Lady Fox, KC, CMG

 Lady Fox, KC, CMG, a lawyer and leading authority on state immunity, died 12 July, 2025, aged 96. 

 Hazel Fox was the first Law Fellow of Somerville College, Oxford, and a giant in the field of State Immunity law. Over the course of a long and distinguished legal career, Lady Fox served as Director of the British Institute of International and Comparative Law and General Editor of the International and Comparative Law Quarterly. She was also a member of the Institut de Droit International, a Bencher of Lincoln’s Inn, a Barrister at 4-5 Gray’s Inn Square and a member of the International Law Association Committees on State Immunity, Diplomatic Protection, and Reparation for Victims of War Damage.

A noted legal academic, Lady Fox was the author many books, from International Arbitration: Law and Procedure (1959) to her final work Law of State Immunity (1st ed. 2002, reprinted 2008). Her writings, especially on state immunity, are still regularly cited by leading courts around the world.

She was the widow of Sir Michael Fox, a high court judge, and Lord Justice of Appeal, and step-daughter of the Baron Denning, OM, PC, DL (1899-1999), a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary and Master of the Rolls.

She was born Hazel Mary Stuart, 22 October, 1928, daughter of John Matthew Blackwood Stuart, CIE (1882-1942), and his wife the former Joan Daria Taylor (1900-1992), daughter of John Vinings Elliott Taylor, and his wife Alessandrina Venables.  Her widowed mother married 2ndly, 1945, Alfred Thompson Denning, who was raised to the peerage in 1957, as Baron Denning, of Whitchurch, co Southampton.

She married in 1954, Michael John Fox (born 8 Oct, 1921), son of the late Michael Fox. Her husband, a High Court Judge 1975-81, and a Lord Justice of Appeal 1981-92, died 9 April, 2007.

Lady Fox was appointed CMG, 2006. 

She leaves three sons, Matthew, Patrick and Charles and a daughter, Jane.

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