Daniels v Trefusis: 1914

Mr Trefusis agreed with an agent called Mr Girdlestone to buy a house for andpound;700. Girdlestone was in fact acting for a Mr Daniels but later claimed to be a principal who had bought from Mr Daniels for andpound;600 and was sub-selling to Mr Trefusis at an increased price. Girdlestone commenced an action against Mr Daniels for specific performance of the agreement said to have been made between them. In the latter action (later dismissed) Mr Daniels’ solicitors wrote to Mr Trefusis’ solicitors asking for a short statement from Mr Trefusis as to what had occurred between him and Mr Girdlestone. The solicitors sent an unsigned statement by Mr Trefusis as to the verbal agreement he had made with Mr Girdlestone, and, later, replies to certain questions which Mr Daniels’ solicitors had posed. The accompanying letter said that they enclosed the questions with what were, and were said by them to be, Mr Trefusis’ answers. These answers were not, however, signed by him. It was common ground that the statement, answers and accompanying letter were sufficient to constitute a note or memorandum for the purposes of the Statute. When Daniels as vendor began an action against Trefusis as buyer Trefusis alleged, inter alia, that there was no memorandum satisfying the Statute.
Mr Trefusis contended that the solicitors were not in fact acting as his agents in providing the statements or proof from him, but were acting on behalf of the plaintiff, and that in any case their authority did not extend to signing a note or memorandum of the contract on the defendant’s behalf. Sargant J held that the first objection was untenable and that the second also failed. The solicitors had authority to forward to the plaintiff’s solicitors the documents which they sent. It did not matter that they may not have been contemplating that those documents would form a memorandum for the purposes of the Statute.
‘The unintentional by-product of satisfying the Statute may be produced as completely by a note or memorandum signed by an agent of the party as by a note or memorandum signed by the party himself, provided, of course, that the agent had authority to sign the particular note or memorandum’.

Citations:

[1914] 1 Ch 788

Statutes:

Statutre of Frauds 1677 4

Jurisdiction:

England and Wales

Cited by:

CitedGolden Ocean Group Ltd v Salgaocar Mining Industries Pvt Ltd and Another ComC 21-Jan-2011
The defendants sought to set aside orders allowing the claimants to serve proceedings alleging repudiation of a charterparty in turn allowing a claim against the defendants under a guarantee. The defendant said the guarantee was unenforceable under . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Contract

Updated: 08 May 2022; Ref: scu.430068