Legal Case Summary
Raffles v Wichelhaus (1864) 2 Hurl & C 906
Contract – Mutual Mistake – Contract Formation – Void Contract – Enforceability – Objective Test – Certainty – Breach of Contract – Meeting of the Minds –
Facts
The complainant, Mr Raffles, offered to sell an amount of Surat cotton to the defendant, Mr Wichelhaus. This Surat cotton would be brought to Liverpool by a ship from Bombay, India. This ship was called the Peerless, but there were two ships that had this name. The complainant and the defendant were both thinking about a different Peerless ship when they agreed to make the sale. One of the ships was due to leave Bombay in October, which was what the defendant had thought for his Surat cotton delivery, but the complainant was referring to the ship that was to leave in December. When the Surat cotton arrived in Liverpool, Mr Wichelhaus refused to pay, as in his mind, it was months late.
Issues
The complainant sued the defendant for breach of contract. The issue in this case was whether there was an enforceable contract between the parties.
Decision/Outcome
It was held that the contract between the complainant and defendant was not enforceable. When the contract was being discussed, there was ambiguity in the Peerless and what ship was being referred to, as well as no agreement on the terms on the sale. There had been no consensus ad idem or meeting of the minds between the parties to form a binding contract. The objective test made it clear that a reasonable person would not have been able to identify with certainty what ship had been agreed on.
Updated 20 March 2026
This case summary remains accurate as a description of the 1864 decision in Raffles v Wichelhaus (1864) 2 Hurl & C 906 and its doctrinal significance in relation to mutual mistake and contract formation. The legal principles described — mutual mistake negating consensus ad idem, and the application of the objective test to determine whether a contract was formed — continue to form part of English contract law and are still cited in academic and judicial contexts.
Readers should note, however, that the precise role and limits of the objective test in contract formation have been further developed and refined in subsequent case law, including Smith v Hughes (1871) LR 6 QB 597 and more recently in cases such as Chartbrook Ltd v Persimmon Homes Ltd [2009] UKHL 38. The objective test is now the dominant approach to contract formation in English law, and the extent to which pure subjective mutual mistake can void a contract — particularly where one party’s interpretation was objectively reasonable — is a nuanced area. Students should be cautious about treating Raffles v Wichelhaus as a straightforward authority for a broad doctrine of mutual mistake voiding contracts, as later law has significantly qualified when mistake will have this effect. No statutory changes have affected the core common law principles discussed in this article.
