Don Martin diary entry for Tuesday,
March 5, 1918:
Began the day by
seeing the censor. He said there was no need of worrying over the notes I sent
by boat but that it wasn’t a good thing to do. I agreed with him and assured
him I had no intention of doing anything irregular and certainly will give no
further cause for criticism which I shan’t. Heard nothing from the Commodore
about the arrangements for the front. It is too early to hear. Was at the
office most of the day. In the evening took Metier of Vancouver to the office
and wrote a story for him about the reception given for his Victoria Cross
friend, Hanna, in Kilked, Ireland. Metier wants to send it to a Vancouver
paper. Wrote a good column story for him.
Weather clear +
reasonably pleasant.
An unusual story was written about Sir William Bowyer-Smith, 11th Baronet (1814-1883). It was perhaps drafted by the office and polished by Don Martin. Dated Tuesday, it was published in the New York Herald on Wednesday,
March 6, 1918.It might have been cabled on March 5 but might have been mailed an earlier Tuesday.
REVEALS
ROMANCE OF BARONET
HIDDEN FOR HALF CENTURY
[Special to the Herald]
Herald
Bureau, No. 130 Fleet Street, London, Tuesday
A romantic story of an English baronet’s
chance meetings half a century ago with a thirteen-year-old Scottish maiden,
who subsequently bore him thirteen children, has just been told in the Court of
Sessions at Edinburgh.
It came out in a remarkable action
concerning the Scottish marriage of the late Sir William Bowyer-Smijth,
residing at Windsor, Melbourne, and six others, against Lady Eliza, Fechnie
Malcolm, or Bowyer-Smijth, Mrs. Wilhelmina Bowyer-Smijth and Mrs. Adela
Bowyer-Smijth for a declarator of legitimacy according to the law of Scotland.
Lord Anderson, the Judge, said that
circumstances originating the action were romantic and extraordinary. Miss
Eliza Fechnie Malcolm was born in Scotland in 1842 and when thirteen met an Englishman
on a fishing holiday at Blair Atholl. He was Sir William Bowyer-Smijth, an
English baronet, with estates and a family seat in Essex and was then forty-one
years of age. He was living apart from his wife, by whom he had three children.
Travelled as Man and Wife
In 1858 Miss Malcolm went to London to
live with her brother, and, walking in St. James’ Park, she casually met Sir
William. Their acquaintance thus renewed rapidly ripened, but Miss Malcolm knew
him only as Mr. Smith. Later he asked her to be his wife and she assented. She
went to her aunt, at Leith, in July 1858. Shortly after Sir William went to
Leith, and in a drive in a cab matrimonial consent was interchanged between
them, and a marriage ring was given and accepted. They lived constantly
together as husband and wife in France, Holland, England and Scotland.
In 1859 Miss Malcolm discovered that the
man she had “married” was a baronet. He then told her he was a widower with
three children and asked her to continue to use the name of “Mrs. Smith.”
Between 1859 and 1872 thirteen children were born and eleven survived.
In July last the evidence of Lady
Bowyer-Smijth was taken, and Lord Anderson said he was most favorably impressed
both with her evidence and the manner in which it was given. She stated that it
was not until 1873 that she got to know that Sir William’s wife was still
alive. Although that was a great shock to her, she continued to live with Sir
William at his urgent entreaty and for the sake of the children.
Married After Wife Died.
Sir Williams’s wife died in 1875, and one
week later he married Miss Malcolm at Cheltenham. Two children, Mrs. Battye and
Mrs. Northcote, the compeering defendants, were born after than date. Sir
William died in 1883. Later Lady Bowyer-Smijth married her present husband, Mr.
Stanford. The plaintiffs had brought this action to have it declared that they
were the legitimate children of Sir William Bowyer-Smijth and Lady
Bowyer-Smijth, of Stanford.
The judge was satisfied that the patrimonial
interest of the compeering defendants would not be affected if their brothers
and sisters got the degree which they had sought. The legal basis of the
plaintiffs’ claim was that they were the issue of a putative marriage. The law
of Scotland was that where a marriage turned out to be invalid by reason of a
pre-existing impediment the legitimacy of the issue was saved if either parent
was in bona fide ignorance of the impediment in question.
The plaintiffs called as defendants their
mother and two sisters, Mrs. Battye and Mrs. Northcote. The mother had not
stated a defence to the action. The other two defendants had, and the Judge was
at a loss to understand why, seeing that no patrimonial consideration was
involved. These defendants were doing all they could to prevent their brothers
and sisters from getting the declarator which they sought.
Impugned Mother’s Good
Faith
They went so far as to impugn in their
defences the good faith of their mother at the date of the putative marriage,
or at all events from 1859. In view of the evidence of Lady Smith that appeared
to be unfilial, and his impression was that as the compeering defendants had no
interests to resist the decree which was sought they had no title to prevail in
their defence.
The
compeering defendants, however, maintained that the Scottish court had no
jurisdiction, as they were domiciled English women, and the Judge gave effect
to that plea and dismissed the action as against them. The liberation of these
defendants from the process, however, still left the action formally complete
because Lady Smijth remained in it as a defendant. Her domicile of origin was
Scottish, and she retained that until she married Sir William in 1875. His
Lordship accordingly sustained his jurisdiction to dispose of the action
against Lady Smijth and held that the law of Scotland should be applied to the
case.
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