The Press. — London, England, 1854-07-22 00:00:00

682 Saba not Volta. A somewhat PERPLEXING CASE OF SURVIVORSHIP came before the " Master " at the Rolls' Court on Tuesday last. It appears that a Mr. and Mrs. Under wood, of Bumstead, Essex, made their wills on the 4th of October, 1853, in contemplation of going to Australia, by which they both m ade a disposition of certain property for the benefit of the survivor of either of them. Mr. Underwood left his property to has wife for life, provided she survived him, then to his children; and, in case of his wife dying before him, or none of his children attaining 21 years (or, if a daughter, marrying), then demised the whole of the property absolutely to his friend Mr. Wing, of Bond street. Mrs. Underwood left the property over which she had a power of disposition to her husband, provided he survived her, and, in case he died before her, then also to Mr. Wing absolutely. The whole Underwood family, consisting of Mr. and Mrs. Un derwood and three children, embarked on the 12th of October, 1853, on board the unfortunate ship Dalhousie, which was wrecked on the 19th of the same month off li.michey-head, when every soul pe rished, with the exception of a seaman named Read. The question for the court to determine was, whether there was any actual survivorshop either on the part of husband or wife, in which case Mr. Wing would possess certain rights under the will of one or other of them. Evidence was taken from Read, the sole relic of the wreck, who stated that Mr. and Mrs. Underwood were washed overboard simultaneously, and apparently perished together, but that a daugh ter was seen clinging to a floating spar some minutes afterwards. Judgment was given accordingly to the effect that no right of survivorship could legally ac crue in behalf of Mr. Wing, but that the next of kin to the daughter, whose life seemed to have been most prolonged of the whole family, succeeded to the inhe internee. JOHN MANGAN, a discharged private from the 4th Foot Regiment, was charged at Westminster Police Court with begging and with unlawfully having his uniform in his possession : The accused was found on Friday afternoon last week in the heart of the recruiting district at Westminster, in the full uniform of the 4th Regiment, with the following inscription upon his knapsack: — " 1 have served in the army nine years and ten months, and was eight years and nine months in the East Indies. lam now discharged, disabled of my right arm, with tid. per day for six mouths. I have a wife and children, and am unable to work. I have some matches to sell." Mr. ARNOLD said be should commit him for a month to hard labour, and if found again in the uniform would commit him under the Mutiny Act fur six months, in default of his paying a penalty for that offence of 201. Lieutenant Wyndham read the following list of discharged soldiers of bad character, who, availing themselves of the sym pathy at present so strongly excited in the public mind, were making a rich harvest by mendicancy : A private of the 9th Foot, acting blind, near Westminster-bridge; one of the 43rd, same affliction and place of resort; one of the 07th Regiment, picture of Ce11i . .., Tottenham-court.road ; one of the 50th Regi ment, performing manual exercise in the streets of St. Giles's ; 14th Light Dragoons, begging community, about in uniform. To these was added snottier of the 22nd, who recently imposed upon Sir W. Napier. • JUDGMENT was given on Tuesday last in the Insol vent Debtors' Court in re W. S. Blackstone, late member of Parliament for Wallingford. The Chief Commissioner prefaced his decision by a minute recapitulation of the circumstances of the case :•-• Mr. Blackstone, he said, obtained an interim order in August, 1852, and, instead of appearing on the day appointed, he went abroad. Being arrested, he renewed his application, and was heard on the 11th of June, and had been several times since then before the court. Insolvent had resolved to purchase the Poniatowski gems, and had made charges on his property for that purpose, with the view of making a large sum of money. the last of which charges was in May, 1645. In 1644 Mr. Blackstone had issued a number of acceptances, and had become a victim to bill-discounters, some of whom, whose names had been men tioned, were well known to this court. Ile had been robbed of hills by persons who pretended to get them discounted; and it was to be regretted that no means had been devised to bring au:h persons to Justice. In the summer of 1845 the career ant Mr. Blackstone came to au sad, and it was on the sth of August, 1815, that the estates of the family, or rather the equity of re demption, were sold to a relative, charged, it would seem, to their full value. The sum agreed upon for the property was a fair one, nothing having been said to the contrary, and the price was 11,622/. The incumbrauces, in the shape of mortgages, were 4:40002., and shortly before the sale a number of judgments were registered. All that remained of the property was 4,5001. Of the sum Miss Blackstone had a claim of 3,8641., and the Walling f ird Bank were creditors to 8001. There was only 8321. remain ing for the trade et editors. With all Mr. Blackstone's desire to benefit these, there was not sufficient for them. The case was a must calamitous failure, and hail resulted, in a great degree, from want of discretion. It was free from vice as to the credi tors, but it was not one in which he could say, in the words of the act, that the debts had been acquired " without culpable negligence." lie was, therefore, not entlUed to grant the insol vent his final order. The case was then adjourned sine die, and the in solvent returned in custody to Oxford Castle. THE PREMISES OF MESSRS. CIL&PI'EI.L, the well known musicsellers in Regent-street, were the object of a daring burglary on Monday morning last. A p rter who slept on the premises was awoke by