A Wapping butcher's son claimed the Tichborne baronetcy, and a 188-day perjury trial sent him to prison for 14 years

Roger Tichborne, born in Paris on 5 January 1829, was heir to a Hampshire baronetcy whose estates, including the 2,290-acre Tichborne Park, paid over £20,000 a year. In April 1854 a capsized boat from his ship, the Bella, was found off Brazil. He was presumed drowned. His mother, Lady Tichborne, advertised for him from 1863. In 1865 a bankrupt butcher in Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, calling himself Thomas Castro, was identified as Roger. He reached England on Christmas Day 1866. His mother accepted him in Paris and paid him £1,000 a year. The title had passed to Roger's brother Alfred, who died on 22 February 1866. Alfred's son Henry was born on 28 May 1866, three months after his father's death, and became the 12th baronet as an infant. The Claimant sued to eject the estate's tenant. The civil trial opened on 11 May 1871 and ran over 100 days. Over 100 people swore he was Roger. Lord Bellew testified that Roger had tattoos the Claimant did not. On 5 March 1872 the Claimant abandoned the case and was arrested for perjury. The criminal trial ran 188 court days. On 28 February 1874 the jury found he was Arthur Orton, born in Wapping in 1834, and he was sentenced to 14 years. The two trials cost close to £200,000, of which the estates bore about £90,000. Released in 1884, he confessed in 1895, retracted, and died destitute in 1898. The baronetcy became extinct in 1968.