PURSUIT OF MILLIONS

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 107, 28 December 1931, Page 2

PURSUIT OF MILLIONS

OPTIMISTS LAY CLAIM TO FORTUNES IN CHANCERY TRAGEDY OFTEN FOLLOWS Will the claims for the Ella Wendel millions find their way to the famous melting pot of human hopes known as Chancery? Precedent shakes a doubtful head and wags a gloomy finger. The pursuit of millions — most of them mythical — has caused heartache, tragedy, and despair for centuries; yet, like the "incompleat" fisherman, the pursuers go on casting for the fish that do not exist. And we still live in an age of optimism! The most classic example of "unclaimed millions" cases was that of the Angell estate, valued at a trifle like £60,000,000, and ineluding 60 square miles of London. There were 200 claimants. Most of them got — nothing ! The first recorded suit over it, which arose in 1824, was revived in 1846, and just when a claimant was boastfully proclaiming his soon-to-be-acquired wealth another claimant murdered him. More recently a claimant tried to take possession of ?. Brixton house as part of the estate of which only a cruel Circumstance had deprived him. When a recent claim was lodged for the Blake millions (Mrs. Helen Sheridan Blake died in 1876), following years of litigation, it was disclosed that "there never were any Blake millions." There was £75,000 originally, but, as there was no next-of-kin, the money was paid to the Crown. Although the Court of Chancery holds about £50,000,000 for hospitals, charities, and minors, there is something less than £1,000,000 not yet claimed. The chances of most of the "millions" claimants getting this, however, are in the ratio of a Chinese laundry ticlcet winning one of Mr. Whiddon's lotteries. Mr. R. Stafford Cripps, British Solicitor-General, said this year: "Even if the Blake millions did exist, the Crown has now a right to them, and that cannot be challenged." Last year the finding of "an ancient document" which was said to he the key to the £53,000,000 left by William Jennings, fluttered the hearts of a hundred or two optimists, many of them in Australia. A certain deed could not be traced in London, but the garden of dreams, nevertheless, was in golden bloom. Then, Mr. T. W; Lloyd, of Lloyd's investigation office, calmly announced that he had been making inquiries for 50 jmars, and if there was such a doqument it could not be enforced owing to the British Statute of Limitations. The latest Australian case was the Everingham millions, for which hopes are still fondly entertained hy certain claimants.