Francis Biddle

Francis Beverley Biddle ( May 9, 1886 in Paris, † October 4, 1968 in Hyannis, Massachusetts ) was a judge in the United States. It was after the Second World War, the U.S. Chief Judge at the Nuremberg Trials.

Biddle was one of four sons of Algernon Biddle, a professor of law at the University of Pennsylvania; his great-great grandfather was Edmund Randolph. Biddle first attended the Groton School in Massachusetts. In 1909 he graduated from the Harvard University with a Bachelor of Arts in 1911 and a degree in law. After college, Biddle worked as private secretary to Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes of the Supreme Court of the United States. He then worked for 27 years as a practicing lawyer in Philadelphia.

In 1935 he was nominated President Franklin D. Roosevelt for the presidency of the National Labor Relations Board. 1939 Biddle Judge at the Federal Court of Appeals for the 3rd Judicial District. After a year he resigned and was appointed United States Solicitor General.

In this office he did not stay long. Roosevelt appointed Biddle 1941 for the position of Attorney General of the United States. He exercised this function to June 1945 at the request of President Harry S. Truman he resigned after Roosevelt's death. Shortly thereafter, Truman appointed him judge of the International Military Tribunal at the Nuremberg Trials.

Francis Biddle was married to the poet Katherine Garrison Chapin. With her he had two sons, Edmund Randolph Biddle and Garrison Chapin.