ROMANCE OF THE PEERAGE

Evening Star, Issue 14548, 24 April 1911, Page 9

ROMANCE OF THE PEERAGE

TWO "LORDS DUDLEY." Tho departing Governor-General of the Commonwealth, Lord Dudley, i 6 thread ened with the loss of his title and great wealth. Mr William Ward, the aspirant to tho peerage, is a working builder in Melbourne, where ho has resided since 1885, and he explains that though his claim is not a new one, it has not been prosecuted in the past for want of means and ignorance of the right of procedure in such eases, but the matter has now been token up determinedly bv the well-known next-of-kin agent, Mr Tnomas W. Lloyd. The claim (according to the Sydney ' Sun ' of the 14th inst.) centres round one Thomas Ward, a Devonshire smuggler in tho eighteenth century, son of the second Baron Ward-Thomas, who was a gay and adventurous spirit, and finding the Old Country too hot for him, sailed for Jamaica, where he became a merchant. Though he had a wife in England, he married again in Jamaica, and by the marriage acquired considerable we-i'th, which, on he. death, went to his Jamaica offspring. The family in England knew nothing of Thomas's escapades in the West Indies and nothing of any claim to the. Ward title, and had to struggle bird for a living. Tho title and English estates came into the hands of the Dud-ey Wards —wrongly so, according to the claimant, the heirs of Thcs. Ward having been passed over, when there was a Ireik in the direct succession in 1740. After many years the Jamaica family claimed these things, relying on their descent from Thomas, but the other side proved that the marriage was bigamous, and T nrmd the tables by gaining possession of '.ho Jamaica estates on this ground. William Ward, of Melbourne, tracing his direct connection with the neglected Devonshire family, claims at least the Jamaica, property, if not the whole of the "nglisii estates and title now hold by his Go-vernor-General. Piquancy is added to ilio story by tho fact that Mr Ward interviewed Lord Dudley last year, and i;:id the facts before him. Lord Dudley fr.ii-1 he wished to " play the game," and if the property belonged to his visitor, he wou'd bo the last in the world to deprive 1 hn of it. His Excellency referred to the deplorable Druce case, and said he woVid never consent to figure in such an affair as that. He also said that though people reckoned him a rich man he was veally very poor, and sometimes found it hard to make both ends meet. His Excello'toy's private incomo, it may bo mentioned, is said to be £150,000 a year.