Thomas Babington McMahon, judge of the county of Norfolk, was born in the town of Dundas, county of Wentworth, Ont., June 15, 1837. His father, Hugh McMahon, many years a provincial land surveyor, was from Ireland.
Judge McMahon was educated by his father, who was an English and classical scholar; studied law at Dundas and Brantford, and at the University of Toronto, and was graduated at that institution with the degree of LL.B., in 1862. He practiced in Brantford from that date until 1875, holding the office of Crown counsel three or four years, and conducting several criminal cases, one or two of them for murder, and a libel case against the Stratford Herald.
In July, 1875, our subject was appointed to the Bench, as already mentioned. During the few years he has filled the position of judge he has earned an enviable reputation both with the legal profession and the general public. His judgments show him to be not only gifted with excellent natural abilities and thoroughly well read in case law, but to be possessed as well of an invaluable fund of strong common sense. Of a genial temperament and never failing urbanity to all who come into contact with him, exceedingly conscientious and painstaking in the discharge of his duties he has well merited the respect and esteem in which he is universally held.
June 17, 1862, he married Miss Emma Watts, daughter of Charles Watts, of Brantford, and they have eight children.