PERRIN, Louis (1782-1864), of 15 Abingdon Street, Dublin and 14 Manchester Buildings, London, Mdx.

The descendant of Huguenots on his French-born father’s side, and of ‘a very respectable’ Irish family on his mother’s, Perrin was born at Waterford in 1782. Being one of a large family, Perrin’s future was only assured after his father, an author, teacher of French, and supporter of nationalist ideals, inherited a large fortune amassed in the French East Indies by his brother. The family then resided in Ulster, and Perrin attended the Diocesan School of Armagh. Having been ‘more a plodding than brilliant student’, he gained a scholarship at Trinity College, Dublin, where ‘he was distinguished among his associates as an uncompromising reformer’.1J.R. O’Flanagan, The Irish Bar; comprising anecdotes, bon-mots, and biographical sketches of the bench and bar of Ireland (1879), 308; Freeman’s Journal, 8 Dec. 1864; D.R. Plunket (ed.), The Life, Letters, and Speeches of Lord Plunket (1867), i. 218; G.C. Boase, rev. S. Agnew, ‘Perrin, Louis’, Oxford DNB, xliii. 796.

After being called to the Irish bar in 1806, Perrin swiftly became versed in criminal and, more particularly, mercantile law. Having fallen under the tutelage of Robert Holmes, he acted as junior counsel in a number of prominent cases, before leading the defence of Daniel O’Connell at his state prosecution early in 1831.2Metropolitan Magazine (1838) xxi. 30-2, 33-4. In 1811 he defended the editor of Cox’s Magazine under crown prosecution for libel and assisted with the defence of members of the Catholic Board for allegedly violating the Convention Act of 1793: G.C. Boase, ‘Perrin, Louis’, DNB, xv. 900-1. His practice grew and he became ‘one of the recognised heads of the Protestant Liberal party at the bar’ and one of its strongest advocates of Catholic emancipation. A leading member of the north-east circuit, he was a ‘sagacious’, though not profound, lawyer, and was credited by his critics with ‘more shrewdness than knowledge’. He was, however, thoroughly conversant with the, then arcane, practice of the common law courts, in which he practiced exclusively, and in December 1830 was chosen by the government to investigate a serious sectarian riot at Maghery, county Tyrone.3Freeman’s Journal, 8 Dec. 1864; The Times, 22 Sept. 1835; PP 1835 (475) (476) xv. 501, xvi. 1 [193-200].

Having been spoken of as a candidate for Dublin city in 1830, Perrin was returned for that constituency as a reformer at the general election of 1831, but was unseated on petition, 8 Aug. 1831.4See HP Commons, 1820-32, iii. 749-51, vi. 747-9. He nevertheless benefitted from the success of the reform party, being appointed third serjeant-at-law, 7 Feb. 1832. He came forward again for Dublin at the request of the mercantile interest at the 1832 general election, and performed ‘extremely creditable services’ in assisting with the revision of the registry on behalf of Liberal claimants.5Freeman’s Journal, 12 Sept., 15, 16, 17, 22 Oct., 27, 30 Nov. 1832. Despite expressing support for the abolition of tithes, he refused to take the repeal pledge, and, although O’Connell was promised government support if he ‘coalesced’ with Perrin, relations between the two men cooled. Perrin’s position as a state prosecutor was made to tell against him, and he was forced to make way for O’Connell.6The Times, 27 Aug., 5, 8 Dec. 1832; Freeman’s Journal, 17, 22, Nov., 3, 7, 8, 10 Dec. 1832; Morning Chronicle, 5 Sept., 19 Nov., 8 Dec. 1832; HP Commons, 1820-32, ii, 753; D. O’Connell to P.V. Fitzgerald, 29 Aug., 22 Sept. 1832; D. O’Connell to William Scott, 25 Oct. 1832, O’Connell Correspondence, ed. M.R. O’Connell, iv. 441-2, 449-52, 458-61. Rejected as a candidate by the electors of Cashel, he benefitted from the support of the Independent Club at Monaghan, where he successfully overturned an entrenched aristocratic Tory interest in an expensive contest.7Morning Chronicle, 25 Dec. 1832; Freeman’s Journal, 17, 20, 21 Dec. 1832; HP Commons, 1820-32, iii. 857-8. It was estimated that Perrin spent £10,000 on elections between 1831 and 1835: Morning Chronicle, 6 Dec. 1849. In spite of his Whig principles, he was nevertheless regarded at this point as a conditional repealer.8That is, he would support repeal ‘if justice not be done to Ireland’: Stenton, Who’s Who of British MPs, i. 309.

