Page:Dictionary of National Biography, Second Supplement, volume 3.djvu/452

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Stretton
442
Strong

on 12 Feb. 1908, and was cremated at Golder's Green.

On his return from India in 1879 Richard Strachey collaborated with his brother John in writing 'The Finances and Public Works of India' (1882), a record of their joint achievements from 1869 to 1881. In the preface to the fourth edition (1911) of Sir John Strachey's 'India: its Administration and Progress,' a development of the original work by the two brothers, Sir Thomas W. Holderness says: 'It describes a system of government which they, more than any other public servants of their day, had helped to fashion. It narrates the concrete results of this system, with intimate first-hand knowledge of its working and of the country and the populations which it affected, with an honourable pride in its pacific triumphs and in the benefits which it had conferred on their fellow Indian subjects.' Strachey wrote the articles on 'Asia' and 'Himalaya' in the ninth edition of the 'Encyclopædia Britannica ' and contributed many more papers than those already cited to scientific journals.

Sir Richard was twice married: (1) on 19 Jan. 1854 to Caroline Anne (d. 1855), daughter of the Rev. George Downing Bowles; (2) on 4 Jan. 1859 to Jane Maria, daughter of Sir John Peter Grant [q. v. Suppl. I.] of Rothiemurchus, N.B., his chief in the Mutiny days. She survived him with five sons and five daughters.

A portrait in oils (1889), by Lowes Dickinson [q. v. Suppl. II]; another in water-colours by Miss Jessie MacGregor; a third in pastel (1902), by Simon Bussy; and a medallion in bronze (1898), by Mr. Alfred Gilbert, R.A., are in possession of the family.

[Vibart's Addiscombe: its Heroes and Men of Note, 1898; Royal Engineers' Journal, 1908; Proceedings of the Royal Society, vol. lxxxi. 1908; Geographical Journal, March 1908; The Times, 13 Feb. 1908; Nature, 27 Feb. 1908; Spectator, 22 Feb. 1908; Engineering, 21 Feb. 1908; private information.]

R. H. V.

STRETTON, HESBA, pseudonym. [See Smith, Sarah (1832–1911 authoress.]

STRONG, Sir SAMUEL HENRY (1825–1909), chief justice of Canada, born at Poole, Dorsetshire, on 13 Aug. 1825, was son of Samuel S. Strong, D.D., LL.D., by his wife Jane Elizabeth Gosse of that town, sister of Philip Henry Gosse [q. v.]. In his eleventh year he accompanied to Canada his father, who became chaplain of the forces in Quebec and rector of Bytown (now Ottawa) and rural dean. Educated in the Quebec High School and privately, the son began to study law in Bytown, and was called to the bar in Toronto in 1849. He entered into partnership with H. Eccles (afterwards librarian of Osgoode Hall) and later with Sir Thomas W. Taylor (subsequently chief justice of Manitoba) and (Sir) James David Edgar (who became speaker of the Canadian House of Commons). Strong rapidly secured a reputation in the courts of equity, and was appointed in 1856 a member of the commission for the consolidation of the statutes of Canada and of Upper Canada. He was elected a bencher of the Law Society of Upper Canada in 1860 and took silk in 1863. Six years later he was raised to the bench as one of the vice-chancellors' of Ontario. He served on the commission of inquiry into a union of the law and equity courts in 1871. In 1874 he was transferred to the Court of Error and Appeal of Ontario, then the highest of the provincial tribunals.

In 1875 Strong was advanced to the newly constituted Supreme Court of Canada as a puisne judge, and on the death in Dec. 1892 of Sir William Johnstone Ritchie [q. v.], he became chief justice. He was knighted next year. His appointment as a member of the judicial committee of the privy council followed in Jan. 1897. He resigned the chief-justiceship in 1902 in order to become chief of a commission for the consolidation of the statutes of Canada. He died at Ottawa on 21 Aug. 1909.

One of the ablest jurists of Canada, Strong was distinguished by his powerful memory for cases, by a scientific knowledge of the principles of both law and equity, and by a power of incisive comment that added much to the force of his obiter dicta. He married in 1850 Elizabeth Charlotte Cane, by whom he had two children.

A portrait in oils hangs in the Supreme Court at Ottawa.

[Rose, Cyclopedia of Canadian Biography, 1886; Morgan's Canadian Men and Women of the Time, 1898; Canadian Law Times, xxix. 1044.]

D. R. K.

STRONG, SANDFORD ARTHUR (1863–1904), orientalist and historian of art, born in London on 10 April 1863, was second son of Thomas Strong of the war office. His eldest brother, Thomas Banks Strong, is dean of Christ Church, Oxford. In 1877 he entered St. Paul's School as a