"LADY TICHBORNE”

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12602, 12 November 1926, Page 7

"LADY TICHBORNE”

MRS ORTON DIES IN WORKHOUSE ALWAYS CLAIMED THE TITLE. Bv Telegraph.—Press Assn.-Copyright. Australian and N.Z. Cable Association. (Received November 11, 7.5 p.m.) LONDON, November 11. Mary Orton, widow of the Tichborne claimant, died at the age of 87. She was buried at Southampton, where for 30 years she had been an inmate of a workhouse. She claimed the right to be called Lady Tichborne to the end. Her name appears in the workhouse records and in the death certificate as “M. S. Tichborne. Arthur Orton declared himself _ to be Sir Roger Tichborne, and claimed the baronetcy and estates worth about £24,000 a year. Roger Tichborne, in 1854, sailed from Rio in a ship which foundered at sea. Orton asserted that he and eight others were saved, and that he had since lived in Australia. His claim was resisted, and the trial began on May 11th, 1871. On March | 6th, 1872, he was declared nonsuited. The law proceedings are said to have cost the estate £92,000. Orton was then tried for perjury. The case for the defence closed on the 124th day, and he waa found guilty on February 28th, 1874, and sentenced to 14 yearshard labour. He was released on ticket of leave in 1884. His confession was printed in 1895, and he died m 1898.