Further and Worse Particulars

In his recent books, From Wig and Pen to Compute and The Man who Shot the President, Eric Stockdale gave an essentially light-hearted account of his days as a student, barrister and Circuit judge.

He coupled that with references to his overlapping experiences as an author and occasional lecturer, and introduced the reader to many members of the crowd scene of the law: from judges to prisoners, from court interpreters to irate litigants, and above all to some fellow barristers.

As he was called to the Bar as long ago as 1950, he had by 2008 encountered many members of each category.

The cases briefly mentioned in those books were criminal, civil, and matrimonial (or uncivil).

In many cases the original pleadings had often been supplemented with Further and Better Particulars.

The present selection of reminiscences fills in some gaps and has been given the appropriate title of Further and Worse Particulars.

The author says of his student days in the 1940s: ‘When I joined the Middle Temple in 1946, there was no requirement for an applicant for Call to the Bar to have a law degree, or indeed, any degree at all.

It was sufficient, at that time for a candidate to pass all the Bar examinations and to eat a specified number of dinners.

In December 1946 I sat and passed the Bar exams in Roman law and Constitutional law and Legal History.

My studies were then interrupted by a request from the Army for me to come and spend two years studying the finer elements of gunnery (which included, apparently the need for an awful lot of painting).