Lancaster Standard and County Advertiser. — 1909-02-19 (Lancaster, Lancashire, England)

BRILLIANT PLEADER.  The death of Mr. H. G. Shee, K.C., Reeorder of Liverpool, occurred on Saturzlay night at his London residence, Eatensquare. The deceased, who was aged sixtytwo, was compelled to withdraw from active  work some fiiteen months &go owing to an attack of paralysis. He spent a considerable time at Brighton, returning from that place on Wednesday. On Saturday an unexpected relapse occurred, and he gradually sank. MT. Shea was a Roman Catholic, and the Rev. rather Bernard Vaughan was present at his death. Of the late judge, who was a well-known figure at the Lancaster Assizes, it might be said that he was cradled  il!' the" law, —for hCs father was the wedl . . known Serjeant Shoe,, who achieved a „good deal of celebrity through defending Palmer. the Rugeley prisoner, who was executed for the murder of Cook, his racing friend. Afterwards Sergeant Shoe was made a Judge of the High Court. Sir Martin Archer Shoe, a former president of the Royal Academy, and a fashionable portrait painter, immortalised in Byron's lines beginning "And here let Shoe and genius find a place," was also of the same family. While Mr. H. Cl. Shoe was generally looked upon as a rollicking Irishman, he was on his mother's side half Scotch, though his father came of an old Irish stock. His father's sister married Charles Lever, ffie famous Irish novelist. Mr. Shoe was born in London in 1847. ITe was educated at Usher CeUea..e• and Christ Church, Oxford, where, like other men -who have achieved fame in after life, he was President of the Union. Adopting the law as his profession, .he became a student of the Inner Temple, and was called to the Bar in 1870, when he joined the Northern Circuit. Liverpool was his starting point, as it has been for many ()tiler famous lawyers and here he had chambers till he removed to London. His progress was slow, though he does not appear, to have sounded the depths .related of HerF,chell. a,nd Gully, who talked seriously of emigrating. Gradualy he built up a practice which extended to Manchester, • and he became known also at the Cumberland and Westmorland 5e ems. •as. well a bt Preston, where he enjoyed considerable repute. As a defender of prisoners he was Ir.,trlll,3qs, and while a inn.;.-,5 'n-is retained in civil cases which depended on a vdgorouS rross-examination and a "way" with the jury .for their success. It was in I the ea:riv 'cr2l,t:ies that hi,. ro,ntati-n as a criminal junior was -made. when. he defended, before Mr. Justice Bowen, a servant girl who was allegeil to ha,-e P-1; az--. senic in her mistress's beer as she fetched it from the cellar. The charge was one of attempted murder' and the defence set up was that the girl had been in the habit of wing arsenic to make her hair glossy, and had accidentally dropped some in the beer. The Jury acquitted her. Mr. Shoe's speech in that case is still remembered among the elder hands as an: example of what a counsel's speech should be. He was extremely brilliant as an advocate, and as a searching and humorous cross-examiner had no equal on the Circuit. But it was in his speeches to the jury that he was most successful. Screwing up his broad, highly-Coloured face. and giving his wig just the faintest toss of rakishness, he could by his witticisms either ridicule an opponent's ease into Oblivion or place the facts of his own ease with deadly effect.  Vic was appointed Recorder of Burnley in 1893, relinquishing the appointment in 1907, when he was made Recorder of Liverpool. For many years, and up to the time f h:s th he was judge of the Salford Hundred Court, tliA binsiness of which he transacted with strict impartiality, though it was said that he used to allow his colleagues at the Bar more liberty than was good for them. But he was loved by all. Whilst he was sometimes quicktempered, there was no sting in his-reproofs, tvliich were 7, onernily ndrninist-rod in the form of a joke. Mr. Shee was not so successful a politician as he was a lawyer. A Liberal in politics he fought Whitehaven, but was twice .defeated. Prior to the pniziire which I,yl tn Hs (11t1 hc se as Commissioner et the Swansea Assizes along with the Lord Chief Justice and it was lac secret that he would have been made a judge but for his illness. _  Mr. Shee, it will be remembered, was one of the counsel for the petitioners in the Lancaster Election Petition, in January, iczo6.