Now, Sir Robert Peel died in 1850, in which year a gentleman named Laurie obtained two royal licences to change his name; first to Northdale, and then to Nuthall, “in compliance with the will of the late Catherine Jack, spinster, of Sloane-street.” In 1851 a lady named Braham was permitted by royal licence to assume the name of Medows, on the plea that she was “the co-heiress expectant” of her aged grandmother, who was so called. In 1852 a gentleman named Rust was granted a royal licence to assume his wife’s maiden name, D’Eye, “out of respect to her memory.” In 1853 a Mr. Penny was allowed to assume the name of Harwood, “by wish of his mother, out of respect to his grandmother.” In 1854 Thomas Clugas, of Guernsey, was permitted by royal licence “to use his paternal name of Clucas.” In 1855 a Miss Galston was allowed to assume the name of Stepney, “out of respect to her maternal ancestors in general.” It is difficult to conceive more trifling grounds than these on which royal licences have been granted in the above-quoted instances.
The authorities are, however, divided in their opinions. The Lord Chancellor (in 1863) refused to recognise officially a change of name, because the applicant had not obtained the royal licence to bear that name, and the arms connected with it; while, on the other hand, the Secretary of State for the Home Department has declared that such a licence is unnecessary, and that a name can be legally assumed without it. But the claim to the new name assumed can only be established “by usage of such a length of time as to give the change a permanent character,” a reservation which has clogged the undoubted right of every Englishman to assume any name he pleases, provided the assumption be made bonâ fide, and with reasonable publicity, while it has the effect of placing everybody at the mercy of any ill-conditioned official who may take pleasure in obstructing him and opposing him.
Reference to the London Gazette proves that Royal licences have hitherto been constantly issued from capricious motives, and on no fixed principle whatever. Doubtless, in many cases, they have been granted in furtherance of testamentary conditions connected with property; but they have been quite as often granted merely to enable applicants to avoid names which were distasteful to them, and to assume others which were more agreeable to them.
As the qualification which Sir George Grey and the Lord Chancellor appear desirous of affixing to the right to change name, without the assistance of a Royal licence, virtually cancels that right altogether in a vast number of cases, it becomes, in consequence, highly important that the rules by which those indulgences are obtainable, and the amount of the fees which must be paid for them, should be exactly made known.
A Parliamentary Return states that since 1850 415 applications have been made for royal licence for a change of name, and 398 licences have been granted. There is a stamp duty of 50l. on every such licence if the change of name is made in compliance with the injunction of any will or settlement, and of 10l. if the application is voluntary. The fees payable are stated to be 10l. 2s. 6d. on a change of name only; 13l. 12s. 6d. on a change of name and arms; and 1l. 7s. 6d. for every additional name inserted in a licence; which fees are paid into the Exchequer. But the return is described as being made only “so far as relates to the Home Secretary’s office,” and therefore does not appear to include fees at the Heralds’ College.
To conclude—it does not appear that the Queen either claims or exercises any special prerogative whatever connected with the subject of change of surname; or that a Royal licence is anything more than the recognition in the highest quarter of a voluntary act already accomplished. Its recipient is not even compelled to bear for a day the surname which it authorizes him to assume; nor are other people enjoined by it to recognise him by that name, if they are not inclined to do so. The case of the Right Hon. R. C. Dundas, who in 1836 obtained a Royal licence, in compliance with the conditions of a Will by which he inherited a considerable estate, to bear the name of Christopher only, and who, in spite of that licence and without either procuring its revocat on or obtaining the grant of a fresh one, has since sat in Parliament under the surname of Nisbet, and who now bears the surname of Hamilton, assumed proprio motu, completely establishes this point.