The Sun.
London, England, 1867-08-21 00:00:00

ROMANCE.

About 200 representatives of the Ingraham fa-
mily, from different States in the Union, met in
New York on Wednesday, to devise means to pro-
secute their claims against a large property in Eng-
land. The leading points of this claim we noticed
a short time ago. It was stated to be necessary to
raise 620,000 to secure the will of Joseph Cowell,
which, it is said, has been found in America, but
the location is not stated. Only $1,500 was sub-
scribed at the meeting, and the subscription is to
by resumed.
This remarkable claim to lands which were be-
queathed nearly 200 years ago, and on which an
opulent and busy city of 200,000 population has
been built, involves a love-story which might form

the thread of a readable romance. The daughter
of Joseph Wilson, a wealthy freeholder of proud
descent, married,. without her father's approval,
Edward Cowell, a plebeian of Yorkshire, and the
young couple, renounced by Wilson, emigrated to
the American colonies, and east their lot in Boston.
In 1680 WilSon died, without, however, relenting
toward his daughter, and when his last testament
was opened it appeared that he had given his pro-
perty, consisting of lands on the River Aire—about
six miles in length by three in. width—to his grand-
daughter; Sarah Cowell, entailing it, however, to
the fourth generation. The will was sent to Sarah
Cowell long before her marriage with Timothy In-
graham, and was handed down to her daughter ;
but the estate, being unsettled and yielding no
revenue, and being, moreover, entailed to the de-
scendants of heirs dwelling at a great distance, was
left in the hands of agents and almost wholly for-
gotten except by them.
At length a manufacturing town of considerable
importance rose on the Wilson lands, and a grand-
son of the devisor made an attempt to recover the
property, but he died on shipboard before reaching
England. The next effort was made in 1803 by
Capt. Solomon Ingraham, a great-grandson of the
devisor. He was an East India captain, and sailed
with his wife from New York, taking all the papers
relating to the estate. These be intrusted to Mr.
Erskine, of London, then an eminent lawyer, but
afterwards Lord Chancellor of England. Captain
Ingraham having died at Madras, the papers were
retained by Erskine in London, nobody making
further inquiry touching the property until 1825,
when the Ingraham family learned that London
newspapers had contained advertisements seeking
the heirs. They then sent Isaac Smith to England
to look up the estate, which was then reported to be
worth more tha❑ £40,000 a year. Ile learned that
the papers had been left by the first Lord Erskine
to his son and successor, then Minister to Belgium,
and that they were locked up in London. There-
fore Smith returned unsuccessful to America.
No further effort was made until 1852, when
Gilbert R. Gladding, of Providence, and Columbus
Smith, of Vermont, the latter a lawyer, who had
been eminently successful in prosecuting American
claims to English estates, went to London and saw
the late Lord Erskine, to whom the papers had
fallen ; but Lord Erskine dallied with Messrs. Glad-
ding and Smith, until, their funds failing, they were
compelled to return to America. Mr. Gladding
pursued his researches, and, after scouring England
in vain, died in Providence iv the full belief that
the will had been brought back to the United States,
and was somewhere to be found in this country.
Mr. W. J. P, Ingraham and others took the task in