George Sherwood (May 29, 1811 – after 1880) was a judge, lawyer and political figure in Canada West.

Family and early life

Sherwood was born in Augusta Township in 1811, the son of

Levius Peters Sherwood Levius Peters Sherwood (December 12, 1777 – May 19, 1850) was a lawyer, judge and political figure in Upper Canada. He was born at St. Johns in Lower Canada, the son of Justus Sherwood. He studied law and was called to the bar in 1803. In ...

and Charlotte Sherwood, daughter of

Ephraim Jones Ephraim Jones (April 17, 1750 – January 24, 1812) was a soldier, judge, and political figure in Upper Canada. He was born in Weston, Massachusetts, in 1750. His father, Elisha, and five of his brothers served with the British during the American ...

. He was of

United Empire Loyalist United Empire Loyalists (or simply Loyalists) is an honorific title which was first given by the 1st Lord Dorchester, the Governor of Quebec, and Governor General of The Canadas, to American Loyalists who resettled in British North America duri ...

stock on both sides of his family.''The Canadian biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self-made men: Ontario Volume''
(Toronto: American Biographical Publishing Co., 1880), pp. 235–236. His older brother,

Henry Sherwood Henry Sherwood, (1807 – July 7, 1855) was a lawyer and Tory politician in the Province of Canada. He was involved in provincial and municipal politics. Born into a Loyalist family in Brockville in Augusta Township, Upper Canada, he stud ...

, later became Joint Premier of the

Province of Canada The Province of Canada (or the United Province of Canada or the United Canadas) was a British North America, British colony in North America from 1841 to 1867. Its formation reflected recommendations made by John Lambton, 1st Earl of Durham ...

. George Sherwood studied law and was called to the bar in 1833, as a barrister at law. The same year he married Marianne Keegan, originally from Nova Scotia. He set up practice in Prescott, originally in partnership with his brother Henry.

Later career

Elected a bencher of the Law Society of Upper Canada in 1849, Sherwood was named

Queen's Counsel In the United Kingdom and in some Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth countries, a King's Counsel (Post-nominal letters, post-nominal initials KC) during the reign of a king, or Queen's Counsel (post-nominal initials QC) during the reign of ...

in 1856. A member of the

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...

, Sherwood donated land valued at £25 for the foundation of

Trinity College Trinity College may refer to: Australia * Trinity Anglican College, an Anglican coeducational primary and secondary school in , New South Wales * Trinity Catholic College, Auburn, a coeducational school in the inner-western suburbs of Sydney, New ...

, an Anglican college in Toronto. Sherwood was an officer in the local militia, and eventually reached the position of lieutenant-colonel, commanding the 1st Battalion of the Leeds militia. He was also a director of the

Brockville and Ottawa Railway The Brockville and Ottawa Railway (B&O) was an early railway in Upper Canada, today's Ontario. It ran north from the town of Brockville on the Saint Lawrence River to Sand Point on the Ottawa River. It was built primarily to serve the timber tra ...

. In his later years, Sherwood was a warden of the Anglican church in Brockville.

Political career

The Sherwoods were part of the Family Compact, the inter-connected families of strong British and Loyalist sympathies which dominated the government of Upper Canada in the early years of the 19th century. When he first entered politics in the general election of 1841, George Sherwood was associated with the

Upper Canada Tories The Tory movement in Upper Canada was formed from the elements of the Family Compact following the War of 1812. It was an early political party, merely a group of like minded conservative elite in the early days of Canada. The Tories would later ...

. Although he supported the union of

Upper Canada The Province of Upper Canada (french: link=no, province du Haut-Canada) was a part of British Canada established in 1791 by the Kingdom of Great Britain, to govern the central third of the lands in British North America, formerly part of the ...

and

Lower Canada The Province of Lower Canada (french: province du Bas-Canada) was a British colony on the lower Saint Lawrence River and the shores of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence (1791–1841). It covered the southern portion of the current Province of Quebec an ...

into the new

, he was a critic of the Governor General, Lord Sydenham, in the 1841 election.Paul G. Cornell
''Alignment of Political Groups in Canada, 1841–67''
(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1962; reprinted in paperback 2015), pp. 93–94. The Tories disagreed with the Governor General's policy of seeking a broad-base of support in the Legislative Assembly, including Reformers, rather than drawing support solely from the Family Compact, as previous governors of Upper Canada had done. Sherwood successfully stood for election for the electoral district of Brockville in the 1841 general election for the

1st Parliament of the Province of Canada The First Parliament of the Province of Canada was summoned in 1841, following the union of Upper Canada and Lower Canada as the Province of Canada on February 10, 1841. The Parliament continued until dissolution in late 1844. The Parliament ...

. He was re-elected in the elections of 1844 and 1848, but defeated in the general elections of 1851 and 1854. He was re-elected in the general election of 1857 and served in Parliament until 1863. In 1845, Sherwood was appointed a commissioner to review the management of public works in the Province. By 1858 he was a supporter of the

Liberal-Conservative party The Liberal-Conservative Party (french: le Parti libéral-conservateur) was the formal name of the Conservative Party of Canada until 1873, and again from 1922 to 1938, although some Conservative candidates continued to run under the label as la ...

, and entered Cabinet that year in the

John A. Macdonald Sir John Alexander Macdonald (January 10 or 11, 1815 – June 6, 1891) was the first prime minister of Canada, serving from 1867 to 1873 and from 1878 to 1891. The dominant figure of Canadian Confederation, he had a political career that sp ...

– George-Étienne Cartier ministry. He served from 1858 to 1862 as Receiver General, and was an ''ex officio'' member of the Board of Railway Commissioners. He held those positions until March, 1862, when he became Commissioner of Crown Lands. He resigned from Cabinet in May, 1862.

Judicial career

In 1865, he was appointed judge of the County Court for Hastings County. As a judge, he was reported to be "courteous, cool and impartial". His date of death is uncertain. He was known to be still sitting as a judge in 1880.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sherwood, George 1811 births Members of the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada from Canada West Judges in Ontario Year of death missing Canadian King's Counsel 19th-century Canadian judges