Jennings Estate
James Riley Jennings 1967
JENNINGS ESTATE
Perhaps nothing in the annals of the history and genealogy of American families has created more excitement, adventure, research, expenditure of money and time, anguish and hope, in the pursuit of fact, fancy myth or legend, than the “Great Jennings Estate”. It was supposed to be $40,000,000 in the safe keeping “of some good bank in England”, left by one William Jennings of Acton, born in 1701, remained unmarried, and died June 29th, 1798, intestate.
The Jarndyce vs. Jarndyce case in “Bleak House”, by Charles Dickens, is said to be based on the Jennings estate.
Some years ago, a full-page spread, in color, appeared in newspapers from coast to coast, under a 1928 copyright, put out by American Weekly, In The caption: American Heirs After Lovely Lady Curzon Riches. The story featured the picture of a lovely young woman, Genevive Jennings of Ohio, as “One of the prominent heirs seeking the famous millions”.
A printed pamphlet left among the papers of Cyrus Morgan Jennings, Waynesville, Ohio, 1849, reprinted and in the possession of his sons, was published in 1850, Nashville, Tenn., by a N.W.Sloan, an active member of the Jennings Association. Excerpts from some forty branches of the family in all parts of the country are presented, along with an urgent appeal for all to come, or send power of attorney to the GENERAL JENNINGS FAMILY CONVENTION, to be held in Charlottesville, Virginia, commencing 15th May next. The purpose was to bring together records, documents or other proof of beneficial interest in the great estate.
Item 8 of the pamphlet quotes our grandfather, Henry Jennings, of Waynesville, Ohio (1812), as being able, through a succession of records and wills, to trace ancestry to Henry Jennings, “our parent stock in America”, to the emigrants register of the ship Kent, on which he came from England, landing in Salem, New Jersey, 16th June, 1677.
Henry supposedly, was in the same line of descent as was William Jennings of Acton.
Frank H. Stewart.
NOTES ON OLD GLOUCESTER COUNTY N.J.
Gloucester County Historical Society Vol. 3, Aug. 1937
P. 124.
Isaac Jennings called meeting of heirs of Jacob Jennings, Deborah Burroughs, Sarah Flanigan and Rebecca Price, Heirs of Henry Jennings, Pearce Hotel, in Woodbury, Mar. 9, 1850. (to plan right toequity in “Big Estate “)
P. 127. JENNINGS ESTATE HEIRS
The descendants of Samuel Jennings, former Governor of New Jersey to the number of 1.50 persons, met in Burlington. They are interest in the mythical Jennings estate of $40,000,000. Among documents produced at the convention was the certificate of marriage of Wm. Stevenson and Ann Jennings, Burlington, 16th, 11 Mo. 1669, and signed by William Penn and others as witnesses.
P. 152. JENNINGS ESTATE PAMFHLET
Charles Cist, of Cincinnati, published a pamphlet about the Jennings estate. It sold for one dollar per copy, five copies for three dollars and eight copies for five dollars.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CS71 J545·1912
Jennings Estate
Associations were formed, conventions were held, officers elected, committees were appointed to cover every aspect of the challenge to prove descent from William “Jennens” of Acton, Assessments were made, money, collected and budgeted. Attorneys were employed and sent to England to establish proof of “estate” and to qualify claimants. The first big convention was held in Nashville, Tenn. about 1848. The results appear not to have been great except to excite excitement. Some interested parties worked overtime gathering genealogy, bible records and writing letters in an honest effort to prove the case.
The largest convention appears to have been held in Charlottesville, Virginia, May 15-18, 1850. A large attendance was recorded including names and addresses of people from New England to the South and Mid-west. Among them was Henry Jennings, Waynesville, Ohio. The convention was established on a high plain patterned after assembly of Virginia. The leaders of the movement appear to have been men of sagacity and competence.
The reports to the convention were so voluminous and disorganized that it would have taken an army of secretaries and analysts to digest them. This work was farmed out to committees and the convention adjourned.
