John Walter Huddleston

Sir John Walter Huddleston (8 September 1815 – 5 December 1890) was an English judge, formerly a criminal lawyer who had established an eminent reputation in various causes célèbres.

As a Baron of the Exchequer (judge) of the Exchequer of pleas he was styled Baron Huddleston, in writing, Huddleston B. Soon after his appointment, the Exchequer was absorbed into the High Court of Justice and the style abolished. He sometimes referred to himself as the last of the Barons.

Huddleston was the eldest son of Thomas, a Merchant Navy officer and Alethea née Hichens. He was born and educated in Dublin, ultimately attending Trinity College. Though he did not graduate, he worked for a while at a public school before entering Gray's Inn in 1836 to train as a barrister. He was called to the bar in 1839.

Initially practising on the Oxford circuit specialising in poor law cases, he developed his criminal practice at the Middlesex quarter sessions and at the Old Bailey, notably in the prosecution of William Palmer. He defended William Cuffay the chartist in 1848, and secured the acquittal of Mercy Catherine Newton, on her third trial for matricide, in 1859. He became a QC in 1857 and a bencher of Gray's Inn, being Treasurer in 1859 and 1868.

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