STORY OF TWOPENCE

Evening Star, Issue 21722, 17 May 1934, Page 1

STORY OF TWOPENCE

FORTY-YEAR-OLD ACCOUNT Somewhere among the New South Wales Treasury’s Dormant Funds Account is twopence. It is no ordinary twopence, such as one might use on a postage stamp or a telephone call. It is a twopence which in its time has had a trust account all to itself! The twopence, says the Sydney ‘ Telegraph,’ is Martin Quinlan’s twopencoe. To the younger generation this would convey nothing, but Martin Quinlan has been dead for over forty years, but his twopence has lived on. It is the residue of Mr Quinlan’s estate, and, strictly speaking, it should have been paid to a beneficiary when Mr Quinlan died, but a probate official made a mistake and paid the beneficiary twopence short. If the amount had l>een a mere halfpenny tlu official might have forgotten about it, but tw’opence was a different matter. He opened a special trust account and paid in the twopence. For forty years the account was carried on and show'll in the department’s balance as “ Martin Quinlan . . . 2d,” until now' the Treasury has taken over this account and placed it w'ith other unclaimed money. If there are any of Quinlan’s descendants who are thinking of making a claim they might be interested to know' that it would cost them at least 6s to obtain the twopence. Thus it' looks as though Mr Quinlan’s tw'opence has come to the Treasury to stay.