equity counsel to the treasury, the duties connected with which post precluded him from applying for a silk gown even had he been so inclined. They were also deemed incompatible with a seat in the House of Commons, and he never figured as a parliamentary candidate.
In 1868 he was made vice-chancellor of the county palatine of Lancaster on the elevation of Sir W. M. James to a vacant lord-justiceship. In 1871 he was elected a bencher of his inn, and in April of that year was raised to the bench as vice-chancellor in succession to Sir John Stuart, and received the honour of knighthood in due course. His sound knowledge of law, together with the great satisfaction he had given in the palatinate court, raised expectations which were not destined to be fulfilled, as his health broke down within a short period of his appointment, and he died at his seat, Chilgrove, near Chichester, on 23 Oct. 1873.
During his short tenure of office, Wickens acquired a reputation for slowness and for too close an adherence to that case law, of which he was an acknowledged master; but he was famous for his intimate acquaintance with all matters relating to practice, and his judgments were rarely appealed from. At the bar he was chiefly renowned as an equity pleader and as a writer of opinions; but though no great speaker, he possessed a gift of clear and vigorous expression, together with a trenchant, concise way of arguing a legal point, which rendered his services as an advocate of no inconsiderable value. In private life he was remarkable for the extent and variety of his literary knowledge, and he was the object of the warmest regard both from his personal and professional friends. He was famed for wit as well as learning, and it was current rumour that his failure to obtain a Balliol fellowship was due to some ill-timed display of the former quality.
He married, in 1845, Harriet Frances, daughter of William Davey of Cowley House, Gloucestershire. His daughter, Mary Erskine, is wife of Mr. Justice Farwell.
[Foster's Alumni Oxon. 1715–1886; Lord Selborne's Memorials, 1st ser. vol. i.; Eton School Lists; Law Times, lvi. 11; Solicitors' Journal, xviii. 20; Times, 27 Oct. 1873 (containing an erroneous statement that he won the Newdigate prize at Oxford).]
WICKHAM. [See also Wykeham.]
WICKHAM, WILLIAM (1761–1840), politician, eldest son of Henry Wickham of Cottingley in Yorkshire, a colonel in the 1st foot guards, by his wife Elizabeth, daughter of William Lamplugh, vicar of Cottingley, was born at Cottingley in October 1761. He was educated at Harrow and at Christ Church, Oxford, where he matriculated on 27 Jan. 1779, obtained a studentship, and became intimate with Charles Abbot (afterwards Lord Colchester) and William Wyndham Grenville (afterwards Lord Grenville). He took his B.A. degree in 1782, and then proceeded to Geneva, where he studied civil law under Amadie Perdriau, a professor in the Genevese university. He then graduated M.A. in February 1786. He was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn in the ensuing Michaelmas term, and obtained a commissionership in bankruptcy in 1790. In Geneva he became acquainted with Eleonora Madeleine Bertrand, whose father was professor of mathematics in the university, and on 10 Aug. 1788 they were married. She lived until 1836.
Wickham's early intimacy with Lord Grenville and his Swiss residence and connections first brought him into public employment. Grenville, then foreign secretary, made use of his services in a secret foreign correspondence in August 1793, and in 1794 he was appointed superintendent of aliens in order to enable him to extend his foreign communications. His letters were carefully kept from the knowledge of the diplomatic service generally, and only reached Grenville's hands through Lord Rosslyn. In October 1794 he was sent to Switzerland on an exceedingly confidential mission, and the fact that he was thus engaged was assiduously concealed from the foreign office. When the fact became known about the end of 1794 it excited great jealousy, and secrecy being no longer attainable, Lord Robert Fitzgerald (then minister plenipotentiary to Switzerland) was recalled, and Wickham was appointed chargé d'affaires during his absence. In the summer of 1795 Fitzgerald was appointed to Copenhagen, and Wickham became minister to the Swiss cantons. His correspondence in this post was most extensive, and the information which he thus gathered for his government proved very accurate and valuable, particularly in connection with the condition of Provence and the royalist movements in La Vendée. He was in fact the government's principal spy on the continent, and his activity and success were so great that in 1797 the directory formally demanded his expulsion on the ground that he acted not as a diplomatic agent but as a fomenter of insurrection (Mallet du Pan, Correspondance avec la Cour de Vienne, ii. 355). He was privately pressed to relieve the Swiss government from its embarrassment by voluntarily retiring, and in Novem-
