Andrew Amos, 1791-1860

Andrew Amos, lawyer and professor of law, was born in 1791 in India. He attended Eton and Trinity College Cambridge. He was called to the bar by the Middle Temple and joined the Midland circuit, where he soon acquired a reputation for legal expertise, and his personal character secured him a large arbitration practice. When University College London was founded, Amos became the first Professor of English law there. Between 1829 and 1837 his lectures were very popular and well attended. He was appointed a member of the Criminal Law Commission in 1834. In 1837 he went to India as 'fourth member' of the governor-general's council, in succession to Lord Macaulay. Returning to England in 1843, he became one of the newly established county-court judges. In 1849 he was elected Downing Professor of Laws at Cambridge. He died in 1860. Many of the lectures Amos gave at University College London were published in the 'Legal Examiner and Law Chronicle'.