Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Lopes, Henry Charles

1404318Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement, Volume 3 — Lopes, Henry Charles1901James McMullen Rigg

LOPES, HENRY CHARLES, first Baron Ludlow (1828–1899), judge, third son of Sir Ralph Lopes, bart. [see Lopes, Sir Manasseh Masseh, of Maristow, Devon, by Susan Gibbs, eldest daughter of A. Ludlow of Heywood House, Wiltshire, was born at Devonport on 3 Oct. 1828. He was educated at Winchester School and the university of Oxford, where he matriculated from Balliol College on 12 Dec. 1845, and graduated B. A. in 1849. He was admitted on 5 June 1849 student at Lincoln's Inn, but on 26 May 1852 migrated to the Inner Temple, where he was called to the bar on 7 June 1852, and elected bencher on 31 May 1870, and treasurer in 1890. He practised first as a conveyancer and equity draftsman, afterwards as a pleader on the western circuit and at Westminster. He was appointed recorder of Exeter in 1867, and was gazetted Q.C. on 22 June 1869. Returned to parliament for Launceston in the conservative interest on 9 April 1868, he retained the seat until the general election of February 1874, when he rendered signal service to his party by wresting Frome from the liberals. In 1876 he was appointed justice of the high court and knighted (28 Nov.) He sat successively in the common pleas and queen's bench divisions until his advancement in 1885 to the court of appeal (1 Dec.), when he was sworn of the privy council (12 Dec.) He was raised to the peerage, on occasion of the queen's jubilee in 1897 (26 July), as Baron Ludlow of Heywood, Wiltshire, and shortly afterwards retired from the bench. He died at his town house, 8 Cromwell Place, on Christmas day 1899, leaving by his wife Cordelia Lucy (m. 20 Sept. 1854), daughter of Erving Clark of Efford Manor, Devon, an heir, Henry Ludlow, who succeeded as second Baron Ludlow. Place among the great lawyers of the nineteenth century cannot be claimed for Ludlow. He showed, however exceptional ability in nisi prius and divorce cases, and was an admirable chairman of quarter sessions.

[Foster's Men at the Bar and Alumni Oxon.; Lincoln's Inn Adm. Reg.; Law List, 1853; Haydn's Book of Dignities, ed. Ockerby; Lords' Journ. cxxix. 400; Men and Women of the Time (1895); Times, 26 Dec. 1899; Ann. Reg. 1899, ii. 182; Law Times, 30 Dec. 1899; Law Journ. 30 Dec. 1899; Law Mag. and Rev. May 1900; Burke: s Peerage (1900).]

J. M. R.