Josiah Symon a giant of late 19th Century South Australian law with peak fame for Mary Schippan case defence
Josiah Symon (at left), articled to his cousin J.D. Sutherland's law firm in Mount Gambier after he arrived in South Australia in 1866 and (at right) caricatured at the height of his later commanding presence in the Adelaide courts. His most famous victory was in the murder case involving Mary Schippan (centre) in 1902.
Images by JT Gittings, Mount Gambier, and caricature by Will Dyson, courtesy State Library of South Australia
Josiah Symon towered over his Adelaide law contemporaries and was the acknowledged leader of the South Australian Bar for more than 30 years from 1871.
Born in 1846 at Wick, Caithness, Scotland, son of cabinet maker James and his wife Elizabeth, Symon was educated at the Stirling High School (dux, 1862) and the Free Church Training College, Edinburgh, Symon migrated to South Australia in 1866.and settled at Mount Gambier and was articled to the law practice of his cousin J. D. Sutherland.
Born and educated in Scotland, Symon migrated to South Australia in 1866. He settled at Mount Gambier and was articled to his cousin J. D. Sutherland. In Mount Gambier, the 19-year-old threw himself into its cultural and sporting life. He joined the Mount Gambier Institute where he gave poetry readings and joined the Mount Gambier Amateur Dramatic Society. Of his first performance, the reviewer noticed "a slight degree of stiffness in his motions" but, in the next performance, he "exhibited a very advanced knowledge of the histrionic art". He also played a few games of cricket and football and became secretary of the horse racing club.
When prominent Adelaide lawyer Samuel Way visited the south east in 1870, he invited the promising Symon to join his Adelaide firm of (Samuel) Way and Brook. Called to the South Australian Bar in 1871, Symon became a partner with Way on Brook's death in 1872.
When some of his well-prepared work was noticed by the leader of the South Australian Bar Association, Samuel Way, Symon transferred his articles to the Adelaide firm of Way and Brook in 1870. Called to the South Australian Bar in 1871, Symon entered into partnership with Way when Brook died in 1872. In 1876, Way became chief justice and, at 29, Symon assumed responsibility for one of Adelaide's finest legal practices. In December 1881 at St Peter's Anglican Cathedral, Adelaide, he married Mary Eleanor Cowle. Appointed Queen's Counsel in 1881, he declined to be elevated to the South Australian Supreme court bench in 1884.
In 1861, Symon was chief secretary in the two short Thomas Reynolds South Australian government ministries, resigning because he didn’t support the moves to dismiss supreme court judge Benjamin Boothby. Symon was briefly attorney general in William Morgan government’s ministry in 1881 but his major contribution to Australian politics related to Australian federation. In the 1901 first federal elections, Symon topped the senate poll in South Australia and became opposition leader in that chamber. Symon was attorney-general in the Reid-McLean Australian government 1904-05 when he battled chief justice Samuel Griffith over the costs and status of the high court.
But Symon had maintained his legal practice where his ability to marshal arguments and to lead the bench imperceptibly towards the conclusion he wanted was effective in civil cases. His attention to detail, breaking down a hostile witness without harassment, and eloquent pleading to the jury in criminal cases made the death penalty largely obsolete for more than a generation. The Australian Mutual Provident Society conspiracy case, and those of Bonney (1889), Joseph Vardon (1907) and Gillett (1923) were high points of his career.
His highest-profile murder case attracted huge attention across Australia. On January 1, 1902, at their home at Towitta in the Barossa Valley, 21-year-old Mary Schippan was accused of murdering her 14-year-old sister Bertha. Although the evidence presented by the police pointed to a guilty verdict, Symon’s masterful handling of the case cast doubt on the evidence, resulting in Mary Schippan being acquitted to universal joy. Symon’s dramatic summing up began at 11.45am and concluded at 5.30pm.
Symon was president (1898-1903, 1905-19) of the Law Society of South Australia and a member of the society of comparative legislation and international law.
Having again topped the South Australian poll for senators at the 1906 federal election, fought on a strong anti-socialist platform, Symon stood aside from the fursing of anti–:Labor parties in 1910 and refused to sign the Liberal Union party's manifesto at the 1913 election. Standing as an independent, he failed to be elected and retired to a lucrative practice that he had never really abandoned.