George Jessel

Asser

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George Jessel, birth 13 Feb 1824 LONDON, ENGLAND, died 21 Mar 1883 LONDON, ENGLAND, occupation: lawyer, English jusrist
http://www.law.upenn.edu/about/history/medallions/jessel/

George Jessel was educated at a school for Jews at Kew, and being prevented by then existing religious disabilities from proceeding to the University of Oxford or Cambridge, went to University College London. He entered as a student at Lincoln' s Inn in 1842, and a year later took his B.A. degree at the University of London, becoming M.A. and gold medallist in mathematics and natural philosophy in 1844. In 1846 he became a fellow of University College, and in 1847 he was called to the ba r at Lincoln's Inn.

His earnings during his first three years at the bar were 52, 346, and 795 guineas, from which it will be seen that his rise to a tolerably large practice was rapid. His work, however, was mainly conveyancing, and for long his income remained almo st stationary. By degrees, however, he got more work, and was called within the bar in 1865, becoming a bencher of his Inn in the same year and practising in the Rolls Court. Jessel entered parliament as Liberal member for Dover in 1868, and altho ugh neither his intellect nor his oratory was of a class likely to commend itself to his fellow-members, he attracted Gladstone's attention by two learned speeches on the Bankruptcy Bill which was before the house in 1869, with the result tha t in 1871 he was appointed Solicitor-General.

His reputation at this time stood high in the chancery courts; on the common law side he was unknown, and on the first occasion upon which he came into the court of Queens bench to move on behalf of the Crown, there was very nearly a collision bet ween him and the bench. His forceful and direct method of bringing his arguments home to the bench was not modified in his subsequent practice before it. His great powers were fully recognized; his business in addition to that on behalf of the Cro wn became very large, and his income for three years before he was raised to the bench amounted to nearly 25,000 per annum. In 1873, Jessel succeeded Lord Romilly as Master of the Rolls. From 1873 to 1881, Jessel sat as a judge of first instanc e in the rolls court, being also a member of the court of appeal.

In November 1874 the first Judicature Act came into effect, and in 1881 the Judicature Act of that year made the Master of the Rolls the ordinary president of the first court of appeal, relieving him of his duties as a judge of first instance . In the court of appeal Jessel presided almost to the day of his death. For some time before 1883 he suffered from diabetes with chronic disorder of the heart and liver, but struggled against it; on March 16, 1883 he sat in court for the last tim e, and five days later he died at his residence in London, the immediate cause of death being cardiac syncope. to:
Amelia Moses

1) Charles James Jessel, birth 11 May 1860 Kensington, London, England, died 15 Jul 1928, buried Hoop Lane Cemetery
1st Baronet Jessel
Married 15 Jul 1890 London, West London Synagogue Maryleborne to:
Edith Goldsmid, birth 1870 London, died 31 Dec 1955, daughter of Julian Goldsmid and Virginia Philipson

2) Herbert Merton Jessel, birth 27 Oct 1866 Brighton, Sussex, England, died 1 Nov 1950, buried Hoop Lane Cemetery
Married 1894 London, West London Synagogue Maryleborne to:
Maud Goldsmid, birth 1874 LONDON, ENGLAND, died 1965 LONDON, ENGLAND, daughter of Julian Goldsmid and Virginia Philipson

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