ECCENTRIC WILLS

Greymouth Evening Star, 13 June 1936, Page 2

ECCENTRIC WILLS

PET ANIMALS CONSIDERED.

A pension of 15/- a week for lifetor a horse. That was the provision made in the will recently, of Mr Henry R. I. Webster, a manufacturer in the Midlands, writes T.H., in the Yorkshire “Weekly Post.” Lucky horse! But not as lijcky as a dog owned by the late Miss Harriet Jay, author of “When Knights Were Bold.” When Miss Jay died four years ago she left a pension of 30./- a week for the upkeep of her dog. Nor as lucky as an Ealing tabby' cat with the imposing name, “Dudly Thomas Ryder,” which .received two inheritances, each of £2O a year, from two sisters who had been its joint owners.

Many strange bequests have been left during the last few years. Probably one of the strangest was that of a Carlisle woman who died about 18 months ago. She left £l2OO for the upkeep of her cat provided it had no kittens. If a family arrived, it was stipulated, the money should go to the woman’s relatives. Pussy is still alive, but she has lost her inheritance.

When Mr P. K. L. Roche, of Hendon, died about four years ago, he left a fortune of £51,499. Of that, £45,000 was bequeathed to animals, and the balance went to his wife and family with whom he had lived happily for many years. Stranger still was the provision in the will of a Mrs Wendel, member of a family of famous New York millionaires, who left her entire mansion to her pet dog and stipulated that butlers, footmen, and other servants should carry on as usual until the dog died.

In the archives of Somerset House scores of queer wills are to be found. One made last year bequeathed £5O eaqh to three members of Rochford Golf Club “to provide a Sunday morning remembrance of, many happy reunions at the nineteenth hole.” Another similar one was that of an angler who left £2O to provide an outing for the members of his club, at which, he hoped good sport would bo enjoyed “and - no mourning worn.” Cruelty in l wills is a commonplace. “To my wife—one farthing, to be sent in an unstamped envelope,” is a typical example. Another includes the paragraph: “My estate would have been considerably larger had it not been for my unfortunate marriage with the cleverest-known legal daylight robber. My associations with this perambulating human vinegarcruet I consider to have cost me considerably over £400.” Scores of husbands, in their wills, forbid their widows to remarry on pain of forfeiture of their inheritance. But a married woman directed her executors to seek out “some nice, good, pretty girl” who would make an affectionate second wife for her husband.