Edward Jenks

Edward Jenks, (1861-1939) was an English jurist, and noted writer on law and its place in history. Born on 20 February 1861 in Lambeth, London, to Robert Jenks, upholsterer, and his wife Frances Sarah, née Jones, he was educated at Dulwich College (1874-77) and King's College, Cambridge, where he was scholar (1886) and, in 1889-95, fellow. He graduated B.A., LL.B. in 1886, and M.A. in 1890. He was awarded the Le Bas Prize and the Thirlwall Prize and was chancellor's medallist. In 1887 he was called to the Bar and for the next two years lectured at Pembroke and Jesus colleges, Cambridge. He was a brilliant law student at King's College, Cambridge and was placed first in the law tripos of 1886. He was called to the bar in 1887. He held many seats: Director of Studies in Law and History at Jesus College, Cambridge 1888-9, Dean at the faculty of law University of Melbourne 1890, University College, Liverpool 1890-92 then later to 1895 at Victoria University of Manchester, reader of English at University of Oxford from 1896, and then at the University of London from 1928-1930 as a professor of English law in the London School of Economics and Political Science, being succeeded by Sir David Hughes Parry. Jenks was a Fellow of the British Academy. He was a founder of the Society of Public Teachers of Law and its secretary 1909-1917. He married first in 1890 to Annie Ingham, who died after giving birth to a son; the son would die fighting in the Great War. His second marriage in 1898 was to Dorothy Maud, a daughter of Sir William Bower Forwood, with whom he had a daughter, and a son Jorian Jenks.