Vol. X.
No. 5.
BOSTON.
May, 1898.
SIR FRANK LOCKWOOD. By One who Enjoyed Knowing Him. IT is difficult to convey to the mind of an American an adequate idea of the unique position the late Sir Frank Lockwood occu pied in public estimation in England. He was before all things a lawyer, and it is principally as a lawyer that he will be re membered. Yet he was by no means a prominent lawyer. So, too, he was con spicuous in politics .and in the social and in the art world, but he had many con temporaries in these fields of activity who were immeasurably his superiors. Never theless, few men in his generation were listened to with more interest in the House of Commons, few had so large a following in society, while it is very doubtful if any man, not being by profession an artist, has ever before produced enough pictures or sketches to cover the walls of a " one-man" exhibition. These varied talents adorned the man, but it was, after all, his manliness and the cheeriness of his nature, and the winsomeness of his individuality that gave him preeminence over all others at the time of his death as the most popular man in England. The events of his career may be very briefly narrated. He was born in 1846, the second son of Charles Day Lockwood, of Ardwick, Manchester. He was educated at Caius College, Cambridge, where he dis tinguished himself rather in a social way than as a student, gaining no more impor tant honor than a place in his college boat. He did not apply himself at once to prepara tion for his profession, but drifted in a mild way into theatricals, and for a time, at least,
was a full-fledged actor, touring with the Kendals under the assumed name of " Mr. D. Macpherson." With his mobile face, graceful presence, musical voice and quick wit, it is impossible to avoid the conviction that, if he had continued on the boards, he would have gained distinction as an actor. But after creditably filling minor parts, his first appearance being as Kenrick in " The Heir At Law," and his last as Max Harkaway in " London Assurance," he aban doned the stage, and entered his name and kept his term at Lincoln's Inn. He was called to the bar in 1872. He first joined the chancery bar, but, as he characteristi cally declared, he found the wines of that bar tres sec, and not to his taste. He then took common law, and, joining the north eastern circuit, soon attained a considerable reputation by successfully defending prison ers arraigned at the assizes. It is said that his first brief came to him from Sir A. Rollet, who was then mayor of Hull, at the request of Mrs. Kendal. Ten years later, or as soon as the law permitted, he was given " silk," or, in other words, was made a Queen's counsel. In 1884 he was ap pointed recorder of Sheffield — a position of considerably more honor than emolument — and in 1894 he was made solicitor general. Relieved, by becoming Queen's counsel, of the drudgery of junior practice, and devoting his talents almost exclusively to advocacy, for which his peculiar qualities especially fitted him, he rapidly advanced in the profession and enjoyed, almost to the time of his death, one of the leading practices at the common 181
