YORK Minster will host a thanksgiving service at the weekend to celebrate the life of a former judge and freemason who died last September.
Gerald Coles will be remembered by family and friends at a ceremony beginning at 11am on Saturday.
Educated at Colton School in Redcar, and Brasenose College, Oxford, he went on to study law at Harvard University, in the US, where he was awarded a Master of Laws degree.
Returning to the UK, he entered chambers and quickly built a reputation as an advocate.
He then moved his chambers to Leeds when he took silk in 1976, eventually becoming first resident judge at Bradford Crown Court in 1992.
A leading freemason, he was appointed Grand Master of the Masonic Province of Yorkshire, North and East Ridings, in 1995, a position he held until his death.
Friends and colleagues will also remember him for his wry sense of humour, his love of food and wine, holidays in France, and of the theatre and opera.
Judge Coles leaves a widow, Yeo, and three sons, Andrew, Christopher and Matthew.
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