Sir Sidney Solomon Abrahams (11 February 1885 – 14 May 1957), nicknamed
Solly, was a
BritishThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
Olympic athleteAthletics has been contested at every Summer Olympics since the birth of the modern Olympic movement at the 1896 Summer Olympics. The athletics program traces its earliest roots to events used in the ancient Greek Olympics. The modern program now comprises track and field events, road running...
and
Chief Justice of CeylonThe Chief Justice of Sri Lanka is the highest post in the judicial system of Sri Lanka and heads the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka. The Chief Justice is appointed by the President, chosen from candidates recommended by the Constitutional Council...
(
Sri LankaSri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
). He was the older brother of famed Olympian
Harold AbrahamsHarold Maurice Abrahams, CBE, was a British athlete of Jewish origin. He was Olympic champion in 1924 in the 100 metres sprint, a feat depicted in the 1981 movie Chariots of Fire.-Early life:...
.
Born in
BirminghamBirmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...
,
EnglandEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, Abrahams competed for
Cambridge UniversityThe University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...
from 1904 to 1906. At the unofficial Olympiad, the 1906 '
Intercalated GamesThe 1906 Intercalated Games or 1906 Olympic Games were an international multi-sport event which was celebrated in Athens, Greece. They were at the time considered to be Olympic Games and were referred to as the "Second International Olympic Games in Athens" by the International Olympic Committee...
' held in Athens, he finished fifth in the
long jumpThe long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength, and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a take off point...
with 6.21 metres. At the 1912
Stockholm OlympicsThe 1912 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the V Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event held in Stockholm, Sweden, between 5 May and 27 July 1912. Twenty-eight nations and 2,407 competitors, including 48 women, competed in 102 events in 14 sports...
he finished in eleventh place in the same event with 6.72 metres. At the 1913 Amateur Athletic Association Championships in
LondonLondon is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, he won the long jump with 6.86 metres.
http://www.gbrathletics.com/bc/bc1.htm
Abrahams served as Chief Justice of Ceylon from 1936-1939. The most celebrated case he presided over was that of the Australian
Mark Anthony BracegirdleMark Anthony Lyster Bracegirdle , was an Anglo-Australian Marxist revolutionary, who played a key role in Sri Lanka's independence struggle. He was one of the handful of European Radicals in Sri Lanka...
, whom the British Colonial Governor Sir Reginald Stubbs was attempting to have deported; the court ruled against the Governor. He was founder-president of the Medico-Legal Society of Ceylon.
Sidney Abrahams chaired a Committee on the Administration of Justice in
NigeriaNigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...
. He was later Senior Legal Assistant to the Commonwealth Relations Office, and played a major role in the suspension of the
People's Progressive PartyThe People's Progressive Party is a political party in Guyana led by Bharrat Jagdeo. The party has been in power since the 1992 elections and currently holds 36 of the 65 seats in the National Assembly.-History:...
Government of
Cheddi JaganCheddi Berret Jagan was a Guyanese politician who was first elected Chief Minister in 1953 and later Premier of British Guiana from 1961 to 1964, prior to independence. He later served as President of Guyana from 1992 to 1997.- Biography :The son of ethnic Indian sugar plantation workers, Jagan...
in
British GuianaBritish Guiana was the name of the British colony on the northern coast of South America, now the independent nation of Guyana.The area was originally settled by the Dutch at the start of the 17th century as the colonies of Essequibo, Demerara, and Berbice...
(Guyana) in 1953.
He was elected president of Britain's oldest athletic club, the London Athletic Club founded in 1863. Abrahams was the first Jew to hold the post.
Abrahams was married to Ruth Bowman and they had two children, Valerie and Anthony.
See also
- List of select Jewish track and field athletes