Cheese v Lovejoy
A will is revoked by destruction only if there is both an act of destruction and an intention to revoke, so crossing out the will and throwing it away, without destroying it, did not revoke it.
Facts
A testator drew lines through parts of his will, wrote on the back This is revoked, and threw it among a heap of waste papers in his sitting room. A servant took it out and kept it in the kitchen, where it remained until the testator's death some years later. The question was whether the will had been revoked.
Legal principle
The Court of Appeal held that the will had not been revoked. James LJ said that all the destroying in the world without intention will not revoke a will, nor all the intention in the world without destroying: there must be the two. Under section 20 of the Wills Act 1837, a will may be revoked by burning, tearing or otherwise destroying it with the intention of revoking it, and drawing lines through it and writing on it did not amount to destroying it. Nor did the words written on the back amount to a revocation in writing, because they were not executed with the formalities of a will.
Related cases on revocation, construction and failure of gifts
- Re Adams [1990] Ch 601
- Re Cleaver [1981] 1 WLR 939
- Gill v Gill [1909] P 157
- Re Goodchild [1997] 1 WLR 1216
- Healey v Brown [2002] EWHC 1405 (Ch), [2002] WTLR 849
- Re Jones [1976] Ch 200
- Kell v Charmer (1856) 23 Beav 195
- Olins v Walters [2008] EWCA Civ 782, [2009] Ch 212
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