The next convention of the Jennings family, of consequence was held at Walpole, New Hampshire, on the 6th of May, 1863, and was for the purpose of collecting information and prosecuting the claims. A constitution was formed in all of its legal fullness. The action here was direct and complete. C. M. Fisher of Vergennes, and Columbus Smith of Salisbury, Vermont, were appointed agents for the investigation of the case in England and America, and were required to make frequent written reports to members of the association. Fisher was empowered to raise five hundred dollars to cover necessary expenses in America and two thousand more to cover expenses in England, by issuing script, which said script shall be a lien upon the property when recovered.
Each script shall be sold for five dollars, entitling the holder to fifty dollars out of the first money recovered. Said Fisher and Smith are to be allowed two dollars per day each and expenses out of the money so raised. In addition they shall be allowed ten per cent of any money recovered by any and all members and heirs, their Executors, Administrators or Assigns. No member of the association shall be liable to pay more than one dollar as expenses, compensation or otherwise to any person whatever.
Many smaller groups met for the purpose of searching and proving ancestry. Descendants of Samuel Jennings, first New Jersey Governor, called their clan together as did also the descendants of Isaac Jennings, including the Lippencotts, Prices, Burroughs and Flanninghams and others in the Canxien, Gloucester areas. Other groups and branches of the family met in Massachusetts, New York, Virginia, Tennessee etc. The big Dailies of the day in Boston, New York, Philadelphia and other cities carried frequent notices of such meetings.
Even in Ireland, about 1851, a Jennings Association was formed for the purpose of grabbing some of the loot. This movement soon faded when it was concluded that the real heirs were in America.
By this time (1850) branches of the family and the progeny had become so numerous and scattered that facilities were not available to handle the situation.
Finally, Mr. Fisher reported from London. There was no “chest or strongbox” in the bank in London or any place else. Upon the death of the miser in 1798, Lord Howe and Viscountess Andover, first cousins once removed, entered upon the property and took possession. They went before the court, entered claims and were given title. At the time there was no contest of the claims. It seems that Lord Howe was given the property and Viscountess Andover the treasures. According to the report, Childs & Co., the bank supposedly in possession of the treasure, disclaimed any knowledge or information about the estate. Mr. Fisher found no proof that Lord Howe and Viscountess Andover were the rightful heirs. But the lapse of time, dispersion of assets and the possible statute of limitations, JIB.de further efforts and expense unjustified. He called the case hopeless.
However, while generations of judges and councils, plaintiffs and defendants died, the suit went merrily on. Not only did new generations of heirs pop up to keep the war going and pauperize themselves, but families of lawyers became specialists in the case, handing it down as a heritage from father to son.
It was charged that inscriptions on gravestones were altered, coffins dug up at night to replace engraved plates on them with spurious claims and counter-claims.
James Riley Jennings 1967
From records available would-be heirs kept the pot boiling for a period of one hundred and thirty years. This may be some kind of a record in longevity for a case in court. At the present time, however, (1967), the fever appears to have subsided, and no further attempts to claim the estate seem likely.
But the protracted struggle did provide a great fortune and windfall to historians and genealogists of the Jennings family. Since 1800 there has been a great search amounting to an almost ”Revival Meeting” fervor in an attempt to prove descent from William Jennings of Acton, England, who left the vast fortune intestate. It provided a motive to create an intense search of lineage.
A.W. Rankis Record Books
THE JENNINGS ESTATE
A Remarkable History
Some eighty years ago on the 19th day of June 1798, to be precise, there died in London, England, in his ninety-ninth year, a gentleman named Williams Jennens. There were at that time plenty of people bearing that name in the United Kingdom, but this particular one was known to all, and respected by but a few, ”Wealthy Jennens some called him, and “Stingy Jennens” be was denominated by others, His was a remarkable history. Left an heir to an enormous fortune, which by judicious management he contrived to treble during his lifetime he, never the less, subsisted in a penurious style, Yet he was favorably regarded at court, probably on account of the fact that King William III had stood as his
sponsor at his infant baptism, and had manifested his regard for the family by presenting the unconscious babe with a silver ewer of magnificent design, He was appointed page to George I, and his miserly habits were well illustrated by the fact, although wealthy, he did not scruple to accept paltry honorarium of $500 per annum for performing this service. His presence at court brought him into continual contact with the galaxy of wit and beauty which crowded the royal halls, and many were the mothers, some even of noble birth, who saw in him a valuable prize for their unmarried daughters. But Jennens rightly calculated that to take unto himself a wife would entail the expenditure of some of his precious gold, and this idea was so repugnant to his feeing that he eschewed the marriage state and died a crusty and morose old bachelor.
