Browne-Wilkinson was the sixth child and only son of the Rev Canon Arthur Browne-Wilkinson,
MC, and of Mary Abraham, daughter of
Charles Abraham,
Bishop of Derby. He was educated at
Lancing and at
Magdalen College, Oxford, where he took a
First in Jurisprudence in 1952. He was
called to the Bar at
Lincoln's Inn in 1953 and
took silk in 1972. He was a judge of the
Court of Appeal of Jersey and of
Guernsey from 1976 to 1977. In 1977, Browne-Wilkinson was appointed a Justice of the
High Court of Justice and assigned to the
Chancery Division, receiving the customary
knighthood. He was promoted as a
Lord Justice of Appeal in 1983, and was of sworn of the
Privy Council. From 1985 to 1991 he was
Vice-Chancellor, the
de facto head of the Chancery Division. He was made a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary and was created a
life peer as
Baron Browne-Wilkinson,
of Camden in the London Borough of Camden on 1 October 1991, and was Senior Lord of Appeal in Ordinary from 1998 until his retirement as Law Lord in 2000. His tenure as Senior Law Lord was marred by the controversy surrounding the
Pinochet extradition case. == Family ==