WIDOW’S LENGTHY WILL.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVI, Issue 26, 30 December 1925, Page 15

WIDOW’S LENGTHY WILL.

TOTAL OF 10G6 PAGES. PREVIOUS RECORD BROKEN. There was admitted to probate at Somerset House recently a will which, for length, breaks all previous records. It is that of Mrs Frederica Evelyn Stilwell Cook, who died last January at the age of GB. She was the widow of Mr Wyndham Francis Cook, of tlio drapery firm of Cook, Son and Co., of St. Paul’s Churchyard. He died in May, 1905, at the age of 44, leaving estate valued at £1,224,381. Mrs Cook left unsettled property valued at £20,723, with net personalty £17,180. The will is dated October 17, 1919, and a codicil, March 2, 1924, and these, as well as a long list of specific bequests, are practically all in Mrs Cook’s handwriting. Tho. testamentary documents consist of some sheets of foolscap and four large books, botnd in blue leather, vith additional otter covers, and with the edges heavily gilt. Two of the books each contain 702 pages, and the others 40G pages each. They contain what is practically a priced inventory. Altogether the will contains 1066 probate folios of 90 words each, or a total of 95,940 words. An official copy of this will cost £79 6s 6d. Hitherto the record for length has been held for somo yea-s by a dccument running to slightly over 410 2>robato folios. Tlio eighth Duke of Devonshire left a very bulky will of 197 folios, and the late Lord Barton a will and codicil of il6 probate id,os, but this was swolien to nearly 400 folios by attached inventories, etc. The smallest will in the Registry is on a sailor’s identity disc under 1-} inches in diameter. It is that of teaman Skinner, who was lost in H.M.S. Indefatigable, in 1916, and is very finely engraved with some 40 words constituting the will. Tho engraving is so delicate that it can only be distinguished by tho aid of a magni' vicg glass, but it was admitted to probate as it complied with ail legal requirements. Tho snortest will, from the point of view of the number of woids, is ono which simply says: “All to mother,” hut was duly signed and witnessed, and was admitted to bate.