Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 38.djvu/87

Mitford parish of St. Andrew, Holborn, on 18 Aug. 1748, and was educated with his brother William [q. v.] at Cheam, under the Rev. William Gilpin [q. v.] At an early age he entered the Six Clerks' office, but afterwards determined to be a barrister, and in 1772 was admitted a student of the Inner Temple. He was called to the bar on 9 May 1777, and in 1780 published 'A Treatise on the Pleadings in Suits in the Court of Chancery by English Bill,' London, 8vo, anon. Lord Eldon subsequently characterised this treatise as f a wonderful effort to collect what is to be deduced from authorities speaking so little what is clear' (Preface to the fifth edition by J. W. Smith, 1847), while Sir Thomas Plumer declared that it reduced 'the whole subject to a system with such universally acknowledged learning, accuracy, and discrimination, as to have been ever since received by the whole profession as an authoritative standard and guide' ( and, Reports, ii. 151-2). Owing to the success of his book (which has passed through several English and American editions), Mitford rapidly acquired a large practice at the chancery bar. Through the influence of his cousin, the Duke of Northumberland, he was returned to parliament for the borough of Beeralston, Devonshire, in December 1788, and in July 1789 became a king's counsel, and was appointed a Welsh judge. In 1791 he introduced a bill for ' the relief of persons calling themselves protesting dissenting Catholics, under certain conditions and restrictions' (Part. Hist. xxviii. 1262-4, 1364-5), which after some amendment was passed through both houses and became law (31 Geo. Ill, c. 32). Mitford, however, opposed Fox's motion for the repeal of the penal statutes respecting religious opinions in the following year (ib. xxix. 1398). In January 1793 he supported the Alien Bill in a vigorous speech (ib. xxx. 217-19), and on 13 Feb. following he was appointed solicitor-general in the place of Sir John Scott (afterwards Lord Eldon), receiving the honour of knighthood two days afterwards. As counsel for the crown, Mitford took part in the prosecutions of Daniel Isaac Eaton, Thomas Hardy, John Home Tooke, William Stone, Robert Thomas Crossfield, John Reeves, and James O'Coigley (see, State Trials, vols. xxii. xxiv-xxvii.) He succeeded Scott as attorney-general on 17 July 1799, and, resigning his seat at Beeralston, was returned for the borough of East Looe, Cornwall. On 11 Feb. 1801, after a futile attempt at opposition on the part of Sheridan, he was elected speaker of the House of Commons in the place of Addington (Parl. Hist. xxxv. 948-55), and was admitted to the privy council on the 18th of the same month. On Lord Clare's death Mitford was appointed lord chancellor of Ireland (9 Feb. 1802), and was created a peer of the United Kingdom with the title of Baron Redesdale of Redesdale in the county of Northumberland, on 15 Feb. 1802. He was sworn a member of the Irish privy council on 9 March, and took his seat in the Irish court of chancery for the first time on 5 May 1802. Though his conduct on the bench was beyond suspicion, Redesdale was unpopular with the majority of the Irish people, owing to his bitter opposition to catholic emancipation and his openly expressed distrust of the catholic priesthood. His letters to the Earl of Fingal, in which he wantonly attacked the Roman catholics, were severely criticised in the House of Commons by Canning and Fox (Parl. Debates, 1st ser. i. 760-2, 787-8). In May 1804 Cobbett was convicted of libelling Redesdale and Hardwicke (the lord-lieutenant) in certain letters on the affairs of Ireland, signed 'Inverna,' which appeared in the 'Political Register.' After his conviction it was discovered that the letters had been written by Robert Johnson, one of the justices of the common pleas in Ireland, who was tried at bar in the king's bench at Westminster on 23 Nov. 1805, and found guilty. Redesdale made an elaborate speech against Lord Grenville's motion for a committee on the Roman catholic petition on 10 May 1805, and declared that the abolition of the Roman catholic 'hierarchy was in his opinion the first step to that conciliation which he believed could alone produce peace to Ireland' (ib. iv. 1061-1082). At the beginning of 1806 he involved himself in an injudicious controversy with Valentine, lord Cloncurry, who was desirous of being placed upon the commission of the peace (Personal Recollections of Lord Cloncurry, 1849, pp. 221-30). On the formation of the ministry of All the Talents, Redesdale was promptly dismissed from the chancellorship, and took leave of the Irish bar on 4 March 1806. He accepted a seat at the board of trade and foreign plantations on 30 March 1808, but refused the offer of his old office in Ireland, which his brother-in-law, Perceval, is said to have made to him on becoming premier. He took an active part in the parliamentary debates and in the hearing of appeals and peerage claims. He introduced the bill for the creation of the office of the vice-chancellor for England (53 Geo. III, c. 24), and, in spite of the opposition of Eldon and Ellenborough, his bills for the relief of insolvent debtors (53 Geo. III, c. 102, and 54 Geo. Ill, c. 23) passed into law (see Parl. Debates, 1st ser.