As parliament assembled, it was rumoured that Perrin would become Irish attorney-general, and he therefore proved reluctant to oppose the ministry.9The Examiner, 7 Sept. 1834; Morning Chronicle, 19 Jan. 1833. He was absent from the divisions on the first and second readings of the Irish coercion bill in March 1833, and then only reluctantly supported a measure which he regarded as an unfortunate necessity.10The Times, 7 Mar. 1833; Freeman’s Journal, 15 Mar. 1833. He did, however, warn against the bill’s propensity to confound legislative and executive powers, and argued for the employment of the common law to deal with dangerous associations. He also opposed the use of courts martial, which he regarded as ‘arbitrary and unconstitutional’. That July he petitioned against the unlawful behaviour of the police in collecting tithes at Aughnamullen, county Monaghan.11Hansard, 22 July 1833, vol. 19, c. 1054. After appearing as a witness at a select committee inquiry into municipal corporations, he attempted to initiate debate on the abolition of the Irish viceroyalty, and presented a petition in favour of an Irish poor law.12PP 1833 (344) xiii. 1 [281-2] In April 1833 he appeared as crown counsel, opposite O’Connell, in the libel prosecution of Richard Barrett, the editor of the O’Connellite newspaper The Pilot,13Freeman’s Journal, 17 Aug. 1833; Derby Mercury, 14 Aug. 1833. and then introduced a bill to regularise marriages in Ireland by removing penalties on Catholic priests who performed ceremonies between Protestants and Catholics.14PP 1833 (373) iii. 551; PP 1833 (392) iii. 557; Hansard, 26 June 1833, vol. 18, cc. 1239-43; 7 Aug. 1833, vol. 20, c. 411-4; 17 June 1835, vol. 28, cc. 864-5. In order to prevent jobbery in local administration, he supported the separation of the fiscal and judicial duties of Irish grand juries. He spoke in favour of the Irish tithe arrears bill, which proposed to advance public money to Irish clergymen who were unable to collect their tithes, and, with O’Connell, prepared a successful Irish juries bill, designed to make the selection of jurors more impartial.15Hansard, 11 July 1833, vol. 19, c. 569; 12 Aug. 1833, vol. 20, c. 559; 20 Aug. 1833, vol. 20, c. 796; D. O’Connell to R. Barrett, 8 Aug. 1833, v. 58-9. He was, furthermore, ‘untiring in his efforts to check intemperance’, and secured a measure to regulate the sale of wine, spirits and beer in Ireland, which was heeded as a great boon to the country’s ‘public order and morality’.16PP 1833 (142) iv. 639; PP 1833 (567) iv. 659; D. O’Connell to P.V. Fitzgerald, 18 May 1833, v. 30-1; O’Flanagan, Irish Bar, 311; Metropolitan Magazine, xxi (1838), 36.

During 1833-4, Perrin served on select committees on the Dublin and Kingston ship canal, civil list charges, the admiralty court, chancery officers, and medical charities.17PP 1833 (591) xvi. 451; PP 1833 (646) vii. 779; PP 1833 (670) vii. 379; PP 1833 (685) xiv. 1; PP 1835 (457) xviii. 465; PP 1834 (602) xiii. 1. Having voted against the ballot, he further alienated Irish radicals by opposing O’Connell’s repeal motion on the ground that ‘Ireland could not obtain her independence but by violence, and that her independence through Repeal meant separation’.18Hansard, 28 Apr. 1834, vol. 23, cc. 142-6. When the Coercion Act was renewed in July 1834, however, he and O’Connell put aside their differences to jointly oppose a proposal to indemnify crown forces who executed its provisions, arguing that this ‘would encourage a licentious army in outrages upon the people’.19Hansard, 13 Mar. 1833, vol. 16, c. 577, 622; 19 Mar. 1833, vol. 16, cc. 845-7; Freeman’s Journal, 25 July 1833; Hansard, 26 July 1834, vol. 25, cc. 557-60. He also claimed that the conduct of prosecutions by the Irish attorney-general, Francis Blackburne, was widely perceived to be unfair and had ‘excited general discontent and dissatisfaction’.20A.R. Hart, A History of the King’s Serjeants at Law in Ireland (2000), 127. For the relative correspondence, see E. Blackburne, Life of the Right Hon. Francis Blackburne, Late Lord Chancellor of Ireland (1874), 161-5. Consequently, although he had been named by O’Connell as one of those most fitted for judicial office, he declined the solicitor-generalship in October 1834, citing his unwillingness to act as Blackburne’s subordinate.21O’Connell to Lord Duncannon, 2 Sept. 1834, O’Connell to to P.V. Fitzgerald, 12 Sept. 1834, D. O’Connell to R. Barrett, 2 Oct. 1834, v. 170-3, 182, 186-7. While O’Connell believed that Perrin had ‘behaved nobly’ in the circumstances, there were also strong doubts about the chances of his being re-elected in the face of a revived Conservative interest at Monaghan.22Morning Chronicle, 8 Oct. 1834; Hull Packet, 10 Oct. 1834; Examiner, 19 Oct. 1834; O. MacDonagh, The Emancipist. Daniel O’Connell 1830-1847 (1989), 108; O’Connell to R. Barrett, 11 Oct. 1834, O’Connell to to P.V. Fitzgerald, 11 Oct. 1834, v. 190-1, 191-2. For the circumstances leading to this offer, see Blackburne, Life of Francis Blackburne, 188-91.

