The Sun.
London, England, 1829-09-10 00:00:00

GUILDHALL.

Yesterday Sir PETER LAURIE was engaged till
nearly six o'clock in a strange proceeding for a Lon-
don police magistrate—the execution of a commis-
sion issued from the Commissary Court at Edin-
burgh, to receive viva soce proof of the identity of a
person claiming to administer to the estate of the
late Alexander Laing, of Edinburgh, plumber, and
return the depositions for the guidance of the Court.
Mr. Hindmarsh attended as solicitor for the claim-
ant, and Mr. Elderton for the respondent. The
commission was addressed to the Lord Mayor, or
any of the Aldermen, and the Lord Mayor declining
to act, Sir Peter Laurie was applied to. It had
been sued out to avoid the expellee of conveying
five witnesses to and from Edinburgh; the amount
claimed being only 6001.
It was explained that the respondent was the
second wife of the deceased, and the claimant the
only son of the daughter of the deceased by his first
wife. If the claimant could establish his identity,
he was entitled to share the deceased's property
with the widow. The claimant is a labouring stone
sawyer, and his father, who was a brass-founder,
married the deceased's daughter while she lived as
servant at a Mr. Armstrong's factory in the neigh-
bourhood of Shadwell.

The witnesses were sworn and purged (that is,
called upon to deny they are actuated by malice or
interest in the evidence they are about to give) ac-
cording to the Scotch form.

The first, Jane Williams, of St. Bartholomew's
Hospital, deposed that she knew Thomas Samson
and Janet Laing, the parents of the young man
Thomas Samson, now pointed out to her, and
heard from her husband that he was present when
they were married at Marylebone church. She had
some of the wedding cake. She visited Janet about
an hour after she had been delivered of the claimant
by Dr. Dunn, of Wapping-wall, since dead. She
weaned the child for the mother, who took it to
Scotland when it was 11 months old, and the mo-
ther dying there, the father brought it back when it
was 18 months old. Witness nursed the child
for a week, and had not lost sight of him since. She
was positive the clajmant was the child born as she
had described, on sth of August, 24 years4go.
As the marriage itself was not disputed, but merely
that the claimant was not the issue of the marriage,
Sir P. LAURIE thought Mrs. Williams's evidence
conclusive on that point, and it was needless to go
farther.

Mr. Hindmarsh, however, called three other wit-
nesses to the fact, one of whom, Ann Slater, was
present at the birth, and had known the claimant
from that time co the present ; and another witness
was equally positive as to his identity: he had
worked at the same factory with claimant's
father, and had also courted Jane or Janet Laing;
and when she married his rival, he (witness) partook
of the fines (.ss. each) paid to regale all the work-
men, upon the marriage, and upon the birth of a
son and heir.

Mr. French, a clerk, proved that he had written a
letter for claimant, and signed claimant's name, al-
though claimant could write. It was a letter which
merely requested a party in Scotland to inquire
whether the claimant's relations were then living.
He wrote it at the claimant's desire.

The questions put to, as well as the answers
given by, the witnesses, were taken down, and each
sheet of the depositions was signed by the Commis-
sioner, Sir Peter Laurie, and his clerk. The evi-
dence will be forthwith transmitted to Scotland,
under the Alderman's seal.