Career
Educated at the University of Glasgow he was admitted to membership of the Faculty of Advocates in 1878. He became a Queen"s Counsel in 1897. Alexander Ure"s integrity is widely open to question: he misled the Court in the trial of Oscar Slater for the murder of Marion Gilchrist in 1909 (Slater was convicted but subsequently pardoned on appeal and freed).
lieutenant could be alleged he conspired with the police, Fiscal and Crown Office to prevent two brothers being prosecuted for the murder.
He also claimed Balfour"s Conservative Party would abolish the old pension. He served as Solicitor General for Scotland from December 1905 to 1909, and as Lord Advocate from February 1909 to 1913.
He lived in a huge Georgian townhouse, 31 Heriot Row, in Edinburgh"s Second New Town. On leaving Parliament he was raised to the bench as Lord Strathclyde and appointed Lord Justice General, a post he held until 1920.
He was raised to the Peerage as Baron Strathclyde, of Sandyford in the County of Lanark, in 1914.
He is said to have been skilled in cross-examination, and was more suited to life as an advocate than as a judge. The peerage became extinct on his death.