Earl must pay up for 'manufactured' land dispute

The Earl of Cardigan was ordered to pay costs of £80,000 yesterday after a judge threw out the landowner's attempt to prevent a neighbour using a gravel path on his estate.

Mr Justice Pumfrey said the three-year dispute between the earl, David Michael James Brudenell-Bruce, and Harry Smith, a resident of his 4,500-acre estate, had been "manufactured" to put pressure on his neighbour to sell him land.

The High Court was told the old Etonian – a descendent of the man who led the Charge of the Light Brigade – had tried to ban Mr Smith from using a private road in Savernake Forest, Wiltshire, home of the Cardigan family. But Mr Smith, who bought The Keeper's Cottage in Durley from the earl's family in 1975, took legal action against Lord Cardigan so he could use the one-mile short cut.

The judge said this dispute, and a refusal by the earl to consent to building work on the cottage, coincided with Mr Smith's refusal to sell land to the estate on favourable terms. He quoted a letter from Lord Cardigan to Mr Smith in September 1998, after the earl's request to buy the land had been turned down. It read: "You are, of course, at liberty to sell (or not sell) as much or as little of your property as you see fit ... I am afraid though, that you are not at liberty to pull a stunt like that on the estate ... accordingly, with immediate effect, you are hereby declared persona non grata on all land owned by the Savernake Estate."

Mr Justice Pumfrey said: "The earl's warfare with Mr Smith really related to the questions concerning other land entirely, and the complaint concerning Mr Smith's use of the path was on the evidence purely for the purpose of putting pressure on Mr Smith in the context of the other dispute."

The earl claimed Mr Smith never had right of way over the land and made repeated attempts to stop him driving along the track.

The dispute had grown to such a degree that Mr Smith's nanny, Dawn Hickey, had feared for the safety of the three-month-old twins under her care when the earl drove his car within feet of their pram.

The earl has previously lost three county court cases trying to stop people having access to the forest. He is also in dispute with Raymond Hudson, 75, a parish councillor who rents a £200,000 detached stone cottage in Durley.

The earl has begun legal proceedings against Mr Hudson for alleged road rage. He said he obtained a written undertaking from Mr Hudson not to "use violence against" or "threaten, harass or pester" him, but he said Mr Hudson had refused to sign a similar undertaking not to re-enter Savernake Forest. The earl will now pursue an injunction to prohibit Mr Hudson.

Mr Justice Pumfrey ruled that Mr Smith had a right to walk his dogs and drive his vehicle along the track without interference from the earl. Thomas Seymour, representing Lord Cardigan, said his client found the latest case a "humbling experience".