WAS IT BLACKMAIL?

Auckland Star, Volume LVI, Issue 66, 19 March 1925, Page 5

WAS IT BLACKMAIL?

i ASTOUNDING FAMILY CASE. i LARGE SUM DEVOLVED. STRANGE FINANCIAL INTRIGUE (By Cable.—Press Association.—Copyright.) (Received 12 noon.) LONDON, March 18. One of the most amazing cases for many years has been opened before Mr. Justice (Sir Montague) Shearman and a special jury, after failure of attempts, made at the judge's suggestion, to reach a settlement. Counsel explained that Mrs. Muriel Waterhouse, a3 executrix of her late husband, whom she married in 1919. was proceeding against Sir David WilsonBarker, an ex-captain in the Naval Reserve, his wife, and a man named Sheldon, all of Hawkhuret, Kent, alleging that Lady Wilson-Barker obtained from Mr. Waterhouse large sums by meane of fraudulent representation, that Sheldon and Lady Wilson-Barker participated in a fraudulent conspiracy ! for the same purpose. Plaintiff seeke to account for these ' payments, or alternatively damages. P'aintiff's counsel said the conspiracy began in 1909. Frank Waterhouse, son of wealthy parents, had inherited £100,000. When staying at Harrogate with his mother in 189! i. when he was ■40 years of age, he made the acquaintance of Lady Wilson-Barker, who gained Mrs. Waterhouse's deep affection. She won an ascendancy over the doting mother and jier son and became a frequent visitor to the Waterhouses' home. For years the two women carried on a correspondence of a deeply religious character; nevertheless counsel alleged thnt Ljidy Wilson-Barker for years carried on an intrigue with Frank Waterhousp. Then subsequently, with Sheldon's assistance, she stripped Frank of every farthing, with the result that he i died in 1922 insolvent. The conspiracy \v:i- n nly discovered ■ after Waterhouse's death. : Lady Wilson-Barker pretended that a solicitor who had discovered their liason was threatening to tell her husband, and that only secret payments could prevent exposure. She imposed on Frank an oath of secrecy. Then, ostensibly to buy the threatener's silence, obtaine! large sums from Waterhouse. sometimes £2000 at a time. All was paid in bank notes. Frank was a man of weak character. He later became an invalid. Sir Herbert Waterhouse would give ; evidence that Sheldon came to him a« head of the Waterhouse family and said the origin of the trouble was that Mrs. Waterhouse made both her sons nromise to give Lady Wilson-Barker £4000 each after her death. They had not carried out this promise, and Lady WilsonBarker and Sheldon considered other means of obtaining the fSOOO. Sheldon helped to compose some of her letter 3, and they obtained much more than £8000. When the claim was first made against Lady Wilson-Barker she obtained a certificate that she was in a state of enfeeblement bordering on lunacy. She deceived another doctor into certifying her as mentally not normal, and also deceived her own solicitor; yet when watched by inquiry agents it was found she was following the normal occupations of a lady.—(A. and N.Z. Cable.)