LANE, AMBROSE, army and militia officer, politician, office holder, and judge; b. probably in 1791 in County Tipperary (Republic of Ireland), son of Colonel John Hamilton Lane and Jane Hunt; m. 19 Aug. 1817 Mary Smith, and they had six children; d. 7 Sept. 1853 in Charlottetown.

Ambrose Lane began his long military career in 1807 by joining the 99th Foot (renumbered 98th in 1815) as an ensign. He rose to the rank of lieutenant in 1811 and in 1812 was posted to North America. His unit was stationed in the Maritime colonies, but saw no fighting during the War of 1812. Four years later Lane was given command of a subaltern’s detachment at Charlottetown. With the army reduction of 1818 he went on half pay and settled in Prince Edward Island, where he took up the duties of captain in the militia and, in 1819, town major of Charlottetown.

Lane quickly established his social and political position in Island society by marrying Mary Smith, a daughter of Lieutenant Governor Charles Douglass Smith. His father-in-law was a man of autocratic temperament engaged in a struggle to free himself from dependence on the House of Assembly. Lane shared both the lieutenant governor’s acerbic disposition and his disdain for colonial politicians. In December 1818 Smith appointed Lane to the Council and used him, along with another son-in-law, John Edward Carmichael*, to provide his administration with the independence from political factions he desired. Local politicians objected to this nepotism, which not only reduced their own role in the government but also confirmed their suspicions of executive corruption. For example, as registrar (1818), examiner (1818), and master (1819) of the Court of Chancery, Lane was in the happy position of setting his own fees as registrar and then, as master, ruling on any complaints these fees aroused.

Frustrated by their inability to control the wilful lieutenant governor, Island notables, including Paul Mabey*, Donald McDonald, John MacGregor, and John Stewart*, formed a committee that held a series of public meetings in the spring and summer of 1823. The meetings resulted in the adoption and circulation of resolutions critical of the propriety and constitutionality of Smith’s conduct. Lane’s lack of qualifications for his judicial posts came under particular scrutiny as a blatant example of undue family influence. The result was the public spectacle of a rigged trial in the Court of Chancery, which held the Island’s attention throughout October and November of that year. The committee members who had framed the resolutions were charged with contempt of court for impugning Lane’s behaviour as a court official; their real crime, of course, was political opposition. Smith, as chancellor of the court, found the defendants guilty. It was a Pyrrhic victory: London replaced him with John Ready* in 1824, and the defendants and their allies swept the election of that year.

Lane survived the retribution and inquiries that followed and adapted, not without some discomfort, to the new power of the local politicians. Although he lost his position as master in chancery in 1825, he retained his other military and judicial posts as well as his seat on Council. In fact, as he assimilated into the local élite, he became a pillar of the new establishment that developed into the family compact of the 1830s and 1840s. From August 1828 to May 1829 he acted as the Island’s colonial secretary and was appointed an unpaid assistant justice of the Supreme Court in November 1829 under Edward James Jarvis. In 1831 Lane and Coun Douly Rankin became the two sub-inspectors of militia on the Island, though only Lane was paid for the work, receiving the half pay of a regular army captain. Two years later he took on the additional duties of adjutant general of militia for Prince Edward Island, with the rank of lieutenant-colonel.

In Council, Lane remained staunchly conservative, opposing advocates of escheat and responsible government and promoting proprietorial interests. When Lieutenant Governor Sir Charles Augustus FitzRoy created separate Legislative and Executive councils in March 1839, Lane was excluded from both bodies, but by September, at FitzRoy’s express request, he regained a seat in the Executive Council without loss of rank. From 1842 to 1853 he was the council’s senior member and as such twice served as the Island’s administrator, in September and October 1847 during a temporary absence of Lieutenant Governor Sir Henry Vere Huntley*, and from October 1850 to March 1851 between the terms of Sir Donald Campbell* and Sir Alexander Bannerman*. He also served on the Central Board of Health, was a trustee of the Central Academy, and became a founding member of the Central Agricultural Society.

A proud and irascible man, Lane made enemies as much by his character as by his political creed. Nonetheless, as a man of talent and experience, not to mention social weight, he was never without important public office on an island often desperate for men with such qualities.

M. Brook Taylor