Ambrose Hardinge Giffard, known to his family as Hardinge, was born in
Dublin in 1771, the eldest son of Sarah, daughter of William Morton, of Ballynaclash,
County Wexford, and John Giffard (1745–1819), High Sheriff of Dublin in 1794, Accountant-General of Customs in Dublin, and a prominent
loyalist. He was named after his father's guardian, Ambrose Harding, an attorney for James Annesley in the celebrated trial of 1743. (Hardinge's grandfather was John Giffard of Torrington, Devon, who gave crucial evidence in the trial, which turned the scales dramatically in favour of the claimant, James Annesley.) After studying for the law he was called to the bar of the
Inner Temple, and was appointed Chief Justice of Ceylon in April 1819. Giffard's health failed, and he was granted
leave of absence, but he died on 30 April 1827, while on the homeward voyage, in , East Indiaman. Before his death a
knighthood was conferred upon Giffard, but the title was never gazetted. ==Works==