“Sir Gilbert Dolben, 1st Baronet”的意思、由来-开放百科全书

Sir Gilbert Dolben, 1st Baronet (1658-1722) was an English lawyer, landowner and politician who also served as a judge in Ireland for many years, while continuing to sit in the House of Commons of England.^[1] He was the grandfather of the noted anti-slavery campaigner Sir William Dolben.

Background

He was the elder son of John Dolben, Archbishop of York, and Catherine Sheldon. His background was strongly episcopal: he was a grand-nephew of Gilbert Sheldon, Archbishop of Canterbury and a more remote connection of John Williams, Archbishop of York. His uncle Sir William Dolben was a distinguished judge. He was the elder brother of John Dolben, who had a very similar but rather less successful career as a barrister and politician.^[2]

Politician

He first entered Parliament as MP for Ripon in 1685 and remained in the Commons with short intervals until 1714, sitting in turn for Ripon, Peterborough and Yarmouth, Isle of Wight.^[2]

Although he was a Tory in politics, he supported the Glorious Revolution, and argued with great force that James II could be deemed to have abdicated.^[2] He opposed the attainder of Sir John Fenwick for treason in 1696, not because he thought him innocent but because he argued that the case should be dealt with by ordinary process of criminal law. In the debates following the celebrated judgment in Ashby v White, he argued strongly that the House of Commons had exclusive jurisdiction over all disputed Parliamentary elections.^[2]

Judge

In 1701 he became a judge of the Court of Common Pleas (Ireland) and he joined the King's Inn, the professional body which governed the Irish Bar^[3] He remained a member of the English House of Commons, and divided his time between England and Ireland, somewhat to the neglect of his judicial duties.^[4] Though he was said to be on bad terms with Thomas Wharton, 1st Marquess of Wharton, the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland from 1708, his career in Ireland seems to have been uneventful. He was one of the few High Court judges who refused to become involved in the bitter feud between the Crown and Dublin Corporation in 1713-4. Either for this reason, or because of his wealth and social standing (he had married an heiress and was made a baronet in 1704) he was the only senior Irish judge who was not removed from office in the general purge which followed the death of Queen Anne.^[3] He solicited for a seat on the English Bench but did not receive it and remained on the Irish Bench until he retired in 1720. He was a bencher of his Temple and acted as its Treasurer in 1721. He is said to have been one of the few investors who enriched themselves, rather than suffering financial loss, in the South Sea Bubble.^[2]

Family and personality

He married Anne Mulso, eldest daughter and co-heiress with her sister Elizabeth (who married his brother John) of Tanfield Mulso of Finedon Hall, Northamptonshire and his wife Mary Luther, a marriage which greatly increased his wealth. They had one surviving son, Sir John Dolben, 2nd Baronet, who was father of Sir William Dolben, 3rd Baronet, a leader in the movement for the abolition of slavery. He died at Finedon in October 1722.^[2]

For many years he was greatly troubled by the profligacy of his brother John, an inveterate gambler who ran through all his own money and then his wife's. In 1691 Gilbert wrote that John's wife and children were living on the charity of friends, something he described as shameful for the family and a reproach to his father's memory.

He was a man of scholarly tastes: John Dryden acknowledged the help Dolben had given him in preparing his translations of Virgil.^[2]

References

1. ^Ball, F. Elrington The Judges in Ireland 1221-1921 John Murray London 1926 Vol. 2 p.65
2. ^¹²³⁴⁵⁶{{cite DNB|wstitle=Dolben, Gilbert|last=Rigg|first=James McMullen|page=189}}
3. ^¹²Ball p.66
4. ^Ball p.27