A STRANGE WILL

Evening Star, Issue 19890, 12 June 1928, Page 8

A STRANGE WILL

DIVISION A CENTURY HENCE Giving evidence in a will case before the Chancery Court in the Old Country, the Portcullis Pursuivant of Anns stated that in 1920 there were ]2O lineal descendants of Queen Victoria living, and that they were to he sought in Germany, Russia, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Spain, Greece, Jugoslavia, and Rumania. The testator had postponed tho distribution ot his estate until the expiration of twenty years from death of the last survivor of Queen Victoria’s descendants who should he living at Ids death, and the will had been attacked on the ground that this provision was invalid on account of uncertainty and the impracticability of carrying it into effect. The ” witness mentioned testified that it would be a matter of enormous expense to prove strictly all tho births, marriages, and deaths involved, and that it would lie extremely difficult, and probably impossible, in thefuture to prove who was the last survivor of such descendants living on September 6. 1926, the date ot the testator’s death. He instanced the great difficulty of ascertaining the real fate of the family of the late Tsarina of Russia, who was , a grand-daughter of Queen Victoria. A' large number of the descendants were members of German Royal families, who, since the revolution" in ]9ld. had become private persons and whose existence in the luture would be difficult to establish._ It was possible, he said, that the period of twenty years from the death of the last survivor might extend to 100 years from the death of the testator. Despite this evidence, Mr Justice Asthnry held that the provision was good in law, and that, as it seemed there would he no absolutely insuperable difficulty in the way of ascertaining the date for division of the corpus of the estate, the will must stand.