Theme: Troublemaker.

One definition of Troublemaker is ‘Someone who thrives on conflict’. That would be my Great grandfather Frederick Wentworth Wade, a barrister and solicitor. He was born in Dublin, Ireland on 23 September 1838 to schoolteacher Robert Wentworth Wade and his wife Annie Gibbons, who were married clandestinely (without parental approval) in Dublin by a German Lutheran priest (Oh the joy when I finally found their marriage!)

Frederick was the 5th of nine children and probably left home at an early age to seek fame and fortune. It is thought that he joined the navy or merchant navy but no specific record can be found. He turned up in Melbourne, Australia about 1859, working for a firm of accountants. He was said to have had a remarkable faculty for dealing with figures. In 1862 he went to Invercargill at the bottom of New Zealand, initially working as a clerk and then partner/ accountant, but very soon he was a law clerk and eventually gained his creditations as a barrister and solicitor in 1869. He set up a practice in Invercargill and remained there to the end of his days.

One of his obituaries described him as having been associated with most of the enterprises which made for the advancement of the town from the time it was in its embryo stage.

He made the news every now and then and was not free from litigation himself. Some of his cases attracted much attention. One of his last cases in 1909 involved a sad tale about the spread of scarlet fever. This case was eerily prescient of the spread of Covid in 2020 – he defended the charge that a man had failed to give notice to the District Health Officer that his daughter was sick with an infectious disease – scarlet fever. Wade explained that while his client admitted the facts, there were mitigating factors. The man’s daughter had been ill a few days previously with a cold and when she became ill again it was thought the cold had returned; it was actually scarlet fever but the man had no medical knowledge. The man’s two daughters had continued to work in a milk factory as did their father, and a man employed to taste the milk became ill. The man’s son continued to attend school and a boy sitting next to him caught the fever and died. Result: the man was Fined one pound and ordered to pay costs of one pound 18 shillings.

In 1878 he defended a notorious wife murderer; an account of the trial said he ably defended the murderer but it was a hopeless case. (Many years later a film was made about it).

He was once charged with using insulting language to the Licensing Bench – “Before you separate, gentlemen, I would like to tell you, you have been guilty of wilfully, wantonly and deliberately inflicting gross injustice, and those of you who are in private business will particularly and individually suffer”. The defence said the words were used after the business of the committee had closed, and he was dealt with leniently, with a fine in default of 24 hrs imprisonment.

In another case he brought a charge against the local police Sergeant who called him a “pettifogging lawyer” while acting for an accused man. It was concluded the remarks were not addressed to the Bench and the case was dismissed with costs.

When Frederick died aged 73 in August 1912, one of the oldest practitioners of Law in the town, many fullsome obituaries appeared in the local newspapers.