BERKELEY PEERAGE. (Hansard, 28 June 1811)

The Lord Chancellor,

at considerable length, addressed their lordships upon the merits of the present claim. He professed to feel that sentiment which had generally actuated the consideration of the Committee. From the bottom of his soul he could say, that he had from the first entertained a wish that lady Berkeley might be enabled to shew the right of the present claimant. But he requested that their lordships would keep the subject of this title abstractedly considered, and putting from their minds other feelings and sentiments which had mixed themselves with the inquiry, and which had been pressed upon their attention, that they would look to the title itself and the evidence that had been adduced in support of that title. He wished them to consider most attentively the Act of Marriage, 26 Geo. 2, s. 33, by which it was required that the marriage should take place after licence obtained, or bans published, and that the marriage should, after the usual solemnization, be duly registered. He had no doubt their lordships would agree with him, that, if licences were not obtained, nor bans published, according to the direction of that act of Parliament, the marriage afterwards would be null and void. God forbid he should, in saying this, be understood to declare, that for want of a precise compliance with that statute, the marriage would be null! If, from the conduct of the parties before and afterwards—if, from their mode of living and demeanor, as husband and wife, they 771 considered themselves to be married—if, from the general repute of the world, or the neighbourhood where they dwelt, they were believed to be so—and if their children, born under such circumstances, were accounted legitimate, it was his opinion that the presumption of law would supply the irregularities of a marriage ceremony. For instance, under such circumstances he was not prepared to say, if the clergyman had not published the bans in an audible voice, and the entry of the marriage-register had afterwards been made in an irregular way, that marriage so solemnised would be declared void. The presumption of law would be in its favour. But, if these irregularities took place under circumstances totally opposite, the presumption of law would be against the marriage.—The noble and learned lord next proceeded to comment upon the nature of the Evidence, and observed, that that on the claimant's side could not have been satisfactory of itself, independent of the evidence adduced so strongly against the claim by so many witnesses, and from such indisputable testimony. The case represented by lady Berkeley herself and her brother, was surrounded by the greatest improbabilities. The object of secrecy was ill-chosen by selecting Berkeley as the parish for publishing the bans and solemnizing the marriage. The fact of their publication was not satisfactorily made out by the claimant's witnesses, and it was in a great degree contradicted by the evidence of the parish clerk at Berkeley. The register of the marriage also, under every consideration, was attended with glaring improbabilities. The conduct of lord Berkeley in leaving his wife two days after the ceremony, and not seeing her again till the lapse of considerable time, was also very improbable. The excuse alleged for keeping this marriage secret, on account of the improper conduct of lady Berkeley's sister Susannah, was open to great suspicion.—His lordship next animadverted upon the directions given by the earl of Berkeley as to the register of his eldest born son alter (he second marriage. The clerk of the parish where this register was made had not only to produce the register itself, but had retained to this day the letter giving these directions, written in lord Berkeley's own hand. The expressions of lady Berkeley, when circumstances should have most induced her to speak sincerely, 772 shewed she did not consider herself legally married, such as those which she, uttered to one of her children: "You little dog, though I'm not your father's wife, I'll let you know I am your mother." The marquis of Buckingham's evidence was most material. The learned serjeant who had been counsel for the claimant, and who, under all the difficulties he had to encounter, had discharged his duty well, had been pleased to represent that lord Berkeley's conduct to the marquis was a mere joke. But when lord Berkeley chooses to commission a friend to inform his brother that he considers his own children illegitimate, and proposes to unite one of them in marriage with his brother's eldest son, that proceeding would, in his opinion, not permit the interpretation of a mere joke.—The noble and learned lord stated the purport of the evidence of the most material witnesses; and independent of the presumption of law, and the want of probability in the testimony adduced to support the title of the claimant, there was, in his opinion, a much stronger body of evidence to shew the non-existence of any marriage in 1785. The claimant had undertaken to prove, that, in which their lordships would be convinced he had completely failed. His lordship concluded by moving, by way of Resolution, That the Claimant had not made out his claim to the title, dignities, and honours of the earl of Berkeley, viscount Dursley, &c.