1870 passed to the Scottish bar, where he rapidly obtained a large practice. Though not one of the crown counsel for Scotland, he was specially retained for the prosecution at the trial of the City of Glasgow Bank directors (Jan. 1879), became sheriff of chancery in 1885, and procurator and cashier for the Church of Scotland in 1886. In 1887 he was knighted, and was appointed sheriff of Renfrew and Bute in 1888, and of Perthshire in 1889. Pearson was a conservative, though not a keen politician, and in 1890 was appointed solicitor-general for Scotland in Lord Salisbury's second administration, and was elected (unopposed) as M.P. for Edinburgh and St. Andrews Universities. In the same year he became Q.C. In 1891 he succeeded, Lord Robertson [q. v. Suppl. II], as lord advocate, and was sworn of the privy council. At the general election of 1892 he was again returned unopposed for