SEALED LETTER WORTH £20,000.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3132, 28 August 1922, Page 7

SEALED LETTER WORTH £20,000.

A romance of two lovers, whose intended marriage in their youth was I'rustrated, but who, many years afterwards, when one was a widower and the other a widow, met and agreed to niarv, (.Mine to an agreeable conclusion—for the widow—in the. King's Bench Division, London, lately. The widow was awarded the sum of £20,001), which she claimed' as having been promised by her old lover when she consented to marry his. The claim was made by Mrs Klizabeth Jane Jenkin against the executors of Sir John Thnrshy. When Sir John was an undergraduate and Airs Jenkin was a young woman they fell in love, but the influence of a third party caused them to give up the idea of marriage. Both married alter this. Sir John lost his wife in 1915, and Mrs Jenkin, by this time the widow ol a barrister, with grown-up sons, wrote to him a letter of condolence. Then began a renewal of their acquaintance. It was arranged that thev would ho married; but before the wedding took place Sir John Thursby died at Grenoble, in Prance. It had been arranged that on returning from a motor tour in Kranee Sir John should hand over £20,000 Lo -Mrs Jenkin, His illness and death prevented Ins return, but before he died he gave Captain Jenkin (Mrs Jenkin's son) a sealed letter to fake to ilr Duckworth, manager of the Manchester and Comity Hank, at Manchester, and a personal friend. Jt ran as follows :-"Please ham! on demand to Captain Guy A. Jenkin £20,000 of Hie Treasury bills now held) by you oil my behalf.- John (>. S. Thursby." At the conclusion ol the case tor Mrs Jenkin. his lordship .said there was sufficient evidence to go to the jury. Sir Malcolm Macnaghtcn. for Mrs Jenkin, submitted that it was abundantly clear that Sir John wished the plaintiff to have this £20,000 in any event, and not on his death alone. Did Sir John Thursby promise the plaintiff £20,000 Treasury bills forthwith on her promise to marry him on their return from France? The evidence left no doubt that he did. Mr Pitman for the defence, said the executors had no personal interest in tins matter, but it was their dutv to examine all claims against the estate most closely. They thought it only right to contest this claim in the exercise of their legal duties. There had

never been the slightest suggestion against the honor of the plaintiff or of Sir John Thursby from first to last. His lordship, in summing up to the jury, said that Mrs Jenkiu had to establish that there was a contract under which Sir John Thursby undertook to give her forthwith £20,000 on his promising to marry him on their return from the Continent. Here were these two people of mature age, who were engaged to be married three years before Sir John died. How was it that nobody knew of the engagement? They had many well-known friends. Why was nobody called to say they knew they were engaged? 'Did they think a. mother-in-law could prevail on a woman of the plaintiffs age, who had long been, engaged to Sir John, a man of her own age, not to marry him? It would have been a. good marriage for the plaintiff. Sir John Thursby was a widower, and the plaintiff*was entertaining him each week in her Hat. The world, being what it was, would be likely to consider the position in a wrong light, and yet the jury were asked to believe that the mother-in-law preferred that kind of/position to go on with her daughter-in-law, instead of her becoming Lady Thursby. The jury found for the widow. Before entering judgment the judge was to hear legal arguments at a later date.