The Sun.
London, England, 1849-08-03 00:00:00

BANS.ING DI

Proprietors' capital . • 14,553,000
Rest • ••••.• •• • • • 3,220058
Public deposits (in-
cluding Exchequer,
Commissioners of
National Debt, Sav-
ings-banks, and Di-
vidend accounts) • • 3,031,025
Other deposits •• • • 11,225,603
Seven day and other
bills ••••• • • • .• .. 1,095,565

£33,126,051

Dated the 2d day of August, 18

CHANCERY.-(THIS DAY.)

(Before the LORD CHANCELLOR, at his private residence.)

IN RE EDWARD VICARS, AN ALLEGED LUNATIC.

This was a petition of Hannah Vicars, of Liverpool,
spinster, a sister and one of the next kin of Mr. Edward
Vic irs (the alleged lunatic), setting forth that the said

E lward Vicars, ofiLiverpool, wine and spirit merchant,

now is, and for some time past has been, so far deprived
of bis reason and understanding that he is rendered al.
to:.;ether unfit and unable to govern himself, or manage
his utlairs; and praying that a Commission in the nature
of a writ LunAico lnquirendo might issue to inquire of
the alleged lunacy of the said Edward Vicars.
Mr. Bolt, Q.(1., and Mr. Renshaw appe,;red J
o behalf
of the petitioner; and Mr. Malins, Q.C., and Mr. ilitie
represented the alleged lunatic.
Mr. Edward Vicars, the alleged lunatic, is 46 years of
age, and the sou of a small farmer and cloth manufac-
turer in Eskdale, near Whit,haven, who recently died at
the advanced age of 80 and upwards. The alleged
lunatic served an apprenticeship to a spirit dealer at
Broughton-on-Earn Sc, in the county of Larcaster; and
eveatu lly, in the month of January,lB3s, went in' o
partnership with his blether, Mr. Matthew Vicars,
and Mr. Jahn Newby Mecre, as soda- water menu
factu:ers, distillers, and wile-merchants, at Liver-
lino!. This partaership continued un'il 1845, dur-
ing the whole of w hich time Mr. Edward Vic as
ac:e I as, traveller for the firm. In 1844, from the ex•
citing life be had ben leading for sornt, years, which
comp:lied him to live somewhat freely-, his health gave
way; he WAS seized with delirium tremens, and having
also had some domestic diff,rences with his wi'e, he
withdrew from the active part he had taken in the buil-
nest of the firm, and retired into the country, at a place
called Holken Ground,:near Bzotti.,,htor,- ,n-Furnes-, a:few
miles from his father's house, where, in the latterend cif
1816, ho had another att,iek of delirium tremens, from
which, however, he shortly recovered. In February, 1847,
he bad ngain a still mei e st va:e attatkiwhich r. as ot 1 )nger
duration, and as he was then much excited and suffered
under certain delusions, he was, under the advice of a Mr.
Atkinson, his medical attendant, removed to the Walton
Lodge Lunatic Asylum, near Liverpool, whence he con-
trived to escape on the 19th of March last, and has con-

