Minister Hill to the Secretary of State .
The Hague, Netherlands , January 23, 1906 .
Sir: The number of communications from various parts of the United States received by this legation regarding alleged estates in [Page 1172] Holland, and in particular regarding one of these known as the “Metzger estate,” having multiplied during the past few months, it seems proper to bring this matter to the attention of the Department of State.
I have, therefore, the honor respectfully to call to your notice the apparent trading upon the credulity of unsuspecting persons at present going on in the United States.
In this connection permit me to refer to my predecessor, Mr. Newel’s dispatch, with inclosures, No. 109, of May 4, 1898, and to other earlier correspondence on the subject contained in a pamphlet entitled “Estates in Holland,” issued by the Department of State, and of which a number of copies were furnished to the legation. In this pamphlet the Netherlands law of 1852 providing for the establishment of a commission to settle claims against estates of deceased persons, as well against the Government, is described and the method of procedure explained on pages 3 and 4.a This law provides for the final disposal of all estates that were in the hands of the commission, beginning with the date of its establishment, within five years and some months after 1852, when the law went into effect. From this it is evident that all such ancient estates, even if they had ever existed, would now under the present law have irrevocably escheated to the State. It may not, however, be amiss to add that so far investigation has shown that these estates never did exist, except in the imagination.
A recent letter from Gresham, Oreg., written by a Mr. G. W. Metzger, secretary of the Oregon Society United Descendants of Baron Theobald Metzger von Weibnom, shows that in that State an organization of the supposed heirs has been formed for the joint prosecution of their claims. The writer asks, on behalf of his society and “several others in the United States,” whether the legation would “consider any proposition relative to an investigation of the case.” Similar letters are being constantly received from Colorado, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and other States. The value of the propertv is stated variously to be from $28,000,000 to $100,000,000. A clipping from the Gazette, of York, Pa., of November 24, 1905, recently inclosed, describes a meeting of 75 heirs in that place under the leadership of “Attorney W. E. Bradley and Mrs. Mary V. McDonald,” both of Philadelphia. This article also states that each individual was allowed to contribute what he thought proper toward the prosecution of his claim.
As this matter has assumed such large proportions, and as it seems reasonable to suppose that a large number of unsuspecting people are contributing money to an enterprise in which there is absolutely no hope of return, I have taken the liberty of setting forth the true status of all such visionary claims and of submitting the matter to the department for such action, if any, as it may think proper to take toward warning the public as to the unreliability of the statements made by persons soliciting funds for the prosecution of claims to estates in this country.
I have, etc.,