OLD MAN’S HOARD

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 53, 26 November 1930, Page 13

OLD MAN’S HOARD

Fortune Among Papers BANK-SLIPS FOUND Large Sum on Fixed Deposit Dominion Special Service. Auckland, November 25. A surprising case of comparative wealth discovered by the merest chance occurred in Auckland within the past few days. Earlier this month an elderly working man died suddenly in a city lodginghouse, where he had rented a room for some considerable time. An inquest was ordered and the police took charge of the man’s effects. There was not much in his room, and apparently nothing of value. A search, however, led to the discovery of a bank book showing a credit balance of about £250. On learning that a local solicitor walj the man’s executor, the police handed over to him the bank book, an old watch, and a few other articles that alone seemed to be worth preserving. . About three years earlier the man had approached the solicitor and bad made a will leaving his property, the amount of which he did not state, to relatives in Ireland. > Among the. effects received from the police was an old bag containing what seemed to be worthless papers and other odds and ends of rubbish. The solicitor decided that .as executor it was his duty to make a careful examination _of what the man had left. He accordingly set a clerk to sorting the papers, which consisted mostly of old bills and lottery To his surprise the clerk discovered among the rubbish bank deposit slips showing that - deceased had a total sum of no less than £2300 to his credit on fixed deposit in the Bank of New Zealand in Auckland and Melbourne. The relations in Ireland will have every cause to thank the lucky chance that preserved to them a legacy which would otherwise doubtless have been disposed of in whatever way banks deal with long unclaimed moneys in their charge. .