Matlock is famous for various things but, in the Victorian age, little could have caused as much public interest as what became known as the ‘Great Matlock Will Case’. The case lasted 12 years from 1856 to 1864. The case revolved around forgery, fraud and conspiracy, relating to a fortune of over £29,900 – more than £3 million in today’s money. The case went to the highest court in the land, then: the House of Lords. Simon Brister reports.
George Nuttall
George Nuttall, like his father and grandfather before him, was a local land agent working out of Matlock. He was a man of some considerable wealth.
Records show him owning extensive land throughout Derbyshire including the Megdale Estate at Matlock (now Cawdor Quarry), other property in Matlock including Frog Meadow (now Firs Parade), property in Ashover, Darley Dale, Two Dales, Castleton, Hardwick, Wensley and Snitterton as well as properties as far afield as Birmingham, Nottingham and Cheshire.
He was a bachelor. However, by the time he reached the age of 52 he was not a well man. He knew this and in 1854 he visited his solicitor for guidance on how to make his will and he then set about handwriting his will in duplicate. The will ran to several pages, in duplicate, and was properly signed and witnessed. The will, after making various specific gifts, left the bulk of his property to his second cousin, John Nuttall.
Why was he so generous to this particular cousin? Research into his family tree may give a clue to this generosity. The records show that Cousin John’s father was ‘killed by his brother’s horse’. George himself had no children (so far as is known) and in the years up to his death he was living with his housekeeper Catherine Marsden (described in the court papers as ‘on terms more than cousinhood’).
In the 1841 Census, George Nuttall is living at Matlock Green with Catharine Marsden (25) and also her sister Eliza (20).
George’s will
George died on 7th March 1856, aged just 54, and one copy of his will was found in his home immediately after his death. After the funeral the other copy was found. It was unusual as it had some added words written in between the lines. The hand writing was acknowledged as that of John Else, who was George’s clerk and had married Eliza Marsden in 1842.
The added words made provision for an income payable to both John Else and the housekeeper Catherine (who was Else’s sister-in-law). It looked as though Else was trying to feather his family’s nest.
This will, with the amendments, was then proved in the probate court by the surviving executors named in the will – that is to say Mr Robert Cresswell and Mr John Marriott. So far so good…
Codicils appear
Else then transferred all George’s papers to his own house and in the April 1856 produced a codicil (a written amendment) to George’s will. It was evidently duly signed, witnessed and dated 27th October 1855. In this codicil, a large part of the estate was gifted to Else instead of Cousin John. The codicil was apparently in George’s hand and apparently signed by George and witnessed by two local worthies.
In January of 1857, Else came forward with another codicil – this time dated 6th January 1856 – which left even more of the property to Else and even less to Cousin John. Again it appeared to be in George’s hand, signed, but this time with two different witnesses.
Else, claiming the authority of the earlier codicils, appears to have moved into George’s house. One day in October 1857, he was working with a maid servant to free a jammed window and, lo and behold, he uncovered a ‘hole in the wall’ concealing – you have guessed it – a third codicil along with some gold coins and, according to one report, all in a stone pickle jar.
This third codicil left virtually the whole of the estate to Else. No explanation was ever given as to why George should have hidden the codicil in a stone jar in the wall of his house nor why Else had not alerted the executors earlier to the existence of these three codicils.
The court case
Naturally Mr Cresswell, as the executor to the original will, proceeded to challenge the validity of these codicils, suspecting Else of forgery. He did this on behalf of the original beneficiaries who were Cousin John’s children; as John himself had died on 21st April, 1856 – little more than a month after George’s death.
The case went to the Court of Chancery. It was transferred from there to the Court Assizes and the case was heard in Derby in 1859 before Lord Chief Justice Earle and a special jury. Perhaps surprisingly, the jury were impressed with the character of Else (he was apparently a church warden) and the jury found in his favour. However, the Master of the Rolls reviewed the case and was unhappy with the verdict, so he ordered a new trial. The jury at the Assizes in 1860 decided that the codicils were forgeries. Else appealed to the Court of Appeal and after deliberation they were unable to reach a decision. The case was then referred up to the House of Lords. The House of Lords was then the highest court in the land – the forerunner of the Supreme Court. As a result, Lord Chief Justice Cockburn was directed to hear a new trial in London. This trial took place in London in 1864 before his Lordship and a special jury. All the time, the legal costs must have been racking up alarmingly.
House of Lords
This final hearing of the Great Matlock Will Case – known as ‘Cresswell and others v Jackson and another’ is set out in the full 72-page transcript of the case (in which it is referred to as ‘one of the most remarkable ever known’). The court case lasted for eight days from Monday, February 22, 1864 and there were 21 witnesses for Else and 19 witnesses opposing him.
Much of the evidence involved cross-examination of the supposed witnesses to the codicils. Some of the witnesses had died in the interim. However, there were clear inconsistencies in the evidence of the surviving witnesses. The clinching factor, however, was the various spelling mistakes which appeared in the codicils as well as in other documents written by Else and produced in evidence. Examination of George writings revealed a man better educated, who rarely made a spelling error.
After eight days, the Lord Chief Justice summed up – apparently taking several hours. The jury, however, returned a verdict very promptly and found that the codicils were indeed forgeries and that there had been a conspiracy between Else and a number of those who would have benefited should the codicils have proved genuine. According to the court records, the verdict was ‘received with a burst of applause, which evidently excited the cordial approval of the great body of those who had heard the case.’
Speculation continued in the township of Matlock as to whether this jury had really uncovered the truth.
Conclusion
Because Cousin John had died soon after George, it was his wife and children who stood to inherit what was left of George’s estate and, under John’s will, the children had to wait until the youngest reached 21. It seems that this didn’t happen until 1877, when what was left of George’s property was sold at auction. It raised £17,000. One can only guess at the amount of the legal costs incurred but happily, there was at least still quite a fortune left for the intended beneficiaries.
Editor’s Note: The author has taken references from The Andrews Pages; the Making of Modern Law (a transcript of the evidence); and the title deeds to property in Dale Road, Matlock.