Judge Samuel Milford & Judge Edward WisePrint Page

A stained glass window erected by members of the legal profession commemorates Justice Milford and Justice Wise who both died in 1865. 

Admitted to the colonial Bar on 23 January 1843 Samuel Milford was sworn in next day as master in Equity. He also became chief commissioner of insolvent estates and deputy-commissary and surrogate of the Vice-Admiralty Court.

On 1 January 1856 he was appointed an additional judge of the Supreme Court and deputy-judge and commissary of the Vice-Admiralty Court in New South Wales. He also presided at Brisbane Circuit Courts and in other jurisdictions of the New South Wales Supreme Court but claimed the right, when the two colonies were separated, to be recalled to the New South Wales bench.

In 1865 against medical advice he attended the Assizes at Maitland where he died on 26 May. He was buried in the Anglican section of Camperdown cemetery with a state funeral.

Justice Wise was admitted to the colonial Bar on 16 June, living first at Enmore, then at Edgecliffe House, Woollahra. He soon represented the Bar on the Barristers Admission Board. Wise's experience and legal talents were soon recognized, and on 19 February 1857 he was appointed to the Legislative Council; from May to September he was solicitor-general in (Sir) H. Watson Parker's ministry. His ability, capacity for hard work, and character soon dispelled criticism of his appointment and he became attorney-general in William Forster's government on 27 October 1859.

Justice Samuel Frederick Milford, M A., was the first Resident Judge of the Moreton Bay district in 1856, and subsequently an Equity Judge in Sydney.  The popular Judge Milford was accorded the honour of a public funeral in Sydney 70 years ago. A stained memorial window in St. Andrew's Cathedral bears mute evidence of the high appreciation of the Bar of his sterling work on the Bench.
The Sydney Morning Herald , 12th April 1935.
(excerpt from the passing of Arthur Feez)

 

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