DELOS ROGEST DAVIS AUGUST 4-1846
Murphy Browne © August 1-2022
Delos Rogest Davis was born on August 4-1846 and was the first person of African ancestry appointed as King’s Counsel in the British Empire. A King’s Counsel was a lawyer who was selected to serve as counsel to the British crown and that was considered a great honour bestowed on any lawyer of the time. During this period of history, George V was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, (which included Canada) and Emperor of India. He was the grandson of Victoria and grandfather of the present British monarch Elizabeth II. The British royal family has an interesting history that every child living in a British colony was forced to learn. On July 17, 1917, George V issued a royal proclamation that changed the name of the British royal house from their German name “House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha” to the more British “House of Windsor.” This was at the height of the first European tribal conflict (first world war) when the British and their German kin were slaughtering each other and doing their best to destroy each other’s countries. George V and all his British relatives relinquished their German titles and adopted British surnames.
The history of Delos Rogest Davis and African Canadians is not as well known and that is a sad fact which needs to be addressed and corrected. Delos Rogest Davis was born in Maryland, to an enslaved African couple, Anne Davis and James Davis. In 1849, James Davis escaped enslavement and lived in Fort Erie for a short time.
Education for enslaved Africans in the US and British North America/Canada was forbidden so neither Anne Davis nor James Davis were literate. However, they were determined that their three children, living in freedom in Upper Canada as refugees from US slavery, would have the opportunity to be educated. James Davis, along with other residents of Colchester North, hired a “private lady teacher” to educate the children of the community. A school was later established in the area, and James Davis was elected as one of its trustees, a position he held for several years.
The African Canadian children of Colchester North benefited from the education James Davis and others initiated for their community. In 1871, James Davis’ son, Delos Rogest Davis began studies to become a lawyer. To further his education, Delos Rogest Davis had worked at a paper mill in Michigan, as a deckhand on the steamer “Forest City” and as a fireman on the tug “Castle.”
Delos Rogest Davis obtained a teaching certificate, and taught school for four years. Becoming a lawyer was a bit of a struggle for Delos because of the white supremacist culture of British North America/Canada where people of African descent were viewed as inferior. Fortunately, in 1871, county judge Gordon Watts Leggatt and attorney Charles Robert Horne, agreed to tutor/instruct Delos. In December 1871, Delos Rogest Davis was appointed a commissioner of affidavits, affirmations, and recognizances. On June 19, 1873, he became a notary public.
Davis was prevented from becoming a lawyer because the Law Society of Upper Canada required that individuals studying law must article for a period of time with a lawyer before taking the entrance exams for admission to the bar of Ontario. For eleven years, Delos Davis studied and practiced law at the level of legal clerk — he was prohibited from handling most legal matters because he had not been admitted to membership in the Ontario bar as no lawyer would hire him to article under them. Davis eventually applied to the Ontario Legislature to pass a private member’s bill to authorize him to practice as a lawyer. The bill was introduced by W.D. Balfour, M.P.P. for Amherstburg. On May 25, 1884, "an act to authorize the Supreme Court of Judicature for Ontario to admit Delos Rogest Davis to practice as a solicitor" received Royal Assent. This act “provided that Davis be permitted to take his final law examination in order to obtain admission to the Law Society of Upper Canada, notwithstanding the fact that he had not complied with the articling requirements of the Law Society.”
Balfour’s bill stated in part “in consequence of prejudices against his colour, and because of his being of African descent he had not been articled to any attorney or solicitor.” Davis placed first in the class of thirteen candidates and was admitted to the Ontario bar on November 15, 1886.
In 1887 Davis established a law practice in Amherstburg focusing on criminal and municipal law. He was counsel in six important murder cases but specialised in drainage litigation. Delos Rogest Davis, born on August 4-1846 as a child of enslaved Africans in the US, transitioned to the ancestral realm on April 13, 1915, after achieving his ambition, against many odds, becoming one of the first African Canadian lawyers and first African Canadian called to the bar of Upper Canada.
Murphy Browne © August 1-2022