some disturbance, and, on getting up, saw two men on the stairs and heard the clash of brass instru ments thrown down. Ile called first for a gun and then for the police, end, on venturing down stairs, found that the thieves had escaped over the bal cony : loft THE PRESS. When the police came, a minute search was made. It ap peared as if an entrance was effected by the balcony. The thieves had broken open three desks and three drawers, and had rifled them of their contents. From the shop-window several instru ments were gone. They were all there safe on Saturday night. c he instruments were packed up on the back counter ready arryiug away. Other portious of property were found for in different parts of the house. The value of the whole was about 1001. The police arrested a man named Anderson who was seen walking away, and, on searching him, found a knife, thirteen mouthpieces, two keys, a pencil case, and two "jemmies " on his person. As he also resisted and attempted to escape when first apprehended, the magistrate at Marlborough-street Police-office before whom he was examined ordered him to be committed for trial. THE CLAIM OF A TAILOR for 01. due for clothes sup plied was resisted lately at the Marylebone County Court upon somewhat curious grounds. The de fendant, a man named King, did not deny the receipt or the value of the articles supplied, but raised a quibbling objection founded on an obsolete statute of George 1., enacting " that no person in England shall make, sell, or sew on any clothes, buttons or button holes made or bound with cloth, serge, camblets, or druggets, or any other stall, under a penalty of 40s. for every dozen buttons so made." The act further provided that no person could recover the price charged for clothes made without buttons of gilt ma terial, the object being to encourage the "Brumma gem " tiade of the day. As it was shown, first, that the aforesaid law, absurd as it was, had never bean re pealed, and, secondly, that the present plaintiff could not pretend to have affixed the legal gilt buttons to the coats supplied to the defendant, judgment was perforce given against him. The defendant afterwards announced by the mouthpiece of his counsel that he should in due course sue the plaintiff for the penal ties enacted under the statutes in question. A DEFENDANT, named William Meade, who seems to have well deserved his description on the charge sheet as " astute looking," was charged with a long series of deceptions at Worship-street Police Court. His crimes have already been investigated there more than once. Their history begins six years ago, and was thus stated before thy magistrate : In the month of June, 1848, the prisoner established himself in a respectable-looking house at Camberwell, where he shortly after iutroduced himself to two tradesmen named Smith and Goodwin, and, after dealing with them for several weeks, and paying for their goods with extreme punctuality, at length exhi bited a copy of the Times, and, pointing to an advertisement from the Solicitor to the Treasury for the next heir of one David Meade, announced himself as that heir, and proceeded to state that he had money in the funds to the extent of 25,0001., and that the landed and other estates into which he had fallen amounted at least to 200,0001, In further confirmation of his representation, he produced a number of letters, purporting to be from gentlemen in the India-house and the Bank, recog nising him in that character, though, as may be imagined, the whole of these documents were forgeries. By these and other letters the prisoner, upon pretence of wanting money to establish his claim and defray the expense of law proceedings in France, where, ho &aid, part of his property was situated, obtained from Mr. Smith goods and money to the amount of about 201.; but so cleverly did he contrive to deceive Mr. Goodwin that that per son not only furnished a house for him, and kept it well stocked with provisions and every imaginable requisite for two clear years, but paid the expenses of post-chaises and other vehicles, which the prisoner meted at his door sometimes by five or six in the morning, to enable him to make alleged business journeys both in this country and France for the arrangement of his af fairs, until, in the whole, the prisoner hal contrived to extract, in money and money's worth, within a fraction of 2501. It was then discovered that the prisoner had been snugly ensconced in bed on several of the occasions when these carriages were wait ing for him, and, on Mr. Goodwin demanding a settlement, the prisoner gave him promissory notes, to be discharged " out of my estates," and then absconded from that neighbourhood with out paying him one sixpence. About eighteen months after that, Mr. Smith, who had been in unwearied pursuit of him, traced hint to Mare-street, Hackney, in very comfortable circum stances. hut, on serving him with a writ at the suit of another tradesman he had victimised, the prisoner suddenly absconded, and was again lost sight of for some time. Other witnesses accounted for this interval, which the prisoner had evidently occupied in running up debts and obtaining advances upon fraudulent pre• tences of similar character to those employed against the above-mentioned prosecutors. A City detective police-officer stated that, notwithstanding the inge nuity displayed, and the large amount of the frauds perpetrated, the prisoner had until lately been no thing more than a common farm labourer, employed by a farmer at Mark's Tey, Essex. At the close of the investigation he was fully committed to Newgate for trial upon several charges of fraud and false pre tences. AN INSOLVENT named James William Howell appeared in Portugal-street, upon his application for discharge from the liabilities he had incurred as the director of, or shareholder in, various projected companies : It appeared that the insolvent was only 22, and had