The Sun.
London, England, 1858-11-12 00:00:00

COURT OF QUEEN'S BENCH.

(Sitting in Banco, before Lord Campbell and Jus-
tices Wightman, Erle, and Hill.)
BETTS V. CLIFFORD.

This was an action in which the plaintiff sued the
defendant to recover damages for the infringement
of a patent granted to him on the 13th January,
1849, for " a new manufacture of capsules, and of a,
material to be employed therein, and for other pur-
poges." The defendant was a metal roller and ma-
nufacturer of coffin furniture at Birmingham, and
the particular infringement of which the plaintiff
complained was that he had manufactured what is
commonly called " Betts's metal ;" which consisted
of sheets of lead thinly coated with tin, as described
ill the plaintiff's specification. The process by which
this was effected was -by taking ingots of lead of
about three-quarters of an inch in thickness, and
ingots of tin of the same size, but of between one
quarter and 1-16th of an inch in thickness, and
pawing
them separately between rollers till the
lead was reduced to one-quarter of an inch in
thickness, and the tin to about 1-20th of the
thickness of the lead. The tin and lead were
then laid on one another and passed through the
rollers
By
yll
this they became of the required thick-
ness.ytioror s it was found that the tin
closely adhered e lead and covered it with a
surface which wasbrights, and stiff, and not liable
to be affected by acids,place
which took At the trial of the ac-
tion,'l7).fore Lord Campbell at
Warwick at the last SpringyeAthat the defendant had made sissizes, it was proved
the, plaintiff contended was an infringement
metal, which
Patent ; but the defendant gaveripgement of the
evidence to show
that the manufacture was no novelty, and had been
' tented by Dobbs in 1804, and that 't, •
pa I was in actual
the
plaintiffs in ' Birmingham long before the date of
patent. During the trial an extraordi-
nary
e
circumsta a great
sensation occurred, which created at
sensation at the time, and was, in fact, the cause of
the present rule being granted. A person named
John Henshaw happened accidentally to be in the
gallery during the trial, and heard the evidence
given before the jury. He then came down and
tendered himself to the defendant's attorney as
being able to prove that the supposed invention
had been well known and in use so early as. 1830
at the manufactory of a Mr. Charles Humpage. He
said he had seen such metal as the plaintiff's made
there for about a year and a half, and that it was
quite a regular thing, and he described the process
of Manufacture, which was exactlythe same as that
described in the plaintiff's specification. This evi-
dence naturally excited some surprise and suspicion,
but in the result the jury found "a verdict for the
plaintiff on the question of infringement, and for
the defendant on the question of novelty. Some
question arose at the trial as to the plaint if' 1 s speci-
fication, and upon this the defendant obtained 1 CATO-
. .

to move to enter a verdict, and accordingly a rule
was subsequently granted for that purpose. A
cross rule was also applied for and obtained by the
plaintiff to set aside the verdict, and for a new
trial, upon the ground that the plaintiff had been
taken by surprise by the evidence given by Hen-
shaw, and numerous affidavits were filed, with a
view to shake the credit due to his'(Henshaw's) tes-
timony. On the other hand, the defendant filed
numerous affidavits in answer, tending to explain
the circumstances under which Henshaw became a
witness, and also to corroborate his evidence.
The Court, in the first instance, disposed of the
question of surprise, and for this purpose heard Mr.
Mellor, .Q.C., for the defendant, and Mr. Macaulay
Q.C., for the plaintiff. The argument lasted nearly
the whole day, and, as the decision was ultimately
in favour of the defendant on this point, it became
unnecessary to have the question as to the plaintiff's
specification argued.
The Attorney-General, Mr. Macaulay, Q.C., Mr.
Udall, and Mr. Webster appeared for the plaintiff;
Mr. Mellor, Q.C., Mr. Hindmarsh, and Mr. Field
for the defendant.
Lord Campbell said, he was of opinion that the
rule for. a new trial ought to be discharged. That
Mr. Betts was an inventor of this process he (Lord
Campbell) most sincerely believed,' but if that pro-
cess was previously in public use the patent could
not be supported. There was conflicting evidence,
upon which the jury had to form their opinion, and
no objection was made as to the manner in which
it was submitted to them. Looking at the manner
in which Henshaw had behaved and the account
he gave of himself, there was enough of suspicion
to induce him (Lord Campbell) to concur with the
rest of the Court in granting this rule, in order
that the matter might be more fully examined into;
but, after the affidavits which 'had been read, he
(Lord Campbell) was satisfied that Henshaw came
into the box without previous concert and without
any fraudulent intent. He was at Warwick for a
lawful purpose, and being in the gallery at the trial,
he recollected the evidence he could give, and com-
municated it to ihe defendant's attorney. His lord-
ship thought that both Henshaw and the defen-
dant's attorney were relieved from all suspicion of
trick or contrivance, and that Henshaw gave
evidence which, if believed, would support the
verdict.. The jury had believed that evidence, and
he (Lord Campbell) could not say that they were
wrong in so doing. Now, instead of being contra-
dicted, Henshaw's evidence materially corroborated
by the subsequent evidence, though the evidence
given at the trial was sufficient to support the
verdict. The only ground on which the rule was
granted was surprise, and the belief that there was
no intention on the part of the defendant to prove
a previous user of the plaintiff's process. His lord-
ship, however, thought that the plaintiff's attorney,
who was no doubt a respectable professional man,
must have been aware that the defen-
' dant would. set up a previous user as a
defence, for ho had witnesses there for the purpose
of answering such a case. If so, the ground of
surprise-was answered. It was a case of conflicting
evidence, upon which the jury had found a verdict
which -he (Lord Campbell) thoUght the Court would
• not be justified in disturbing. His Lordship con-
, eluded by saying, that he would not comment any
further upon the case, for there was the case of
" Betts v. •Menzies" which was to be tried, and he
• did not wish to say anything that might affect the
trial of that cause.

Mr. Justice Wightman and Mr. Justice Erle, at
some length and Mr. Justice Hill, briefly, expressed
themselves to the same effect.—Rule for a new trial
discharged.