9 July 1891: Court of Appeal

Returning to the thread of courtroom drama we'd been pursuing, here's an added and fun little twist to the lengthy court proceedings that pitted Valerie Wiedemann against the Hon. Robert Horace Walpole for breach of promise of marriage and libel.

Not the fourth segment of a trial that had seen the courtroom three times before, these proceedings stemmed from Walpole's desire for a new, fourth trial to appeal his loss in the third, and the £300 that was awarded to Miss Wiedemann.

Surprisingly, the motions heard here, in an article from the 9 July 1891 edition of the London Times, were being made by Wiedemann's own attorneys, men to whom she owed money.

The barristers, Messrs. Atkinson & Dresser, wanted Wiedemann to be prevented from engaging in any appeal Walpole would have been preparing. She was, their representative said, obligated to pay these attorneys £769 she owed them for services rendered out of any awards she received from the court. She must then, he continued, be barred from entering in any subsequent case that might cost them the £300 to which they felt entitled.

The reaction of the judges here is priceless!