Lord Mersey

John Charles Bigham, 1st Viscount Mersey (3 August 1840 – 3 September 1929) was a British jurist and politician. After early success as a lawyer, and a less successful spell as a politician, he was appointed a judge, working in commercial law.

After his retirement, Mersey remained active in public affairs, and is probably best remembered for heading the official Board of Trade inquiries into the sinking of steamships, most notably the RMS Titanic, the RMS Lusitania, and the RMS Empress of Ireland.

Background & early life[]

Bigham was born in Liverpool, the second son of John Bigham, a prosperous merchant, and his wife Helen, née East. He was educated at the Liverpool Institute High School for Boys, and the University of London, where he studied law.

Bigham left the university without taking a degree. He then travelled to Berlin and Paris to continue his education. Called to the bar in 1870 by the Middle Temple, he practised commercial law in and around his native city. On 17 August 1871 he married Georgina Sarah Rogers, also from Liverpool. The first of their three sons, Charles Clive Bigham (2nd Viscount Mersey), was born in 1872.

Barrister and judge[]

In 1883, Bigham was named a Queen's Counsel. His commercial practice prospered. In 1885, he tried his hand at politics, standing as a Liberal candidate for Parliament at the Liverpool constituency of East Toxteth, but lost. In 1892, he stood unsuccessfully in another Liverpool seat, the Exchange constituency. He was finally elected at his third attempt in 1895, standing as a Liberal Unionist. He was never able to make a great political impact, and his interest in politics was less than his interest in his legal work, which continued to flourish. During his last decade as a barrister, he was so in demand that he became one of the richest lawyers in his circle.

In October 1897, Bigham was named a judge to the Queen's Bench, continuing his work in business law, and disqualifying him being an MP. He was knighted the following month. He presided over the railway and canal commission of 1904, worked in the bankruptcy courts, and reviewed courts-martial sentences handed down during the Second Boer War. He was appointed President of the Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division in 1909, but found the divorce work unfulfilling and retired in 1910. He was raised to the peerage as Baron Mersey, of Toxteth in the County Palatine of Lancaster, in the same year.

The Titanic investigation[]

In 1912, Mersey received his greatest fame when he was appointed by Lord Loreburn, the Lord Chancellor in the government of Herbert Henry Asquith, to head the inquiry commission into the sinking of the Titanic. There was some criticism of his handling of the inquiry; some felt he was biased towards the Board of Trade and the major shipping concerns and cared too little about finding out why the ship sank. In 1998, the historian Daniel Butler described Mersey as "autocratic, impatient and not a little testy", but noted the "surprising objectivity" of the inquiry's findings.

At the time of May 1912, however, he was lauded by the British press - most prominently by the Daily Telegraph - who were affronted by the 'presumptuous Americans', who had the audacity to take up what they felt was a British case exclusively, with the Senator, Mr. Alden, being mocked for having no idea of the maritime customs, though they were forgetting that many American citizens had died in the sinking and that White Star Line was part of the megaconcern International Mercantile Marine, so American money was part of Titanic's construction. Bigham was succoured by specialists at maritime tradition. Bigham was more of a trade specialist. The Procuror-General was Sir Rufus Isaacs, one of the best attorney's that England had in those days.

When some wanderers, who had to testify, strolled around, Mersey got irritated and wondered why no one kept and eye on the important witnesses. He also snapped at anyone who dared to enter the Scottish Drill Hall, where the investigation was held, to just randomly ask a witness a question., like some of the labor unions that smelled publicity. Mersey was keen on keeping it short. He wanted no details, just quick answers, usually yes or no. When he was not interested, he secretly doddled icebergs on a blank paper.

Much of the later critism on Bigham was the case of the SS Californian, which had a role in the tragedy that came more to the foreground when the Captain, Stanley Lord, as well as the Californian's crew were heard during the British Inquiry. Some felt that Lord was unfairly made into a scapegoat, while Captain Smith was glorified and made into a hero.

Other investigations[]

In 1913, Mersey presided over the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea and added three more maritime inquiries to his résumé with his heading of the inquiries into other disaster, such as the sinking of the RMS Empress of Ireland (held in Canada in 1914), the sinking of the Falaba in 1915, with the sinking of the Lusitania being the next big investigation that same year. About the last case, Mersey is among those suspected by conspiracy theorists of a cover-up. His biographer Hugh Mooney writes that such suspicions are wholly conjectural, but "the conclusion of the inquiry , which blamed Germany for the tragedy without reservation, was without doubt politically convenient." Mersey was raised in the peerage from baron to viscount in 1916.

Later years[]

In his later years, Mersey was beset by deafness, but continued to work actively, returning to the bench in his 80s when the divorce courts had a heavy backlog; Mooney writes, "he helped to clear the lists with all his old efficiency". His wife died in 1925, and he died four years later at Littlehampton in Sussex, aged 89.

Mersey's third son, although the second surviving, was Sir Trevor Bigham, who became Deputy Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis. His first son, Colonel Charles Clive Bigham, survived the sinking of the passenger ship SS Persia in 1915.