A framed chromolithograph picturing Mr Justice William Ventris Field, Baron Field of Wakenham.

Queen's Council, later Queen's Bench, he oversaw the reorganisation of the court system following the Judicature Act of 1881 which established Judges Chambers in England and served (especially in the court of Chancery) to make trial without a jury the normal mode of trial, except in certain instances.

In 1890, he retired from the bench and was raised to the peerage as Baron Field, of Wakenham in the County of Surrey, on 10 April 1890. He had been sworn of the Privy Council earlier the same year.