WON £30,000 IN IRISH SWEEP

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 20 April 1935, Page 16

WON £30,000 IN IRISH SWEEP

LOST MOST OF IT IN 3 YEARS FAILURE AS A FARMER - From Our Own Correspondent. (By Air Mail.) LONDON, March 30. Three years ago this month a foreman ganger employed at a Cheshire factory, won £30’,000 in the Irish sweep ever Forbra’s victory in the Grand National. He died last October, and his will, just published, shows estate valued at £2015, w’ith net personality nil. Behind these bare facts lies yet another tragic story of misfortune and calamity that has beset successful sweepstake winners. The “lucky” winner of £30,000 was George Herbert Cuffin, who died, aged 58, at Meadow House Farm, near Chester —for shortly after his good fortune he had left his employment to take up fanning.

His widow, with three children still at home, does not know' whether she will have to go out to work again. All that is left of Mr Cuffin’s £30,000 is a farmhouse and 177 acres of land, but Mrs Cuffin wall not know how much she has until it is sold.

Mr Cuffin was living happily V'itb his family when he won his great prize. Just before he had been disabled at his work and had been awarded a sum as compensation. When he drew' Forbra, a fancied horse, in the Grand National, he decided to keep the whole of the ticket for himself.

A few months later, in August, Cuffin W'as summoned at Chester for neglect to maintain liis w'ife and children.

“Since winning the Irish sweep,” Mrs Cuffin’s legal representative stated, “he has been drinking heavily and his frequently ill-treated his w'ife, who complains that he has been associating wdth another woman.”

Mrs Cuffin, in evidence, said, “I know this there was more comfort without the money than with it. I wish we had never w'on it.”