The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1880-02-21 00:00:00

HOLLINGSHEAD V. HOLLINGSHEAD.

The above cause has been heard in the High Court of
Justice, before Mr. Justice Fry, and was a case which shows
what is sometimes the effect of the law of primogeniture in
the cue of small properties.—We take the following report
of the case from The Times :

The parties to the action are three sons of a Mrs.
Hollingshead, who died in April, 1879; their father
died a little more than twenty years before that date.
He was a labouring man; he had a large family;
some of his children lived with him,' some elsewhere.
His eldest son was the child of a former marriage. A
few months before his death he became possessed,
under a legacy, of a sum of £7OO or £BOO. Daring his
last ilhiess he got the money in actual notes and
gold. After his death his wife had the money,
and bought with £2OO, part of it, a plot of land at
Hammersmith and built two houses on it with the
rest of the money. She lived in one of the houses and
received the rents of the other down to her death.
Both father and mother died intestate. No letters of
administration were ever taken out to the estate of
the father till lately, when the plaintiff obtained such
administration for the purpose of trying this action.
For the same purpose one of his brothers took out
letters of administration to the estate of his mother.
He was made a defendant. The eldest son of the
second marriage was also made a defendant, as
heir at-law of his mother. The object of the
action was to settle whether the property was to
be divided among the members of the two families,
as representing personal property of the father, or
whether the eldest son of the second marriage was
to take it all. That depended on a question of
law and on a question of fact. The question of law
was whether, notwithstanding the fact that more
than twenty years had elapsed since the death of the
father, inasmuch as there was no personal representa-
tive who could bring an action to recover his property,
his recently constituted administrator could recover
from the estate of his administrator de son tort. The
question of fact related to the title of the late Mrs.
Hollingshead to the money of her husband. It was
asserted by the defendant, the heir of his mother, that
, a few days before his death his father had given the
money to his wife by way of absolute gift. The rest
of the family asserted, on the contrary, that she had
only got the money after his death, and that there was
a family understanding that the widow should be
allowed the use of the whole property during her life,
and that on her death it should be divided equally.
Mr. Cookson, Q.C„ and Mr. Byrne appeared for the
plaintiff and one defendant; Mr. North, Q.C., and
Mr. Marcy for the defendant, the heir.
Mr. Justice Fry, looking at all the circumstances,
came to the conclusion that the money had been given
to Mrs. Hollingshead by her husband in his lifetime.
He said the fact that no claim had been made by
any of the family In her lifetime, and the presumption
that she dealt with it in a legal manner, were
circumstances that supported thie view. There was
evidence that Mrs. Hollingshead expected that at her
death the property would go among all the family,
and she had said that the making of a will would
make no difference. Whether that expectatidn was
founded on a mistaken view of the law, or on the
pression that her eldest son would divide his inherit-
awe, he could not say, In this case it might be that
the law.of primogeniture might defeat the expectation
of the owner of property, but with that, as a Judge,
he had nothing to do. He must decide that the pro.
perty was real estate belonging to Mrs. Hollingshead,
and went to her heir. That being so, the question of
law as to the Statute of Limitations need not be de-
cided.