John Herman Merivale

John Herman Merivale (5 August 1779 – 25 April 1844, Bedford Square) was an English barrister and man of letters. Life He was the only son of John Merivale of Barton Place, Exeter, and Bedford Square, London, by Ann Katencamp or Katenkamp, daughter of a German merchant settled in Exeter, and was born there on 5 August 1779. The grandson of Samuel Merivale (1715–1771), tutor in a local dissenting academy in Exeter, he was brought up a presbyterian. He spent some years at St. John's College, Cambridge, but left without taking a degree. In later life he conformed to the Church of England. On 17 December 1798 Merivale entered Lincoln's Inn, where he was called to the bar in Hilary term 1804. He practised in chancery and bankruptcy, and published Reports of Cases argued and determined in the High Court of Chancery, London, 1817–19. He sat on the Chancery Commission of 1824, in the report of which he concurred, but expounded a wider scheme of reform in A Letter to William Courtenay, Esq., on the Subject of the Chancery Commission, London, 1827. On 2 December 1831 Merivale was appointed to a commissionership in bankruptcy, which he held until his death, on 25 April 1844. He was buried in the churchyard, Hampstead.