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James Avon Clyde, Lord Clyde

British politician (1863-1944)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMay 7, 2026
Entity authorityQ6129021 ↗
Source-derived summary

James Avon Clyde, Lord Clyde, (14 November 1863 – 16 June 1944) was a Scottish politician and judge.

Early life and career

Clyde was born on 14 November 1863, the son of Dr James Clyde LLD (1821-1912). His father was a teacher at Dollar Academy and then at Edinburgh Academy.

He was educated at the Edinburgh Academy and at the University of Edinburgh, where he graduated with an MA 1884 and an LLB in 1888.

Legal career

Clyde was called to the Scots Bar in 1889, and by the times he was appointed a King's Counsel (KC) in August 1901, he was the leading junior counsel in Scotland. As a KC, he was retained by several railway companies and frequently appeared before the Law Lords.

He was later Dean of the Faculty of Advocates from 1915 to 1918.

Political career

He held office briefly as Solicitor General for Scotland from October 1905 to December 1905.

He was the unsuccessful Tory candidate for Clackmannanshire and Kinross-shire in 1906.

He was elected at a by-election in May 1909 as the Liberal Unionist Member of Parliament (MP) for Edinburgh West, and held the seat until 1918.

Editorial summary

“James Avon Clyde, Lord Clyde” enters the record as british politician (1863-1944). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what James, Avon and Clyde can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1863, 1944, 1821, 1912—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1863-01-01. Its strongest next move is a source search built around James, Avon and Clyde.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“James Avon Clyde, Lord Clyde” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, James, Avon and Clyde provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6129021. VIAF identifies the subject as 22210160. The Library of Congress control number is no95003565. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1863, 1944, 1821 and 1912.

Critical limits

Public reputation and documentary evidence do not always develop together; absence from a summary is not evidence of historical absence. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “James Avon Clyde, Lord Clyde”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow James Avon Clyde, Lord Clyde primary sources, James Avon Clyde, Lord Clyde archive and James research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “James Avon Clyde, Lord Clyde”?
  2. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
  3. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “James Avon Clyde, Lord Clyde” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.