When the Whig ministry was dismissed in November 1834, Perrin refused to join O’Connell’s Anti-Tory Alliance, an organisation which he feared was unconstitutional. Along with Michael O’Loghlen, he made an unsuccessful attempt to establish an independent Liberal organisation in Dublin, free from O’Connell’s dictation.23McDowell, Public Opinion, 161-2; MacDonagh, Emancipist, 117. Despite having been selected, with O’Connell’s support, to stand again for Monaghan at the 1835 general election, he opted for the Liberal stronghold of Cashel, again with O’Connell’s enthusiastic endorsement.24Morning Chronicle, 5, 13, 23 Dec. 1834; O’Connell to J. O’Brien, 16 Dec. 1834, v. 231-2. Having ‘none of those refined charms to dazzle or attract multitudes’, Perrin was not ‘an habitual public orator’, yet he addressed the crowd at length and was returned on a reformist platform, promising to help revise the pension list, abolish sinecures, reduce taxation, and abolish tithes.25Metropolitan Magazine, xxi (1838), 22; Morning Chronicle, 20 Jan. 1835; The Examiner, 3 May 1835; Parliamentary Test Book (1835), 127. He was appointed first serjeant, 27 Jan. 1835, and then quietly sat out ‘the stir when he was passed over for a judicial vacancy’.26D. McCabe, ‘Perrin, Louis’, Dictionary of Irish Biography, viii. 63-5. The Conservative ministry attempted to place Joseph Devonsher Jackson above Perrin, but strong public objections led them to reverse their decision: Morning Chronicle, 31 Jan 1835; Belfast News-letter, 17, 20 Feb. 1835; The Examiner, 22 Feb. 1835. After the Whigs resumed office in April 1835 and Blackburne retired, Perrin became Irish attorney-general.27This, in spite of O’Connell having endorsed the claims of a Catholic candidate, Michael O’Loghlen: O’Connell to E. Ellice, 14 Apr. 1835, v. 291

As chief law officer, he strove for impartiality, tempered by sympathy for the position of Catholics, in the administration of the law.28MacDonagh, Emancipist, 122-3, 127; A. Macintyre, The Liberator. Daniel O’Connell and the Irish Party 1830-1847 (1965), 146. A middle-sized, muscular man of ‘severe and striking appearance’, with ‘dark and menacing’ brow, an aquiline nose, and lips ‘drooping at both extremes’, Perrin was considered cold and stern in disposition.29Metropolitan Magazine, xxi (1838), 25. While he was regarded as ‘a man of singular abilities and surpassing ingenuity as a lawyer’, his political opponents claimed that, having been ‘profaned with a harpy touch’ by radicalism, he possessed ‘little or none of the grace and ease of polished life’ and was therefore ‘wanting in grace as a speaker’.30Dublin University Magazine, i (1833), 195; F.E. Ball, The Judges in Ireland 1221-1921 (1926), ii. 276. He was, however, a powerful and argumentative debater, possessed of ‘a strong confident tone’, his language being of ‘a masculine and persuasive cast’. He kept his oratory ‘within the circle of calm and unimpassioned reasoning … preferring unadmired coldness to unfruitful precipitancy’, and, in spite of an austere manner, he was well-regarded for showing moderation towards political opponents.31O’Flanagan, Irish Bar, 309, 310; Metropolitan Magazine, xxi (1838), 22, 25, 37.