in about a year incurred debts and liabilities to 1,8001. lie had been ma nager of " The Realm Insurance Company," and a director of a company called " The London and County Hotel Company," which was provisionally registered. Two other persons named Hanuen and Madelow were connected with it. An advertise ment appeared for a person who could advance money, and be was to be appointed secretary. A person of the name of Cooper answered the advertisement, and the result was that he ad vanced 5001., taking a bond from the insolvent. The company was a failure, and Mr. Cooper opposed for the manner in which he had been deprived of his money. From another opposing creditor (a Mr. Cochrane, &jeweller) the insolvent obtained two gold watches and a chain. One of the watches he presented to SATURDAY, Was Madelow, to whom he said he was to have been married, and the other he pledged. Another complainant was • job master, from whom the insolvent hired a brougham, and made an appearance preparatory to his expected marriage. The Commies'°Nita, in giving judgment, would not attach fraud to the case, but could not see his way to discharge the insolvent : he had been concerned with other parties in ttie companies, and Mr. Cooper had lost his SOOT. It seemed to him that Mr. Cooper had been rather soft in laying down his 3001. to be secretary to a company which came to nothing. The insolvent had 601. of the money so obtained. As to the jewellery it was got, as he expected, to be married, and the brougham was had to make a show. The insolvent was a clever and expert young man, and, although the judgment would not be for fraud, it was ne cessary to apply some check to him. His honour accordingly pronounced a judgment of five calendar months from the vesting order. FIFTY COFFEE-SELLERS were prosecuted on Thurs day at the Court of Inland Revenue for violation of the law with respect to the admixture of chicory with coffee. A CHARGE OF FRAUD to the amount of 10,0001. was brought against a City merchant named Cole, hitherto engaged in extensiye business and enjoying much credit in trading circles. The case was inves tigated on Thursday at the Mansion house. In July last year Cole applied to Messrs. Long and Campbell, colonial brokers, for some large advances of money upon a cargo of tin which he represented as lying in the docks. He obtained 10,0001., and lodged what purported to be a dock warrant for a quantity of tin worth 13,0001. or 14,0001. No suspicion was enter. tained as to the correctness of the transaction, these warrants being considered by commercial men as unexceptionable as bank notes. Many months after wards, however, some suspicions were excited, and inquiries having been instituted resulted a few days since in the discovery that the cargoes were not existent, and that the warrants were forgeries. The prisoner has been remanded. A FRENCHMAN NAMED CHAXITE D'AzEm applied to the Insolvent Court for discharge from prison. He alleged that he was in the possession of a secret for purifying by filtration sea water. A Mr. Score had advanced about 3001., and was to have a share in the invention, which was considered as very valuable. A patent had been obtained, but the insolvent made an objection to filing the specifications, or in any way to disclose his secret. Much time was spent in devising how the practicability of his scheme could be ascertained, and if it turned out successful there would be ample returns to pay everybody. Finally, the insolvent consented to perform some experi ments in the Queen's Prison in presence of Mr. Pepper, of the Polytechnic, Mr. Score offering to furnish money for the expenses. THE KEEPER OF A COFFE-SHOP in Panton•street, Haymarket, a man named Frederick Harding, was charged with violating the Betting Act. Mr. Rayner, the actor, had staked 10s. with him to win 31. if the Knight of St. George ran first at one of the Wor cestershire races. The horse won, but Harding refused to pay, declaring that the bet had been claimed and paid to another party. Before the Marlborough-street Police Court he attempted to disprove his identity, alleging that he had been mistaken for his brother. The magistrates sen tenced him to pay 501., half the maximun penalty allowed under the act, and in default three months' hard labour. *ands ad Offerats. AN Orr. AND CoLouß WAREHOUSE belonging to Mr. William Knighton, at No. 7, White Conduit terrace, White Conduit-fields, was almost totally de stroyed by a fire which broke out at an early hour on Monday morning. Twelve inmates were on the premises at the time, all of whom were asleep when roused by a policeman with the alarm of fire, and several of them escaped with great difficulty. Two adjacent houses were much damaged by the confla gration. A BRIG named the William Woolley was totally destroyed by fire in Sydney harbour, 9th May. ON Saturday last, at Keswick, the Rev. Edward Wilson committed suicide in an outhouse adjoining his dwelling, by cutting his throat with a razor during temporary derangement. The deceased was incum bent of St. John's in-the-Vale for the long period of forty eight years, and was held in great esteem and respect. AN INQUEST was held on Saturday last touching the death of Mr. George Jones, aged thirty-one, a medical gentleman, residing in Edward-terrace, Pen tonville, who put an end to his existence on the pre vious Thursday, by drinking a large quantity of h!drocyanic acid. It appeared from the evidence that deceased had laboured under great mental de rangement for some 'time before, and the jury re turned a verdict of "Temporary insanity." A PROTRACTED INQUIRY has been proceeding during the present and previous week before Mr. Baker, the coroner for East Middlesex, regarding the death of a child named Richardson, who died in the Royal Free Hospital after a severe surgical operation. The evidence given at the inquest extended over ten days, and involved a great mass of extraneous de- j