Born in 1707 and educated in England and Leiden, Fielding started writing satirical dramas for the theatre in the late 1720s, but retired following the Theatrical Licensing Act of 1737 which limited the possibilities of this sort of work, and gained admission to the Inn in November of that year. Turning to the law as a way of supporting his wife and children, he was Called to the Bar in 1740 and practiced as a barrister. He took to writing novels in the 1740s, the most famous of which was Tom Jones. He also found time to be London's chief magistrate, in which position he founded the Bow Street Runners, said to be London's first police force, in 1749, and published numerous pamphlets on juridicial and humanitarian matters.

Edmund Burke, born in Dublin in 1729, is sometimes considered the father of modern British Conservatism. After graduating from Trinity College, Dublin, he travelled to London to take up the study of law, gaining admission to the Middle Temple. It was not long, however, until he abandoned his legal studies and set off to travel Europe. He began to publish philosophical and historical works and founded a political journal. Elected a Member of Parliament in 1765, Burke began a long career in the Commons. Over 1774 and 1775, he gave a number of speeches in support of the American Colonies and their grievances, appealing repeatedly for peace. In 1790, he published an influential pamphlet reflecting upon and criticising the French Revolution and died in 1797 at the age of 68.

Born in Charleston, South Carolina in 1739, Rutledge was admitted to the Inn in 1754 and Called to the Bar in 1760, returning to South Carolina to begin a successful and lucrative career in the law. Elected to the first Continental Congress in 1774, he was elected President of South Carolina in 1776 and oversaw the defence of Charleston against British attack, later becoming Governor of the state under a revised constitution. His younger brother, Edward, was also a Middle Templar and one of the signatories of the Declaration of Independence.

After the Revolutionary War, he represented South Carolina at the first Constitutional Convention and was instrumental in drafting the Constitution, convincing the convention against the abolition of slavery (he himself owned sixty enslaved people at the outbreak of the Revolution). He later served in the newly constituted Supreme Court, and in 1795 Washington nominated him the second Chief Justice of the United States, but his nomination was rejected by the Senate.

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Elder brother of Thomas Pinckney, Charles was born in Charleston, and travelled to Great Britain with his family at a young age. Following a spell at Oxford, he was admitted to the Inn in 1764, and Called to the Bar in 1769. Records survive in the Inn's Archive of his participation in exercises as a student. He returned to South Carolina a few years later and combined legal practice with involvement in colonial politics. On the outbreak of war, Pinckney joined the Revolutionary cause and took part in a number of significant engagements. These included the Siege of Savannah, the Battle of Brandywine and the defence of Charleston, the latter of which saw him taken prisoner by the British. Following the war, he returned to politics, standing (unsuccessfully) for President in 1804 and in 1808 as the Federalist candidate. A slave owner throughout his life, he opposed Rutledge’s attempts to end the importation of slaves on the basis of the reliance of the South Carolinan economy on slavery. He supported the abolition of the slave trade in 1808 but was opposed to emancipation.

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Thomas Pinckney was born in Charleston, South Carolina, but at the age of three was taken by his father to Great Britain and remained there throughout his youth. He studied at Westminster and Oxford and was admitted to the Middle Temple at the age of eighteen. Pinckney was Called to the Bar in 1774, returned to South Carolina soon afterwards, becoming heavily involved in the Revolution. After the war, he served as Governor of South Carolina from 1787 to 1789, and in 1792 was appointed by President Washington as ambassador to Great Britain. He later served in the House of Representatives and as a Major-General in the war of 1812, dying in 1828 in his hometown of Charleston.

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Richard Sheridan was born in Dublin in 1751 and was educated at Harrow. As a young man he fought two duels for the honour of the singer Elizabeth Linley, who he went on to marry in 1773. It was allegedly the opposition of her friends and family to an engagement to a man with no prospects that induced him to join the Inn. His first comedy, The Rivals, was produced in 1775 at Covent Garden Theatre. Sheridan followed this with a succession of hugely popular plays and comic operas, including The School for Scandal, that were performed at the Drury Lane Theatre. He took over David Garrick’s shares in the theatre on the latter’s retirement in 1776, and took over full ownership two years later with the support of his father-in-law, Thomas Linley. Later in life he became a Member of Parliament and became known for his powerful oratory. Sheridan served as Treasurer of the Navy from 1806 to 1807. He died in poverty in 1816.

John Laurens was born in 1754, the son of rice planters in South Carolina. He and his brothers were taken to London for their education and he was admitted to the Inn in 1772. He commenced his legal studies in 1774 and returned to South Carolina in 1776 to fight in the American Revolutionary War. In 1777, Laurens joined the Continental Army under George Washington, fighting at the Battle of Brandywine and being appointed an aide-de-camp to Washington alongside Hamilton and the Marquis de Lafayette. He fought at Charleston, Savannah and the Siege of Yorktown, before being killed at the Battle of the Combahee River in 1782. He is well known for his criticisms of slavery and promoting the idea of arming slaves and granting them freedom in return to military service, although his father’s wealth arose from his joint ownership of one of the largest slave trading houses in America.