15 Facts About Henry McCardie

Sir Henry Alfred McCardie was a controversial British judge.

Henry McCardie moved to London to continue work in 1904 and was a popular barrister, on one day handling twenty-one cases in twenty-one different courts.

Henry McCardie became known for two things; firstly the quality and detail of his written judgments, and secondly his tendency to rebel against the judicial norm and criticise the system, which prevented him from advancing further up the judicial hierarchy.

Henry McCardie was popular with the Bar and became a bencher of the Middle Temple in 1916 and a reader in 1927, but received much criticism from the judiciary for his judgements.

Henry McCardie was born on 19 July 1869 in Edgbaston to Joseph Henry McCardie, an Irish merchant and button maker, and his English wife Jane Hunt.

Henry McCardie's father died when McCardie was eight, and as a result he and his six siblings were raised by their mother alone.

Henry McCardie was educated at King Edward's School, Birmingham and was noted as intelligent but lazy.

Henry McCardie left the school when he was sixteen to get a job and for several years worked in an auctioneer's office before being admitted to the Middle Temple in 1891.

Henry McCardie was called to the bar on 18 April 1894 and almost immediately began work at the chambers of James Parfit in Birmingham.

Henry McCardie became well known on the Midlands and Oxford Circuit for his clear arguments and the amount of time he spent working on cases and studying the law as to present the best case for his client; he worked so late that his chamber became known as "the lighthouse" as there was always a light on in the windows.

On one occasion he and the QC he was working with, Edward Marshall-Hall, walked out of court in the middle of a case; it was felt that such a popular and effective junior barrister Henry McCardie must have been in the right in doing so.

Henry McCardie applied to Lord Loreburn, the Lord Chancellor to become a King's Counsel in 1910, but the delay while Reid considered the application harmed Henry McCardie's business, and he withdrew it.

Henry McCardie was noted for his tendency to rebel against the opinions held by the rest of the judiciary and much of society as a whole; as early as 1931 he was supportive of the legalisation of abortion, saying that "I cannot think it right that a woman should be forced to bear a child against her will".

Henry McCardie made several judgments in areas that previously had no case law; in Cohen v Sellar [1926] 1 KB 536 he decided that a fiancee who breaks off the engagement is not entitled to the return of the ring, and his ruling in Hartley v Hymans [1920] 3 KB 475 was one of the cases used by Lord Denning in his resurrection of promissory estoppel.

Henry McCardie Cecil wrote in his memoir Just Within the Law that "I have only the happiest memories of appearing before him".