REPORTS OF COURT CASES CONCERNING RUSSELL KING-HALL
Extract from THE TIMES of May 31 1877
At Bow St Mr George Attenborough, 72, Strand was summoned before Mr Vaughn to show cause why certain jewellery illegally pawned should not be handed over to the complainant Baroness Nelson and Bronte, grand niece of Lord Nelson. It appeared from the lady’s statement that she returned to England in January 1876 from Russia where she had resided for thirty years and brought with her jewels valued £500. She entrusted these to Mr Russell King-Hall, son of Vice Admiral King-Hall, to sell for her. It was alleged he had instead pawned the property and had gone away. An emerald and diamond coulant, the gift of the Empress of Russia, had been traced by Sergeant Mark, 46E, an officer attached to this court, to the shop of Mr Attenborough. Mr Attenborough informed Mr Vaughan that he was perfectly willing to give up the jewels, but he did not have them with him. Mr Vaughan said some further enquiries must be made, and he should therefore adjourn the case and issue a summons for the attendance on the next occasion of Vice Admiral King-Hall.
Extract from THE TIMES of June 21, 1877
At Bow St Mr George Attenborough, jeweller and pawnbroker of the Strand, attended upon an adjourned summons respecting the detention of a pair of diamond earrings and an emerald and diamond coulant alleged to have been illegally pawned and belonging to an elderly lady calling herself the Baroness Nelson and Bronté. The complainant who claimed to be the grand niece of Lord Nelson, deposed that the jewels worth 1,400 roubles each, where presented to her at St Petersburg by the Emperor and Empress of Russia, and were entrusted by her, for sale, to a youth named Russell King-Hall the son of Vice-Admiral Sir William Hall, who, she alleged, had pawned them and appropriated the money to his own use. Some of the jewels were traced by Sergeant Monk, E 46, to the defendant’s and some to another establishment in Ludgate Hill. Mr Attenborough now cross-examined the complainant great length respecting her career at St Petersburg and her relationship with the young man, Mr Hall, who is now abroad. She said she was a governess to several families of distinction in Russia; had never held any other capacity; was legally entitled to the rank of ‘Baroness’, although she had not always assumed the title; had often been to the police courts at St Petersburg, owing to repeated attempts to poison and assassinate her; but never as a prisoner or defendant; had once lived with a less distinguished family named Baird; had made a will at one time leaving 24,000 roubles and all her jewelry to the young man Hall, who lived in the Albany, and whom she had visited there on business, being determined that the dreadful Russians should never have a penny of her money; had never heard anyone challenge her right to the title, except someone who wrote to The Times, and said there was no such title, and whose letter she answered with a prompt denial of such an unfounded assertion. Mr Vaughan, stopping the cross-examination, observed that it had nothing to do with the charge. The only question was, did she intrust the jewels to a person who pawned them without her authority, and were those jewels in the defendant’s possession? The defendant urged that the previous history of the lady was of importance to the question if he could show that her career had been one of misrepresentation, and that there was such collusion with this young man, whom she had described as 18 or 21, in the disposal of the jewels as would justify the opinion that the defendant ought not to suffer by the transaction. He had already expressed his willingness to deliver up the goods, although it was as agent rather than as a pawnbroker that he had consented to advance money upon them to a gentleman of high position and apparent respectability, and upon representations which appeared to be reasonable. The questions which he desired to put to the lady were based upon a letter received by him from a perfect stranger residing in St Petersburg, and who had read the report of the case in the English papers. Admiral King-Hall, the father of the young man to whom the jewels were intrusted, said that his son was in his 23rd year and was now in Australia. The ‘Baroness’ had demanded £300 of witness as compensation for the loss of her jewels, and to ‘settle the matter out of court’, but he had informed her that his son was of age, had been connected with the Press at Lille, and was now in Australia, having caused him much anxiety. He gave her a present of £5 because she pleaded that she was destitute and he felt that his son might have wronged her, although he knew nothing of their relation with each other. Some letters written by the son to the Baroness were put in and read. They contained promises to see Sir Charles Dilke and Mr Cochrane about her ‘claims’, and to consult Count Schouvaloff and the Duchess of Edinburgh about her unjust expulsion form Russia. He referred to an article of jewelry on which he had got £5 for her, and said, “the rest is at the bank”. Mr Vaughan said this latter statement was a confirmation of the complainant’s case and ordered the jewels to be restored, there being little doubt that they had been illegally pawned; but no fault whatever could be found with the defendant in the matter. The jewels where then handed over to the complainant, who said that as we happen to be in England not in Russia she hoped that the letter received by Mr Attenborough from St Petersberg would be delivered up to her. Her character had been maligned most shamefully, and she had a right to know who her accuser was. She was about to enter into a statement respecting her expulsion from Russia, but Mr Vaughan said that he had no power to entertain the question and declined to read the letter, which Mr Attenborough handed up for the inspection of the magistrate. It was stated that the complainant is 73 years of age.