Background
He was born the eldest son of Alexander Wedderburn Colvile of Ochiltree and Crombie, Fife and educated at Eton College and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated Master of Arts in 1834.
He was born the eldest son of Alexander Wedderburn Colvile of Ochiltree and Crombie, Fife and educated at Eton College and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he graduated Master of Arts in 1834.
Trinity College.
He trained as a barrister and was called to the bar in 1835. He practised at Lincoln"s Inn for ten years before being appointed Advocate General to the East India Company in 1845. He went to Calcutta and was appointed Puisne Judge to the Supreme Court of Bengal in 1848 and Chief Justice of Bengal in 1855.
He was knighted in 1848.
He was the first Vice Chancellor of the University of Calcutta. He served in this office for two years, from January 24, 1857 to January 24, 1859.
He was president of The Asiatic Society. He retired and returned to England in 1859.
He gave the decision of the Judicial Committee in Dow v.
Black, an important constitutional case from Canada. In April, 1875 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. He died in London, of heart failure on 6 December 1880.
They had one son, Andrew John Wedderburn, born in 1859, who died in 1876.
Royal Society]
He was made a Privy Councillor, initially as an Assessor to the Judicial Committee of the Council of India appeals, and eventually as a full member of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council.