Richard Martin Meredith (27 March 1847 – 20 May 1934) was a co-founder and the first Chancellor of The University of Western Ontario; vice-chancellor of Ontario; President of the High Court of the Supreme Court of Ontario and Chief Justice of the Ontario Court of Common Pleas. Family Born at 565 Talbot Street, London, Canada West, he was one of the eight sons of John Walsingham Cooke Meredith, a first cousin of Chief Justice Sir William Collis Meredith, Edmund Allen Meredith and James Creed Meredith. He shared the same name as one of his great uncles (the father of James Creed Meredith), who was named for Richard Martin, a contemporary of Meredith's great grandfather, Ralph Meredith (1748–1799), Attorney Exchequer and Justice of the Peace for Co. Dublin. His brothers, known as The Eight London Merediths, included Chief Justice William Ralph Meredith, Vincent Meredith, Thomas Graves Meredith Q.C., and Charles Meredith, first cousins of Richard Edmund Meredith and Frederick Walsingham Meredith, President of the Law Society of Ireland. Legal career Educated at Hellmuth Boy's College, London, he then proceeded to the Royal Military College of Canada, passing out in 1865. He served as an officer at Windsor, Ontario during the Fenian raids, earning a medal. Following this he entered his brother William's legal offices and was called to the Bar in 1869. Specializing in chancery and equity law, he went into practice with another brother, Edmund Meredith (1845–1921) Q.C., a well-known criminal barrister, forming the London-based firm of Meredith & Meredith, subsequently Meredith, Judd & Meredith. He continued his career in London, during which time he took silk as a Queen's Counsel, until the Prime Minister, John A. Macdonald appointed him a Judge of the Chancery Division of the High Court of Ontario in 1890, at Toronto. In the same year (1890), he was also elected to the vice chancellorship of Ontario, a position he held until 1905. From 1905 to 1912, he was President of the High Court of the Supreme Court of Ontario. In 1905, he also served as a Judge at the Court of Appeal, where his frequent disagreements with his brothers William and Edmund earned him the nickname 'the dissenting judge'. In 1912, he succeeded his elder brother, William, as Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas, his final judicial post, retiring in 1930. He was sometime a director of the Ontario Investment Association. University of