Charles Osborne

Charles Osborne, MP (1760 – 5 September 1817), was an Irish politician and judge. Biography He was born in County Waterford, the fifth son of Sir William Osborne, 8th Baronet and his wife Elizabeth Christmas of Whitfield, daughter of Thomas Christmas. He sat as a member of parliament in the Irish House of Commons for Carysfort between 1790 and 1800. He went to school in Drogheda, and attended Trinity College Dublin, graduating in 1780. He entered Lincoln's Inn and was called to the Bar in 1788, becoming King's Counsel in 1798. He was appointed a Commissioner for Revenue Appeals, and later standing counsel to the Revenue. After the Acts of Union 1800, which he supported, he was appointed a Justice of the King's Bench for Ireland, serving from 1802 until 1817, being styled The Hon Mr Justice Osborne. His political opponents said that his appointment was entirely due to his support for the Union, and that he lacked the requisite legal ability to be fit for judicial office. Despite his successful career in the House of Commons he seems to have been a curiously obscure figure: Elrington Ball goes so far as to suggest that most barristers had never heard of him at the time of his elevation to the Bench, despite his having served as Revenue counsel since 1793. On the other hand, Ball thought that his Parliamentary career gave him a wider experience of public life than some of his judicial colleagues.