Docket No. 93.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
on behalf of
Gladys Mary Baylies,
Claimant,
v.
GERMANY.
PARKER, Umpire, rendered the decision of the Commission.
This case is before the Umpire for decision on a certificate of the two National Commissioners[a] certifying their disagreement.
Charles F. Fowles, a British subject, who had since 1902 resided in New York City, where he was engaged in business as an art dealer, was a passenger lost with the Lusitania. He was accompanied by his wife, who was also lost. He was survived by two daughters, Gertrude Frances Browne (now Gertrude Frances French), then the wife of a British subject, and Gladys Mary Baylies, the claimant herein, who was then and has ever since been the wife of an American national. No claim is put forward of the damages growing out of the death of Mrs. Fowles, and the record fails to disclose whether she was the mother or stepmother of Mrs. Baylies.
No claim is made for the value of personal property lost with Mr. and Mrs. Fowles. No claim is put forward on behalf of Gertrude Frances French, who, it seems, presented her claim, for damages suffered by her through the death of her father, to the British Foreign Office.
The decedent, Charles F. Fowles, who was 49 years of age at the time of his death, was a successful business man and left a substantial estate. To each of his two daughters and to each of eight other relatives, all of the latter residing in the British Isles, he bequeathed $5,000.00, or a total of $50,000.00. A life interest in thirty-eight and three-fourths per cent (38¾%) of his residuary estate was bequeathed to each of his daughters and the remaining twenty-two and one-half percent (22½%) was divided between their children. The decedent was accustomed to contribute $200 per month to the claimant, who was 26 years of age at the time of his death.
To the extent that contributions made to her by claimant’s father during his life and those which would probably have been made to claimant but for Germany’s act causing his death were the direct fruits of the personal efforts of the decedent, whose producing power was destroyed by his death, the claimant has suffered pecuniary damages which Germany is obligated to pay. But to the extent that such actual or probable contributions were derived as income from the estate of the decedent which, on his death, would inure to the benefit of claimant she suffered no pecuniary damages.
Applying the rules announced in the Lusitania Opinion, in Administrative Decision No. VI, and in the other decisions of this Commission to the facts as disclosed by the record herein, the Commission decrees that under the Treaty of Berlin of August 25, 1921, and in accordance with its terms the Government of Germany is obligated to pay to the Government of the United States on behalf of Gladys Mary Baylies the sum of ten thousand dollars ($10,000.00) with interest thereon at the rate of five per cent per annum from November 1, 1923.
Done at Washington February 25, 1925.
EDWIN B. PARKER,
Umpire.
—-
[a] Dated February 11, 1925.
You must log in to post a comment.