After his death the executors made an autopsy of his chest and strongbox, and also opened his will and codicil. They found that his wealth exceeded the wildest estimate which bad been made during his lifetime. There were landed estates in nearly every part of the country, and stock of almost every English fund which was then in existence. There were mortgages innumerable. Hid in a mortgage deed in the iron chest, the key or which could not be found until a long search had been made, were found a roll of bank notes of one year’s issue amounting to upwards of $100,000, together with $50,000 in gold coin. Another $10,000 in notes and coins were found in his country and town residence. At one banking house was a massive chest containing bis mother’s plates, jewelry, and valuables, which had never been opened since her decease, while at another was a deposit of $250,000 which he kept in view of any sudden emergency. A check on this amount had not been drawn for nearly twenty years. When the total sum had been counted up it was found that the deceased miser, for such be really was, had been worth no less a sum than One Hundred and Twenty Millions of Dollars.
“Who are the heirs?” Puzzled the executors as soon as the inventory had been completed. The contents of the will did everything but answer the question. It merely contained the superfluous intimation that the property should go to the heirs-at-law. The executors spent years in investigating and tracing, and finally arrived at the conclusion that no direct heirs were in existence and that the search must go back to the descendants of his brothers and sisters, if he had any such kindred, and, if not, to the relatives of bis father and mother. So proclamation was accordingly issued inviting the Jennings of the United Kingdom generally to come in, prove property, pay charges and carry off the booty. This announcement brought a small army of claimants upon the scene every one of whom were sure that his or her genealogy could be traced to the dead millionaire. Among them were at least a score of women ready to swear that they had been married in secret to the said William Jennings, by whom they each individually had borne numerous progeny.
Twenty years were occupied in investigating the merits of the claims of the would-be heirs, ending in their entire rejection, except in one solitary instance. A connecting link was traced from one of Mr. Jennings’ aunts to the family of Lord Howe, one of the richest of England’s aristocratic families. The executors, only too glad to have the burden transferred from their shoulders, proposed to turn the possessions over to the Howe family, but to this argument the English Government, which held the property in trust, interposed an objection. Finally, however, the Court of Chancery determined to allot the family Howe’s portion of the real estate, which, in the opinion of the Government, was about as much as so distant a relationship was worth. The noble peer grasped at the offer and today what the family termed “The Jennings’ windfall” is counted as the most valuable of the large possessions which belong to the noble house of Howe.
Meanwhile the unclaimed legacy, like a snowball, grew larger and larger, while the real estate steadily increased in value. At last, more than by accident than design, a new discovery was made. Someone found that sometime during the year 1754 the grandson of one of William Jennings’ brothers accompanied by his wife, Ann, and three children had come to America and had landed at Fredericksburg, Virginia. The executors thought the right vein had been struck at last, and in 1849 they caused an advertisement to be inserted in a number of American papers setting forth the details of the property which awaited an owner. In America the Jennings is an extensive house.
In the summer of the year in which the advertisement was issued the Virginia Jennings held a meeting, and by resolutions invited all persons residing in that,, claiming to be heirs of William Jennings aforesaid, to face the music. Three months after the convention of would-be heirs of the Jennings was held at Nashville, at which seventy delegates, representing branches of the Jennings family in eight, states in the Union, were in attendance. This was in addition to another set of claimants held at Charlottesville.
Both of these bodies appointed committee’s to obtain the necessary legal evidence to substitute their claim and employed commissioners to proceed to England to present and prosecute their suits. One of these individuals discovered from the English records that one Joshua Jennings had emigrated to Fairchild County, Conn. in 1656.