Perhaps his most significant political contribution was the ‘yeoman service’ he rendered in supervising the inquiry into Irish municipal corporations. The commission’s work was regarded as ‘a monument of research’ which amply illustrated ‘the ancient municipal history of Ireland’. In spite of ‘agonies of rage’ from the Conservative benches after Perrin was appointed chief commissioner in July 1833, he ably coordinated the work of the commission from Dublin.32MacDonagh, Emancipist, 132; O’Connell to P.V. Fitzgerald, 5 July 1833, v. 51-2; Freeman’s Journal, 21 Oct. 1833; Belfast News-letter, 28 June 1835; Macintyre, Liberator, 230-5. Perrin was said to have given up £2,000 of his professional earnings to administer the commission, declining any compensation: Morning Chronicle, 13 Dec. 1834; Belfast News-letter, 13 Aug. 1833. Having ‘described with obvious gusto and damning objectivity the archaic, clumsy, and often corrupt machinery by which Irish municipal life was regulated’, he made a ‘masterly speech’ of ‘ratiocinative eloquence’, when introducing the first Irish municipal corporations bill, 31 July 1835, making it clear that the corporations ‘could expect little mercy at his hands’.33McDowell, Public Opinion, 181; O’Flanagan, Irish Bar, 312; Metropolitan Magazine, xxi (1838), 36; Hansard, 31 July 1835, vol. 29, cc. 1288-1311. For summaries of the bill [PP 1835 (455) ii. 1], see Macintyre, Liberator, 236-7; MacDonagh, Emancipist, 132. Although the bill passed the Commons, it stalled in the Lords owing to the lateness of the session. Nevertheless, his report was described as ‘one of the most clear and powerful documents ever submitted to Parliament’, and formed the basis of the subsequent bills introduced to parliament over the following five years.34O’Connell to P.V. Fitzgerald, 10 July 1835, v. 318; Ball, Judges in Ireland, ii. 276; Freeman’s Journal, 8 Dec. 1864, and see PP 1835 [23] [24] [25] [27] [28] xxvii. 1, 51, 79, 199, xxviii. 1.

Perrin was now regarded as the champion of Irish reform, and made an effective speech in support of Lord John Russell’s resolution to engraft appropriation to the Irish tithe bill.35Belfast News-letter, 17 Apr. 1835; The Examiner, 10 May 1835; Hansard, 7 Apr. 1835, vol. 27, cc. 914-26; Morning Chronicle, 8 Apr. 1835; Examiner, 12 Apr. 1835. He also assisted in the preparation of an unsuccessful Irish registration bill, introduced by Michael O’Loghlen in August 1835.36PP 1835 (503) ii. 671; Hansard, 19 Aug. 1835, vol. 30, cc. 698-706; Belfast Newsletter, 25 Aug. 1835. That year he sat on the select committee on bribery at elections and introduced bills for the appointment of constables and sheriffs, and the prevention of public order offences in Ireland.37PP 1835 (547) viii. 1; PP 1835 (493) i. 487; PP 1835 (486) ii. 739; PP 1835 (472) iii. 543. However, after less than two months in office, and in defiance of convention, he claimed a vacancy on the King’s Bench, becoming the first attorney-general to accept a puisine-judgeship in two hundred years.38Ball, Judges in Ireland, ii. 275; The Times, 24 Aug. 1835; Belfast News-letter, 23 June, 24 July 1835. He retained the attorney-generalship until the close of the session in order to attend to the municipal corporations bill: The Times, 23 June 1835; The Examiner, 26 July 1835.

Perrin’s elevation to the bench was hailed in Liberal circles as ‘a benefit to Ireland of the first order’.39Examiner, 30 Aug. 1835. With ‘some peculiarities of manner’ (possessing ‘a fine physical constitution’, he liked his court well-ventilated in all weathers), he was regarded as ‘one of the most Constitutional Judges who ever sat on the Irish Bench’. Vigorous, diligent and painstaking, he took a humane interest in the fate of prisoners, particularly those who were charged with serious offences and undefended.40Freeman’s Journal, 8 Dec. 1864; O’Flanagan, Irish Bar, 312, 313, 314. He remained ‘a Liberal of the old school’, earning the respect of the O’Connellites, while foregoing the confidence of Conservatives. During the late 1830s he persistently argued for the minority view that a broader criterion of value be employed in determining £10 freeholdings at registry, ‘a matter with the profoundest electoral consequences’. He presided at the state trials of O’Connell in 1844, and the Young Irelanders in 1848.41Liverpool Mercury, 2 Feb. 1860; Ball, Judges in Ireland, ii. 280, 349; McCabe, ‘Perrin, Louis’.

In poor health, Perrin resigned his seat on Queen’s Bench in February 1860 (yet continued to dispense justice at petty sessions in county Dublin), the death of his eldest son, John, the assistant-barrister for county Louth and counsel to the Irish government, being held as the reason for his abandonment of public life.42Liverpool Mercury, 2 Feb. 1860; The Examiner, 18 Feb. 1860; O’Flanagan, Irish Bar, 315. He died at his villa at Knockdromin, near Rush, county Dublin in December 1864 and was buried in nearby Rush. He was succeeded by his eldest surviving son, Mark Perrin, who served as secretary to the Irish lord chancellor and registrar of judgments in Ireland.43Belfast News-letter, 19 Jan. 1860. Four of Perrin’s sons became barristers, two served in the army, and one entered the clergy: E. Keane, P.B. Phair & T.U. Sadleir (eds.), King’s Inns admission papers (1982), 399; Boase, ‘Perrin, Louis’.