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Name: DAVIS, Dermot Renn OBE, Sir

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Nee: son of Eric Renn Davis of Molo

Birth Date: 20 Nov 1928 Molo

Death Date: 6 June 1997 Westminster

First Date: 1928

Last Date: 1962

Profession: Crown Counsel Kenya 1956; Asst. Attorney-Gen British Solomon Islands Protectorate 1962; Legal Adviser Western Pacific High Commission and Attorney-Gen BSIP 1963

Married: In New Forest, Hants. 3 Apr 1984 Mrs Mary Helen Farquharson Pearce née Howard b. 21 Sep 1926 Steyning, d. 27 Nov 2016 Marlborough (prev. m. to William J. Pearce)

Book Reference: Colonial, O&C, Telegraph Obit., Pembroke

School: Prince of Wales School, Nairobi and Wadham College Oxford 1948-51

General Information:

Pembroke No. 160, 1937, Highlands Hotel, Molo.
Telegraph - 8 Jul 1997 - Sir Renn Davis, who has died aged 68, became Chief Justice in such far-flung territories as the Solomon Islands and the Falkland Islands. A tall, slim, affable man with fine, almost Victorian manners, Davis adored exploring and was popular wherever he moved. Though a shrewd and careful lawyer he was not noted for his timekeeping. He would often breeze in well after the last minute, quite unflustered. For all this, he had a steely determination and a certain stubborness in his approach. Dermot Renn Davis was born on Nov 20 1928 at Molo, in the White Highlands of Kenya. He and his 2 sisters had an idyllic childhood full of unsupervised walks with a picnic basket and fishing rods. His father had moved to Kenya to farm, but later ran the Highlands Hotel where he built a golf course; he died when Renn was 13. His mother kept a string of Somali ponies, and young Renn quickly became a good horseman; later he rode with the Molo hounds. Renn was educated at Pembroke House preparatory school at Gilgil. His Common Entrance papers for Cheltenham were lost when the ship carrying them was torpedoed. Fearing that the same fate might befall her son, his mother sent him to the Prince of Wales boarding school in Nairobi, where he became head boy. He then went up to Wadham College, Oxford, to read Law. He was called to the Bar by Inner Temple in 1953, before returning to Nairobi to practise. In 1956, he was called up by the Attorney-General's office under the emergency regulations to deal with the Mau Mau rebellion. As a Crown Counsel, he travelled to outlying districts, prosecuting tribesmen who were bound by oath to drive out the Europeans by raiding farms and committing atrocities. Often the juries were too terrified to bring in a guilty verdicts, however clear the evidence. Davis moved to the Solomon Islands in 1962 as Attorney-General, legal adviser to the Western Pacific High Commission, and a member of the Executive Council. …………… 1980 Chief Justice of Gibraltar ………… 1987 Chief Justice of the Falkland Islands …….. OBE in 1971 and knighted in 1981. ………… A good mimic, Davis could, for example, capture accurately the voice and expression of a deputy governor's wife and the sort of things she would say. Besides gardening, his greatest passions were classical music and opera; he was on his way to a Handel Festival in Leipzig when he died. After his marriage in 1984, to Mary Pearce (née Howard, the widow of William Pearce), he became a keen fly fisherman. The couple had known one another since they were 18.
Chief Justice of Gibraltar Obituary - …… His father, who was half-French, half Irish and had served with the Royal Flying Corps in WW1, owned a hotel there with its own golf course and stables.. The plan was for Renn (the name's origins are obscure) to be educated at Cheltenham College in this country. But the ship carrying his Common Entrance papers was sunk in the war and his mother, fearing that her only son might suffer a similar fate, sent him instead to the Prince of Wales boarding school in Nairobi. He became head boy there and won a place to read law at Wadham College, Oxford (his headmaster's alma mater). University also enabled him to indulge his lifelong passion for amateur theatricals. Called to the Bar by the Inner Temple in 1953 he practised for 3 years in a Nairobi law firm before being called up for National Service during the Mau Mau emergency. He was drafted into the Kenya Attorney-General's chambers to help cope with the mounting workload for government lawyers then moved on to become a prosecuting counsel in the provinces. The experience reshaped Davis's career. Opting to stay in the colonial legal service, he left Kenya in 1962 to become Attorney-General in the Solomon Islands and legal adviser to Western Pacific High Commission.
 

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