This issued the Eastern Jennings, and the too, sent a delegate abroad to make a strike for the cash. He had scarcely reached his destination, when the families of the Lippincotts, Prices, Flanagans, induced, through some circumstances, to believe that they and they only were the legal heirs. An organization was formed, and one more delegate, T. B. Price of Philadelphia was added to the group of American lawyers in London. Their combined efforts, however, were of no avail. Links were wanting and records had disappeared. The English Jennings fought the American ones, and Jennings found themselves baffled at every step. An Irish Association sprung up and $15,000 were subscribed to meet the expenses of an investigation on behalf of the Jennings of the Emerald Isle. The cash with which the American lawyers were provided gave out, and the claimants becoming disheartened, refused to continue their subscriptions. Finally, after the matter had been called to remain in abeyance for several years, a
general convention of the American claimants was called to meet at Walpole, N. H., in May, 1863. An organization called the Jennings Association was effected, and several thousand dollars for investigating purposes were raised on script of the value of $5.00, the script entitling the purchaser to $50.00 out of the first money recovered by the Association. It is scarcely necessary to say that the script has not been redeemed to this day.
For the last fifteen years scarcely a session of the Common Pleas Court of England has been held but what the Jennings case has come up in soma form or other, until it is now a standing joke among the members of the legal profession. Many ludicrous phases in the great case are continually cropping up. At one time the inquires at the Bank of England were so numerous that seven clerks were kept busily employed in the “Jennings Inquiry Department”.
One of the many Jennings (sons) who brought suit for the property was forced to admit in court that if his allegations were correct, his mother must have been sixty three years old at the time of his birth. One of the American Lawyers sent to prosecute the claim spent a portion of the funds intrusted to him for this purpose in a jolly tour across the continent, and finally lost the remainder in betting on the Derby Races.
About 30 years ago, one of the Connecticut claimants, while travelling in England, accidently learned that Lord Howe was sojourning on the continent. Thereupon be went to the steward of the London estate and demanded possession. The servant, who was alone in the house, thought it
polite to offer no resistance, especially as the newcomer was armed with a document which had been obtained on an “ex parte” application from one of the lesser courts. Elated at his success, the stranger made himself at home, and indulged to a plentiful degree in the choicest wines which
were stored in the cellar. The steward wrote his Lordship, am the news soon brought him back, posthaste, to the Hall. There he found the intruder quietly seated in an armchair in the Library making merry over the wine. An order to leave was met with a refusal; Lord Howe then directed the servants to put him out at the door, but he was a muscular individual, and a couple of well-directed blows sent the servants scattering in all directions. Another attempt was made, and this time, with his Lordship’s help the intruder was thrown head foremost from the window to the grassy lawn beneath. He was never seen again in the neighborhood.
But the fight is once more to begin in right earnest. The New Jersey and Pennsylvania claimants who have kept the lawyers quietly at work during the last five years, now declare that a document has been discovered which adds the missing link to the claim and incontestably proved their right to the property.
Several conventions have been held in Camden during the last few years, and the heirs in meeting assembled, resolved to appoint a committee to proceed to London, and in conjunction with Mr.
Judah P. Benjamin to open the case at the autumn term of court. The claimants are sanguine of the success of their effort and are already individually beginning to approximate their share of the $800,000,000, which is the latest official figures of the value of the fund.
The financial committee at their meeting held at Dr. Lessy’s December 28, 1878, appointed a committee to draw up and have presented to the heirs of the next meeting of the Association, a statement in reference to the lineal descendants of Humphrey Jennens, son of John Jennens,
who was the true lawful ancestor of William Jennens, of Acton, England, born September 4, 1701 and died June 15, 1798. William Jennens of Acton, son of Robert Jennens, and grandson of Humphrey Jennens, died intestate, leaving large personal and real estate. According to the wills of John Jennens and Humphrey Jennens, also the laws of England, the property belongs to the oldest male heirs, Charles Jennens, being the oldest son of Humphrey Jennens, would undoubtedly have inherited the property, but being deceased without male heirs, the property goes to Henry, the next oldest son, or his descendant.
Henry Jennens came to America in 1677, on board the ship Kent, first landing at New Castle; thence sailing up the Delaware River to Burlington, West New Jersey; his name appearing among the proprietors of Burlington County, as fully appears in the compilation of the laws of Spicer and Lemming. (See State Library, Trenton, N. J.)
