Sir Francis Buller, 1st Baronet

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Sir Francis Buller

Gillray's cartoon of Buller

Sir Francis Buller, 1st Baronet (17 March 1746–4 June 1800) was an English judge.

[edit] Life

Buller was born at Downes, the son of James Buller, Member of Parliament for Cornwall, and his wife Lady Jane, daughter of Allen Bathurst, 1st Earl Bathurst. He was educated at Grammar School, Ottery St Mary, and Christ's Hospital, London. In 1763, at the age of 17, he married Susanna, daughter and heiress of Francis Yarde of Churston Court, Devonshire. In February 1763, he was entered at the Inner Temple as a pupil of special pleader William Henry Ashurst, taking out his own certificate as special pleader in 1765. In Easter term 1772, he was called to the bar and rose rapidly through it, becoming king's counsel on 24 November 1777. On 6 May 1778, at only 32, he was made a puisne [subordinate] Judge of the king's bench. His conduct on the bench, however, was often the subject of severe criticism, accused of being hasty and prejudiced. He was caricatured as "Judge Thumb" by James Gillray in 1782, implying that Buller had asserted that a husband could thrash his wife with impunity provided that the stick was no bigger than his thumb, although no record exists of such an assertion.^{[citation needed]} He was one of the judges on the Zong Massacre case.

He was always the second Judge in his Court, though when Lord Mansfield was absent through illness (e.g., the last two years of Mansfield's life) he took the lead and in effect acted as Lord Chief Justice. However, on Mansfield's death, William Pitt delayed and then in the end appointed Kenyon not Buller to the role (despite Buller being the superior lawyer), but did make Buller a baronet on 13 January 1790. On 19 June 1794, he resigned from the king's bench and took his place in the common pleas.

He was a guardian of Anna Eliza Brydges, later the first Duchess of Buckingham, and of Lady Caroline Leigh. He was a trustee to the 1796 settlement between Anna Eliza and Richard Temple.

His health in the late 1790s was undermined by frequent attacks of gout and by a slight stroke of paralysis. He had arranged to resign in a few days time, when, during a game of piquet at his house in Bedford Square, he was seized with his fatal illness. He died late on the night of the 4th or early on the 5th of June 1800. His eldest surviving son Francis succeeded in the baronetcy. Lady Buller died in 1810.