Charles Day, one of Aileen’s lawyers, submitted to the court that the proceeding was one of the worst pieces of judicial tyranny ever attempted in this country; that it was purely a conspiracy to get into the house by illegal means, for the purpose of forcing a sale of the house and pictures and destroying Cowperwood’s intention and desire to leave the mansion and its contents as a museum for the public.
However, at the same time that her New York attorneys were trying to prevent the temporary receivership being made permanent, her lawyers in Chicago were attempting to have a receiver appointed there for the entire estate.
A clear title to the additional art gallery, sold as a result of the foreclosure proceedings of the Reciprocal Life Insurance Company, had never been obtained, and after four months the insurance company filed a suit against Receiver Cunningham and against the title company which refused to take title to the art gallery.
In addition, while the reorganization committee of Chicago capitalists were working on a plan with representatives of the House of Brenton Diggs, the bondholders of the three underlying companies demanded that bills of foreclosure be filed. Contending that the Cook County Court had jurisdiction over all of the Cowperwood property, Aileen’s lawyers asserted that the Circuit Court had no jurisdiction. The judge of the said Circuit Court admitted as much by announcing that it would withdraw as soon as Jamieson succeeded in taking charge of the New York property.
However, five months following Aileen’s appeal to The United States Circuit Court of Appeals, a two-to-one decision was reached, which made permanent the temporary receivership of William H. Cunningham. Nonetheless, a dissenting judge contended that the Federal Court could not meddle in probate matters, which were the business of the State. The agreeing judges, on the other hand, claimed the receiver should remain until a reasonable time had elapsed—as judged by the Circuit Court—for creditors to ask the Surrogate Court to appoint an administrator, at which time they would turn over the property to him. At the same time, a temporary injunction preventing Jamieson from applying for ancillary letters was dissolved.
And now there were endless delays, courts, claims to be satisfied, and decisions to be made. And opposed to these, a legally uninformed widow, whose total supply of money, left her by her dead husband, was being used in defence of her complicated rights. And lying ill, her health completely shattered, and her actual means now dangerously low.
Therefore, Aileen’s lawyers, together with Jamieson’s lawyers, and the legal representatives of the London Underground, arranged a settlement whereby she would receive $800,000 in lieu of her dower rights, and as a part of her personal estate due her. A petition was filed in the Probate Court in Chicago for confirmation of this unrecorded agreement.
The Inheritance Tax Appraiser pronounced a total value of the estate, four years after the death of Cowperwood, at $11,467,370,65. Hearing on the motion to have the appraiser withhold his report was taken up and argued in Judge Roberts’ chambers. Mr. Day, appearing for Aileen, claimed that if Judge Severing confirmed the agreement, nothing remained but to sell the assets of the estate. Day claimed the appraisal was too high, both in value of the art collection at $4,000,000 and of the furniture, which, he said, above the second floor, was not worth more than $1,000.
Then Jamieson applied to Surrogate Henry for ancillary letters in New York. At approximately the same time that Aileen lost her suit to prevent him from obtaining these ancillary letters, Judge Severing confirmed the agreement between her and Jamieson whereby she was to receive $800,000 and the widow’s one-third of all personal property after the debts were paid. Under this agreement, Aileen transferred to Receiver Cunningham the house, art gallery, pictures, stable, etc., to be auctioned off, and Jamieson, more than four years after probation proceedings had been begun in Chicago, was appointed ancillary executor in New York. He should have stopped proceedings for the auction of the property in New York, but he did not. Included in the gallery were 300 pictures valued at $1,500,000, among them works of Rembrandt, Hobbema, Teniers, Ruysdael, Holbein, Frans Hals, Rubens, Van Dyck, Reynolds, and Turner.
And yet, out in Chicago, and at the very same time, lawyers for Jamieson were going before Judge Severing, in the Probate Court, claiming that the only way to save the estate from insolvency was to turn over the
$4,494,000 in bonds of the Union Traction Company to the reorganization committee for the purpose of forming a new company, and Aileen’s lawyers were contending the action had taken place secretly and without the sanction of the court. At this point Judge Severing announced that he did not believe he could enter an order to that effect unless both sides agreed to it. Hence action was postponed indefinitely to give attorneys for both sides opportunity to reach an agreement.
More delay! Delay! Delay!
Corporations! Corporations! Corporations!
Decisions! Decisions! Decisions!
Courts! Courts! Courts!
Until, in fact, five years had passed, ending in the auction of everything that had belonged to Frank Cowperwood, the proceeds of which, including all the real property, amounted to $3,610,150!
Chapter 75
Five years of wandering through the endless wilderness of law, lawyers, corporations, courts, and judges had left Aileen with the painful realization that at the end of whatever steps she took in any direction, there was nothing. In fact, the sum and substance of all those years and efforts was that she lived alone, was visited by no true friend, legally defeated in one honest claim after another, until at last she fully realized that the dream of grandeur which this house represented had vanished into thin air. There remained only, as her part of the estate, the $800,000 and the widow’s one-third of all personal property after debts were paid, in return for her transfer and surrender to Receiver Cunningham of the mansion, art gallery, pictures, and everything else. The law and the corporations and the executors, like wolves, were constantly on her trail, and finally they had caught up with her to the place where she now had to move out of her own home in order that it could be auctioned off to strangers.
But even before she could move into the apartment she had chosen on Madison Avenue, the house was overrun with agents of the auctioneers, tagging articles of every description with their appropriate catalogue numbers. Wagons drove up to take away paintings—300 of them—to the Liberty Art Galleries on Twenty-third Street. Collectors came and sauntered about, speculating. She was ill and depressed, having to listen to Receiver Cunningham explain that it was his duty to make a complete inventory of the house and gallery and submit it to the court.
There followed announcements in the newspapers to the effect that beginning Wednesday of the following week and continuing for three days and evenings, the furniture, bronzes, statuary, ceiling and overdoor panels, and art objects of all descriptions, including the large library, were to be disposed of. The place: 864 Fifth Avenue; the auctioneer: J. L. Donahue.