BERRYER, ANTOINE PIERRE French advocate, was the greatest Legitimist advocate of his time. Ad mitted advocate in 1811, he followed Louis XVIII. to Ghent dur ing the Hundred Days of 1815. On his return he advocated mod eration in the treatment of the Bonapartists. He was associated with his father and Dupin in the defence of Marshal Ney, and undertook alone the defence of Generals Cambronne and Debelle. He also stood out as a bold advocate for the freedom of the press, and opposed the rigorous repression exercised by the police department. After the revolution of 1830 he was elected to the Chamber, and championed the cause of the duchess of Berry, but when she landed in the south of France to attempt to set her son, the duke of Bordeaux (afterwards known as the comte de Chambord) on the throne, he tried to dissuade her from the attempt. Berryer then started for Switzerland; he was arrested and brought to trial, but immediately acquitted. In 1833 he pleaded for the liberation of the duchess, and made a memorable speech in defence of Chateaubriand, besides defending various Legitimist journalists in the courts. He also defended Louis Napo leon in 1840 after the affair of Boulogne.
Berryer was a member of the National Assembly after the revolution of 1848, and continued to fight in the Legitimist cause. He protested against the coup d'etat of Dec. 2, 1851, and with this great speech his parliamentary career ended, but 12 years later he appeared as a deputy to the Corps Legislatif. . In 1865 he visited London as the guest of Lord Brougham. At a banquet given in his honour by the benchers of the Temple and Lincoln's Inn famous speeches were delivered by Brougham and Alexander Cockburn on the ethics of advocacy, when Brougham supported what may be called the absolute and Cockburn the qualified or moderate theory. Antoine Berryer died at Augerville on Nov. 29, 1868.