WEBBER MILLIONS

Greymouth Evening Star, 14 April 1927, Page 9

WEBBER MILLIONS

AN AUCKLAND CLAIMANT.

(Special to "Star.”)

AUCKLAND, April 14. Two* discoveries made late in life by Luke <Webbpr, retired dairyman, living at Newton, are that he is probably the gteat grandson of. a Dutch merchant, and ir so the grandfather of many yOttng people, nine of them in Auckland, Who would under an eccentric will made 200 years ago, share in the eState that has accumulated to the extent of £100,000,000. Several times in the last four years it lias been aseserted that when Edward Webber, merchant prince of Holland, died in New York early in the 18th century, he left an enormous sum to his seventh generation. The millions are about to be claimed by several people, who consider that they are direct descendants. There are at least 200 claimants in Australia, and a recent report from Adelaide has it that there are so many in that city that they have decided to call a general meeting and to send a Mr G. H. Hall to London to establish the claim. This report was brought under the notice of Webber by a daughter living in Sydney, and led him to write yesterday setting forth the credentials of the New Zealand Webbers. “It is not much good to Mrs Webber and myself, and in any case we cannot benefit,” he said yesterday. “But it is worth giving it a go for the sake of the grandchildren.”

It is the second time that the attention of Webber has been drawn to the possibility of his grandchildren being among the heirs to this strange fortune.