This is the text of a speech delivered on the occasion of Judge Smithies leaving the Winchester for the Bristol group of courts on the Western Circuit. Speaker's emendations shown in cursive script.
It has been a privilege knowing Kenneth Smithies as colleague, guide, mentor and friend for twenty-five years. “Friendship,” said John Evelyn, “is the golden thread that ties the hearts of all the world.” Kenneth's is the strongest of that quality. This has been a privilege shared with many, many others, yet he has that great capacity of making every particular friendship appear to be that of greatest importance to him. And that is because it is.
What is, in most of us, a social expertise, is in Kenneth something which comes from a deep love and understanding of his fellow human beings, founded, of course, on a profound faith.
Those are rare qualities, unfashionable qualities, but they are qualities which have infused his judgments and inspired them throughout the time he has graced the bench of this Winchester group of courts on our circuit.
But it is not merely for these essential human qualities that Judge Smithies has been appreciated. He comes second to none for his knowledge of the law in all the varied fields in which a circuit judge may be called to apply it and of all its procedural ramifications in those fields. Few, if any, amongst his brother judges, of whatever rank, have appeared twice on the same day in The Times newspaper vindicated by the House of Lords and the Court of Appeal in different cases. The House of Lords case now reported at p. 440, All E.R. 1987 is surely one of the most courageous, humane and common sensical of judgments which he ever gave in a judicial career characterised by many of the same.
Now this young man is to go west — to somewhere called Bristol where, it seems, notwithstanding any appearance to the contrary by those who practise there, the writ of the English common law still runs. Our loss is Bristol's gain. They will gain a judge of immense experience, knowledge and skill, who after thirteen years on the bench still flourishes that standard upon which is emblazoned the judicial oath to do right to all manner of men, without fear or favour.
I am told that standard flies in Bristol, but it will be none the worse for the fresh, forceful and perhaps mildly idiosyncratic breeze which Judge Smithies is about to bring to it.
I have said this is “Au revoir,” for we all hope that some sort of legal “lease-back” scheme may be arranged to permit Judge Smithies to return to us from time to time to... to flutter the flagging standards he will leave behind here. How otherwise will the impeccable use of the glorious English language and its perfect pronunciation survive amongst (or should it be among?) us? How otherwise will our corporal (or should it be corporeal) needs for revitalising tea of precisely the correct blend and infusion be catered for? For, Mr Patterson, we lose not only a judge but also the tea boy. And although it might be said that the skills of each are not dissimilar, namely the capacity to pour hot or cold water at the right moment, and stir with honey, adding, perhaps, a touch of acid lemon, Judges may come and go, but tea boys are irreplaceable!
So, with reluctance, we release Judge Smithies to perform in the Bristol group in both those skills in which he excels. And with our very good wishes for such happiness and success there as he has brought to us and to his work here.
One final obervation.
Judge Smithies is going to reside in the bosom of his family. That family for so long adorned by his late wife which has meant so much to him, and us, and to his work. That family now resides at St. Aldehlm's House, near Bristol.
St. Aldhelm, Mr Patterson, as you well know, was a Dorset saint of the 8th century, of whom it is said that he preached so long a sermon in the church yard at Wimborne that the staff upon which he leant took root, and established itself as a minor tourist attraction.
This story is not — or not yet — widely known in Bristol! We send our pilgrim to take new root and become a major attraction in Bristol.