FORTUNE CLAIMED
WOMAN APPEALS TO HOUSE OF LORDS
A quiet, middle-aged woman, with a low, soft voice, hopes to appear before the House of Lords to press her appeal as claimant to the Marie L’Epine fortune.
The .Misses Mason, three of the ten claimants to the wealth of Marie L’Epine, who died intestate and a lunatic in 1798, found their appeal barred by the Statute of Limitations. Miss Jessie Mason, of 10 Kildare Gardens, Bayswater, is now recognised as the appellant, and she hopes to get the decision of the Chancery Division and the Court of Appeal reversed in the House of Lords. “It was only two years ago that my sister and I found in the registers of St. Martin-in-the-Fields a marriage entyr proving that Maria L’Epine had been married in London, and that her daughter and our ancestor, Abigail Eccles, was legitimate. George 111. presented the money to Lord Howe in recognition of his services abroad, with the stipulation that in the event of heirs of the L’Epine family being discovered he would hand back the property. The estate was valued in 1792 at £45,000, and at compound interest of 2i per cent, would now amouut to many millions. As it was believed that Marie L'Epine had no legal heirs, the fortune, instead of going to a daughter, becamde escheat to the Crown.
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/SUNAK19290615.2.208
Bibliographic details
Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 690, 15 June 1929, Page 27
Word Count
225FORTUNE CLAIMED Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 690, 15 June 1929, Page 27
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