HIDDEN MILLIONS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XL, Issue 12272, 16 May 1903, Page 5 (Supplement)

HIDDEN MILLIONS.

REMARKABLE CHARGES AGAINST ECCLESIASTICS. Pabis, April 10. An approaching lawsuit for the possession of a fortune of over £3,000,000 "sterling is causing much talk and speculation among the inhabitants of St. Etienne (Loire) and the surrounding district. In 1842 there died at Lyons, aged

eighty-seven, a lady named Mile. Bothe de la Barmondiere. She was very pious, and rarely saw anyone but priests and nuns. Before she died she had in vain tried to find some' member of her family, and on her deathbed she commissioned a "priest of her acquaintance to seek out her relatives. As it was Known that the old lady had left a large sum of moneyover half a million— there were not wanting those who claimed her as a relative, but the priests obstinately refused to admit that they had any right to the fortune.

A woman named Katherine Sabot refused, however, to be put off, and took her, case to the archbishop. He informed her that she had come too late, and when she and her family began a search for documents to prove their claim they found that the municipal records had either disappeared or that the pages containing . them had been torn out; and it was alleged that certain ecclesiJstics had consulted the archives before them.

This scandal had almost been forgotten when a second legacy of two millions and ahalf left by the Countess de la Barmondiere, a cousin ot the former lady, was accidentally revealed by a nun belonging to the Order of St. Joseph. As the result of her imprudence in informing the relatives of the colossal fortune awaiting them it is affirmed that the nun was persistently terrorised until she lost her reason and died. The family interested in the second legacy have been ceaselessly engaged since 1883 "in trying to obtain information enabling them to enter into possession of the money, but the sister who nursed the countess previous to her death was shifted from convent to convent, so that those who wished to question her were con sta ™ v baffled in their attempts to find her The police authorities of St. Etienne have been requested by six or seven families to take action against the ecclesiastics, who are believed tc have the money in their possession, and the trial is expected to lead to some strange disclosures.