Eldon, LORD, Lord Chancellor. John Scott, better known as Lord Eldon, was born 4th June 1751, in Love Lane, Newcastle, of obscure but respectable parentage. Lord Stowell (q.v.) was his elder brother. Leaving the Newcastle grammar-school in 1766, John Scott entered University College, Oxford, with a view to the church, and the following year he obtained a fellowship. A run-away marriage, into which he entered with a Miss Surtees in 1772, nearly ruined him; however, by the advice of his brother, he returned with his wife to the university. Here, during the year of grace after his marriage, he lived on his fellowship and gains as a private tutor; and the year expiring without a college living falling vacant, he betook himself to the study of law. In 1776 he was called to the bar. By the death of his father, in the year of his call, Eldon found himself in possession of £3000. Success soon dawned on him; and, with success in his profession, his ambition expanded, he took to politics. A silk gown and a seat in parliament were but steps towards knighthood and the post of Solicitor-general, conferred on him by Pitt in 1788. In 1793 he became Attorney-general. In 1799 the office of Chief-justice of the Court of Common Pleas became his, as Baron Eldon; and in 1801 he ascended the woolsack. From this time till 1827, with little intermission, Eldon continued to occupy the woolsack under successive governments. In 1821 he had been made an earl by George IV. In 1834 he ceased to speak in parliament. After outliving almost all his immediate relations, he died in his eighty-seventh year, January 13, 1838, leaving behind him a fortune of over half a million sterling.
Eldon was a handsome man, of very winning and courtly manners. His career amply proves that he had the greatest talent, sagacity, and power of managing men. He was undoubtedly a great lawyer, and his judgments, which have been much praised for their accuracy, fill a small library; but he took so long to arrive at them, that he has been charged with having caused more injustice by delay than worse judges by the iniquity of their decisions. For literature, as for art, he had no feeling, and the style of his decisions is generally detestable. As a public speaker he is far from estimable. He was no statesman; for forty years he was a leading enemy of reform and religious liberty, and it may be said that his whole political stock in trade was zeal against the Roman Catholics. He is said to have added parsimony to his other defects; but it is certain he was capable of generous actions, and his devotion to 'Bessy' his wife was truly beautiful. See the Life by Twiss (1846), and Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors.