The Rt Hon. Sir John William Basil Kelly, PC,

PC (NI) PC or pc may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Player character or playable character, a fictional character controlled by a human player, usually in role-playing games or computer games * ''Port Charles'', an American daytime TV soap opera * ...

, QC (10 May 1920 – 5 December 2008), usually known as Sir Basil Kelly, was a

Northern Irish Northern Irish people is a demonym for all people born in Northern Ireland or people who are entitled to reside in Northern Ireland without any restriction on their period of residence. Most Northern Irish people either identify as Northern ...

barrister A barrister is a type of lawyer in common law jurisdictions. Barristers mostly specialise in courtroom advocacy and litigation. Their tasks include taking cases in superior courts and tribunals, drafting legal pleadings, researching law and ...

judge A judge is a person who presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a panel of judges. A judge hears all the witnesses and any other evidence presented by the barristers or solicitors of the case, assesses the credibility an ...

and politician.

Life

Kelly was born into an

Ulster Protestant Ulster Protestants ( ga, Protastúnaigh Ultach) are an ethnoreligious group in the Irish province of Ulster, where they make up about 43.5% of the population. Most Ulster Protestants are descendants of settlers who arrived from Britain in the ...

family in

Clones Clone or Clones or Cloning or Cloned or The Clone may refer to: Places * Clones, County Fermanagh * Clones, County Monaghan, a town in Ireland Biology * Clone (B-cell), a lymphocyte clone, the massive presence of which may indicate a pathologi ...

County Monaghan County Monaghan ( ; ga, Contae Mhuineacháin) is a county in Ireland. It is in the province of Ulster and is part of Border strategic planning area of the Northern and Western Region. It is named after the town of Monaghan. Monaghan County Cou ...

, on 10 May 1920 as one of the two children, and the only son, of Thomas William Kelly and Emily Frances Kelly (''

née A birth name is the name of a person given upon birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name, or the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a birth certificate or birth re ...

'' Donaldson).''

Dictionary of Irish Biography The ''Dictionary of Irish Biography'' (DIB) is a biographical dictionary of notable Irish people and people not born in the country who had notable careers in Ireland, including both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.Seamus Dubhghaill: Birth of Basil Kelly, Northern Irish Barrister, Judge & Politician. https://seamusdubhghaill.com/2021/05/10/birth-of-basil-kelly-northern-irish-barrister-judge-politician/ His parents were small farmers in West Monaghan, who had their house 'burnt out' during the revolutionary period in

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

in the early 1920s. Shortly after this, the family moved, around 1925, north-east to

Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...

, settling in a working-class area of East Belfast, where Basil and his sister were raised. Here he attended Mersey Street Primary School, where he later won a scholarship to the prestigious

Methodist College, Belfast God with us , established = 1865 , type = Voluntary grammar , religion = Interdenominational , principal = Jenny Lendrum , chair_label = Chairwoman , chair = Revd. Dr Janet Unsworth , founder ...

, later receiving his university education at

Trinity College, Dublin , name_Latin = Collegium Sanctae et Individuae Trinitatis Reginae Elizabethae juxta Dublin , motto = ''Perpetuis futuris temporibus duraturam'' (Latin) , motto_lang = la , motto_English = It will last i ...

(TCD). He was called to the

Northern Irish Bar The Bar of Northern Ireland is the professional association of barristers for Northern Ireland, with over 600 members. It is based in the Bar Library, beside the Royal Courts of Justice in Belfast, together with the Bar Council of Northern Ire ...

in 1944 and

took silk In the United Kingdom and in some Commonwealth countries, a King's Counsel ( post-nominal initials KC) during the reign of a king, or Queen's Counsel (post-nominal initials QC) during the reign of a queen, is a lawyer (usually a barrister or ...

in 1958. He served as senior Crown Counsel in Tyrone,

Fermanagh Historically, Fermanagh ( ga, Fir Manach), as opposed to the modern County Fermanagh, was a kingdom of Gaelic Ireland, associated geographically with present-day County Fermanagh. ''Fir Manach'' originally referred to a distinct kin group of al ...

and

Armagh Armagh ( ; ga, Ard Mhacha, , "Macha's height") is the county town of County Armagh and a city in Northern Ireland, as well as a civil parish. It is the ecclesiastical capital of Ireland – the seat of the Archbishops of Armagh, the Pri ...

from 1958 to 1968.

