Stern, Philip Cohen

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STERN, PHILIP COHEN

STERN, PHILIP COHEN (1847–1933), Jamaican lawyer and politician. Stern was born in Kingston and educated at University College, London, becoming a barrister in London in 1869 and in Jamaica in 1870. He was also admitted as a solicitor in Jamaica, where he lived until 1878 and after 1893. In 1883 he founded and edited Pump Court, the Temple newspaper and review. Ill health forced him to leave England soon afterward and he returned to Jamaica where he rapidly established a reputation as an outstanding lawyer and was involved in most of the famous legal cases in Jamaica during the next few decades. Stern sat in the Legislative Council from 1895 to 1908. On his retirement from the council he was appointed its clerk (1908–24) and served as registrar of the Supreme Court (1909–10). He was three times mayor of Kingston.

[Bernard Hooker]