Thomas Jennens being the son of Henry Jennens, a resident of Burlington County was married to Ann Borton, in Haddonfield Meeting in 1731, as is proven by the records of Friends Meeting, which we duly authenticated. His mother having given her consent to this marriage as required by the Friend’s Discipline. After having requested a certificate from the Monthly Meeting of Friends at Haddonfield in 1755, he with his family moved to Richland, now Quakertown, Pa., and in the year 1756, he again made application to the Friends Meeting (monthly) of Richland for the removal of himself and family to Little Egg Harbor, now Tuckerton, N. J. Having traced Henry Jennens family to Little Egg Harbor, now Tuckerton, N.J., what remains to be accomplished is to connect him in England as the son of Humphrey Jennens. In order that there may be no conflict in presenting the claim to the Court of Chancery of England, the Finance Committee recommended the adoption of the following resolutions, viz:
RESOLVED, That this Association appoint five persons from the Isaac Jennens branch, and five persons from the Thomas Jennens branch, for the purpose of considering the necessity of forming a unity of joint heirship binding all the above heirs to abide by such agreement in order that we may make a like agreement with the William Jennens’ heirs of Virginia. This can legally and lawfully be done by consent of the heirs, the Committee have no doubt,.
The Committee would here state that it has been no part of Mr. Cook’s duty to trace out the different history of the various branches of the heirs, but in following up the genealogy of Henry Jennens he has obtained valuable information which will assist them in establishing their own relationship, which each branch will be required to do at the proper time.
All of which is respectfully submitted by the Committee-January 4, 1879
To the Jennens’ Association
From copy of A. W. Rankis Record Books
Gloucester County N.J. Historical Society
A Phantom Fortune
The Last of the Jennings Heirs Goes to The Poor House in Camden
Broken in health, entirely destitute and 71 years old, Isaac Jennings went into the Camden County Almshouse a few days ago, there to end his days, and with him vanishes the dream of the Jennings family to the possession of their mythical English inheritance, generally stated as worth eighty million pounds sterling.
In 1880 Mr. Jennings had by hard work and thrift secured a home and saved some money besides. One day in that year he was waited on by two men, one a florid, well-spoken Englishman, the other an American calling himself Jennens. He told Isaac that he had just returned from England and was satisfied that the enormous fortune left by Dr. Lewis Jennens in 1778 was now locked up in the Bank of England and awaited the call of the American Claimants. A trifle of money was needed, etc. and Mr. Egenton, the Englishman, was a solicitor and would attend to details. Isaac was dazzled but first consulted Lawyer Cooper who at once pointed out bad spelling and grammar in certain papers that looked suspicious. A meeting of the Jennens family was called and enough responded to make a regiment, but no one had any money and after six months controversy the poor members of the family were forced out and the “Jennens Association” started and stock issued. Three thousand dollars were raised and turned over to Mr. Egerton, who was subsequently identified as an attorney’s clerk and a fugitive from justice.
After 1880 a craze set in and the bogus lawyers reaped a rich harvest. An old lady mortgaged a $200 a year annuity and lost it, and a prominent doctor on Arch Street paid in a contribution of $8,000. There was no end of warnings. James Russell Lowell, United States Minister to England, called at the Bank of England and was told that no such fund ever existed and that the only money in dispute at the bank vaults was 18,ooo and that this was in the course of settlement. The Court of Chancery, by its clerk, disclaimed any knowledge of a Jennens will or fortune. A court proceeding, signed by Sir John Coleridge, awarding certain funds to American claimants, was bailed bare as a first step toward immediate possession, but Judge Kelley pointed only to a friend interested that the Chief Justice’s name was spelled Colerige and he signed himself Barronite.
All in vain -Isaac put his last thousand into the concern, (1890) all of the rest having fallen out, and now the end has come. Some retribution has followed up the swindlers. Egerton died in Portland Prison and no less than three of the imported lawyers in the case died of delirium tremens. From first to last Isaac Jennens has paid out $12,000 and perhaps $25,000 more was sunk in the wretched swindle, and curiously enough none of the claimants ever seem to have any clear idea of who Dr. Jennens was nor how the 180,000,000 accumulated. They simply went it blind.
(From Gloucester County, N.J. Historical Society)