FILE MILLIONS IN CHANCERY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 277, 31 December 1909, Page 3

FILE MILLIONS IN CHANCERY.

RELICS OF ANCIENT LAWSUITS. -. Cash and securities of the value of about £50,000,000, the property if suitors in th 6 Supreme Courts, arc he.d by the Paymaster-General. %he cash amounts to £2,304,420, and the securities to £40,028,000. Of this total £25,029,058 is in British Government securities and £7,(34,022 in British railways. The number of ac-, counts open in the Paymaster-General's books ii 37,508. In thi! annual account of these funds is given'a list of boxes, sealed packets, and miscellaneous effects which the Bank of England is guarding on behalf of the Supreme Court. In the list arc boxes of plate, jewellery, heirlooms, and deeds, A relic of an old Chancery suit is J. bag of clipped money marked "Jones v. [Lloyd, August 20, 1720." A sealed envelope deposited at the bank contains certificates for a million shilling shares [in the Mexican Smelting Corporation, I Limited.

In another sealed envelope ore two bills of exchange for £SOO each, dated June 20, 1885, and payable three and six months after date. A sealed packet is "said to contain" a bill of exchange for £IOOO. Eight boxes of plate are deposited at the bank under a Chancery suit begun thirty-five years ago. Amongst "securities of value not expressed" is an Exchequer order for £5 a year. The bank holds the certificate, which is in respect of a life, annuity against which claim ceased to be made in 1705.