ROMANCE OF THE PEERAGE

Otautau Standard and Wallace County Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 313, 2 May 1911, Page 2

ROMANCE OF THE PEERAGE

f\VO "LORDS DUDLEY."

Tlio departing Governor-General of the Commonwealth,' Lord Dudley, is threatened with the loss of his title and great wealth. Mr William Ward, the aspirant to the peerage, is a working builder m Melbourne, where he has resided since 1885. and he explains that though his claim is not a. new one, it has not been prosecuted m the past for want of means and ignorance of the right of procedure m such cases, but the matter has now been taken up determinedly by the well-known next-of-kin agent, Mr Thomas W. Lloyd. The claim (according to the Sydney ' Sun ' ..!* the 14th in^t.) centres round one Thomas' Ward, a Devonshire smuggler m the 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 lie became a merchant. Th-m-yli he had a wife m England, he married again m Jamaica, and by the marriage acquired considerable \vci'lh, wbich, on hs death, went to his Jamaioa offspring. The family m England knew nothing of Thomas's escapades iv the West Indies and nothing of any claim to the Ward title, and had to struggle bird for a living. The title and English estates came into the hands ot the Dud ey Wards — wrongly so, according io the claimant, the heirs of Thos. Ward having been passed over, when there was a ...•e..k m the direct succession m 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 'unit J the tables by gaining possession of i.lir Jamaica estates on this ground. William Ward, of Melbourne, tracing his direct connection with the neglected" Devonshire family, claims at least "the Janiaic m itoperty, if not. the whole of the ...tiglisi: estates and title now held by his ' Go-vernor-General. Piquancy is added to the story by the fact that Mr Ward interviewed Lord Dudley last year, and i.:id the f nets before him. Lord Dudley e.tid he wished to "play the game," and "if the property belonged to his visitor, he wou'd be the iast m the world to deprive 1 im of it. His Excellency referred to the deplorable Druce case, and said he wo-. id never consent to figure m such an affair as tliat. He also said that though pooiole reckoned him a rich man ho was .ealiy very poor, and sometimes found it hard to make both ends meet. His Excelhyioy's private income, it may be mentioned, is said to be £150.000 a* year.