Later career

In 1964, he was elected to the

House of Commons of Northern Ireland The House of Commons of Northern Ireland was the lower house of the Parliament of Northern Ireland created under the ''Government of Ireland Act 1920''. The upper house in the bicameral parliament was called the Senate. It was abolished wit ...

Ulster Unionist The Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) is a Unionism in Ireland, unionist political party in Northern Ireland. The party was founded in 1905, emerging from the Irish Unionist Alliance in Ulster. Under Edward Carson, it led unionist opposition to the I ...

member for Mid Down. He was appointed as

Attorney General for Northern Ireland The Attorney General for Northern Ireland is the chief legal adviser to the Northern Ireland Executive for both civil and criminal matters that fall within the devolved powers of the Northern Ireland Assembly. The Attorney General for Northern Irel ...

in 1968. He was appointed to the

Privy Council of Northern Ireland The Privy Council of Northern Ireland is a formal body of advisors to the sovereign and was a vehicle for the monarch's prerogative powers in Northern Ireland. It was modelled on the Privy Council of Ireland. The council was created in 1922 as ...

in 1969, entitling him to the style ''

The Right Honourable ''The Right Honourable'' ( abbreviation: ''Rt Hon.'' or variations) is an honorific style traditionally applied to certain persons and collective bodies in the United Kingdom, the former British Empire and the Commonwealth of Nations. The term is ...

''. In March 1972, the entire

Government of Northern Ireland The government of Northern Ireland is, generally speaking, whatever political body exercises political authority over Northern Ireland. A number of separate systems of government exist or have existed in Northern Ireland. Following the partitio ...

resigned, and the

Parliament of Northern Ireland The Parliament of Northern Ireland was the home rule legislature of Northern Ireland, created under the Government of Ireland Act 1920, which sat from 7 June 1921 to 30 March 1972, when it was suspended because of its inability to restore ord ...

was prorogued. As a result, Kelly ceased to be Attorney General. The office of Attorney General for Northern Ireland was transferred to the

Attorney General for England and Wales His Majesty's Attorney General for England and Wales is one of the law officers of the Crown and the principal legal adviser to sovereign and Government in affairs pertaining to England and Wales. The attorney general maintains the Attorney ...

, and Kelly was the last person to serve as Stormont's Attorney General until the re-establishment of the position in its own right in April 2010. In 1973, he was appointed as a judge of the

High Court of Northern Ireland The courts of Northern Ireland are the civil and criminal courts responsible for the administration of justice in Northern Ireland: they are constituted and governed by the law of Northern Ireland. Prior to the partition of Ireland, Northern Ir ...

, and then as a

Lord Justice of Appeal A Lord Justice of Appeal or Lady Justice of Appeal is a judge of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales, the court that hears appeals from the High Court of Justice, the Crown Court and other courts and tribunals. A Lord (or Lady) Justice ...

of Northern Ireland in 1984, when he was also knighted and appointed to the

Privy Council of the United Kingdom The Privy Council (PC), officially His Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, is a formal body of advisers to the sovereign of the United Kingdom. Its membership mainly comprises senior politicians who are current or former members of e ...

Death

Lord Justice Sir Basil Kelly died at his home in

Berkshire Berkshire ( ; in the 17th century sometimes spelt phonetically as Barkeshire; abbreviated Berks.) is a historic county in South East England. One of the home counties, Berkshire was recognised by Queen Elizabeth II as the Royal County of Berk ...

on 5 December 2008 after a short illness. He was 88 years old.

References

Sources

* Flackes, W.D. and Elliott, S. (1989), ''Northern Ireland: A Political Directory'' (3rd ed.). Belfast: Blackstaff Press Ltd

External links