The desire to take calculated risks served Anthony Sumption well during his long career. A decorated wartime submarine captain, solicitor, banker and barrister, he had an ability to evaluate situations and act decisively, which allowed him to excel in these four separate fields.

Anthony James Chadwick Sumption was born in 1919 and educated at Cheltenham College. He was fascinated by submarines, and while still at school joined the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve. His father then sent him to London to train as an articled clerk. Finding the work tedious, Sumption nevertheless discovered that student life agreed with him, so he left employment to begin a degree in law at the London School of Economics.

During the Munich crisis of 1938 Sumption was called up by the Navy, but once Chamberlain returned from Germany claiming to have secured “peace in our time”, he was stood down, returning to London to continue his studies.

When war began he was again called up, and in 1941 he volunteered for submarines. After serving in a number of boats including the American-built L26, P552 and P555 (the last known as “State Express” after the American cigarette brand) he was appointed first lieutenant of the Trident. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross in recognition of his “outstanding skill, coolness and zeal” on war patrols which took the submarine from home waters to the Mediterranean, thence to Ceylon and back again.

After passing his submarine commanding officer's course Sumption was, in August 1944, appointed CO of Varangian, which he commanded until the end of the war. After the war in Europe, Sumption was flag lieutenant to the Flag Officer Gibraltar and Mediterranean Approaches before returning to England to resume his studies in 1946.

That year he married Hedy Hedigan whom he had met in Gibraltar where she was stationed with the Women's Royal Naval Service.

Sumption was admitted solicitor in 1946, building a broad practice that specialised in commercial and banking law. He then decided that he was more interested in those areas themselves than in their legal regulation, so he changed career and became a merchant banker.

Initially, things went well, with Sumption rising to control a small secondary bank. However, he became disillusioned with the problems of the British economy in the 1970s, spending increasing amounts of time at his holiday home in the South of France.

He decided to read for the Bar, sold his bank and in 1971, now over 50, was called to the Bar by Lincoln's Inn, although he practised from chambers in Verulam Buildings, which were part of Gray's Inn.

Not long after, Sumption and his family moved to Somerset, where he worked from chambers in Bristol for some of the week. This continued until his marriage was dissolved in 1979 and he returned to London.

Specialising in tax law, Sumption wrote several textbooks, notably Sumption on Capital Gains Tax, a loose-leaf manual which continues to be updated after every Budget. In 1980 he was appointed a recorder of the Crown Court, a position he held until his retirement in 1985.

Outside his professional career, Sumption's main interest was politics. He served on the LCC and Westminster City Council in the 1950s and twice stood unsuccessfully for Parliament, in a by-election at Hayes and Harlington in 1953 and then at Middlesbrough West in the general election of 1964.

Once he retired, Sumption moved to the South of France where he could indulge his passions of boating and painting. He turned a room in his flat into a studio and kept a boat that he sailed frequently.

When his health began to fail, Sumption returned to London, sharing a flat in Greenwich with his parrot, Wilberforce.

He is survived by two daughters

and two sons, one of whom is the QC and medieval historian Jonathan Sumption.

Anthony Sumption, DSC, lawyer, was born on May 15, 1919. He died on January 8, 2008, aged 88