tinued at large ever since.
Mr. ROLT, in support of the petition, read the affi
davit of Mr. Joseph Churton, a surgeon of Liverpool,
who deposed that he had known the alleged lunatic for
fifteen) }ears, end had bean his medical attendant. On
the 25th of February, 1847 be, at the request of Mr.
Matthew Vicars, his brother and partner, visited Mr.
Edward Vicars, for the urpose of inquiring into the
state of his mind, and found him labouring under strong
mental delusions, amongst others, that he (the alleged
lunatic) had no stomach or intestines. Mr. Churton
then certified that he was of unsound mind, and upon
that certificate he was taken and incarcerated in the
Walton Lodge Lunatic Asylum, conducted by Dr. Lich-
field. On the 17th of January last Mr. Churton was
again called in to visit the al!eged lunatic, and found him
labouring under mental delusions, the most conspicuous
of which was, that electricity was a powerful agent in the
production of insanity, that such agency was exercised
upon himself by the magistrates and other design-
ing people without the asylum, aided by those
within, for the purpose of keeping him in
state of lunacy, so as to justity his deten-
tion in the asylum. A great number of affidavits
to the same effict wero read by Mr. Rolt, from which
he contended that, in February, 1847, when he was
taken to the lunatic asylum, the alleged lunatic was not
of sound mind.
Mr. MALINs said he shou!d not dispu`e that.
Mr. ROLT said, undoubtedly the delusions, such as
they were, of the alleged lunatic, had been very much
modified by the treatment of Dr. Lichfield, but
still they continued to some extant, and to such ex-
tent that his partners could not deal with him in
reference to the affairs of the partnership, or to
its dissolution, and that he could not be entrusted
with the management of his own fortune, now very
considerable, arising out of the prosperous state of the
firm of which he was a member. The partners of the
alleged lunatic had offered that if he could produce cer-
tificates of his sanity by two eminent physicians, be-
tween whom there was no concert, they'would at once
treat with him with a view to dissolve partnership,
and divide with him the capital and profit of the concern.
Mr. Bassieusw followed on the same side. He con-
tended that the affidavits showed a very strong animus
on the part of tho alleged lunatic towards lunatic asy-
lums, and that it was impossible to say what that delu-
sion might drive him to do. The assassin, M‘Naughten,
believing that the Government of the country bad per.
scented hire in some way, was driven to take away
the life of Mr. Drummond, whom he mistook for the
Prime Minister. It was idle to say that the alleged
lunatic, Mr. Edward Vicars, was now a perfectly
>oii!d and sane man. kii•Naghtan was remarkably
mild at home, in the bosom of his family, who had no
idea that he laboured under any delusion, and see the
awful catastrophe which resulted from his going at
large. The business in which Mr. Vicars, the alleged
lunatic, was a partn• r, began in 1835, when each of the
three partners subscribed a capital of 1,0001. That
business had been eminently prosperous, and was now
worth 16,000/. Ought a man, subject to a delusion such
as had been described, to have the entire control of
his' property ? lie submitted that under all the circum-
stances the case was one which called for inquiry by a

jury.
The affidavit of Dr. Southey was read, who deposed
that he had visited the alleged lunatic so recently as in
July lest, and that on all ordinary subjects be was sane
and capable of managing bis own affairs; but re-
specting electricity, and its powers of being applied
in such a manner as to enable the keepers of
madhouses to render their patients insane and to
keep them in that state, he laboured under a
delusion. The affidavit of Dr. Southey concluded
in these words—"Now,although I am convinced that in
his present state of mind it would be an act of cruelty to
place Mr. Edward Vicars in any asylum, or, indeed, to
interfere with his free agency, yet I am sorry to say that
I would not assert my belief that ho is of perfectly sound
mind, in consequence of the above stated delusion re-
specting electricity."
The LORD CHANCELLOR said it would seem from Dr.
Southey that a person may be of unsound mind, but yet
capable of managing his own affairs.
MALINS said he appeared for Mr. Edward Vicars,
the alleged lunatic. In the early part of 1847 Mr.
Vicars was undoubtedly of unsound mind. That was
the result of excessive drinking, induced by his habits of
life, he being the travelling partner of his firm—that of
wine and spirit merchants, and compelled to drink with
their customers. Though, in the first instance, he was
p3rhaps properly enoue,ti confined in a lunatic asylum,
yet his delusion speedily assumed so modified and harm-
less a form under the treatment he received there, that
it amounted to a grievous and intolerable cruelty and
wrong to keep him incarcerated there for a period of
two y ears. In that place he was never visited by his
friends or partners; they, on the contrary, stood care-
fully and coldly aloof, and never took any steps to
ascertain .shat modifications his malady had undergone,
or to procure his release from a place which be
loathed and abhorred, and so to restore him to the bosom
of his family and the world. This treatment, added to
his on consciousness that he was perfectly able to ma-
nage his own affairs so excited and irritated his feelings
as to induce a degree of violence, in which his original
delusion was to some extenth merged and forgotten. It
was under those feelings a,he had effected his escape
from the asylum in larchtth last;
than
h.and no sooner had he
recovered his liberty
deportment
and vio-
lence left him, and his whole"'
bretraent assumed
that mildness and intell!genee
characterized aforetime. The Lea-rnertehr heol read
s
a voluminous mass of affidavits to prove e alleged
lunatic's sanity since his release, into which our limits
will not alkkm us to enter.
The LORD CHANCELLOR said, independently of the
question, vi leather the alleged lunatic was of unsound
mind or not, there was the position in which he stood
with regard to his property.
Mr. MALINS said be understood the issue which the
other side raised was that there should be two indifferent
medical men to report on the state of his mind.
The LORD CHANCELLOR was much disposed to nomi-
nate two indifferent medical men, but he did not bind
the parties to it. It seemed to him that it would be
much better for the alleged lunet;c if the partnership
were put an end to. The delusions of the party had
certainly been very coueh reduced, Ile (the
Lord Chancellcr) had seen proof of_ a very
great improvement ; that was borne out by all
the medical men, except one. The weight, however, of