VAST LONDON ESTATE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18711, 17 May 1924, Page 11

VAST LONDON ESTATE.

■ —, AUCKLAND : woman's CLAIM. . p-} DESCENT FROM JOHN ANGELL jfesN . P'FBAMER OF. STRANGE WILL. II QUAINT philanthropy. I '& claimant to one of the wealthiest estates in London is at present living in Auckland. She is Miss Garvey, of 266, Jervois Road. It was by reading in the New Zealand Herald of Saturday last of another claimant at present resident in London that Miss Garvey was induced to tell of her family's connection with the fortune. •_ The property involved is the Angell • Estates, which include about 50 square miles of South London. The area involved lies principally between Kennington and Croydon, embracing Brixton, Streatham, Stockwell, Lambeth, and Balham, All these districts are very closely populated, and the rent roll to-day must be enormous. • It is to this princely estate that Miss Garvey avers she is one of the heirs-at-law. It iB 140 years since the original owner, John Angell died, but Miss Garvey says her father possesses papers, deeds, and documents showing unbroken descent from the mail who nude a will so carelessly in 1774 that his estate has been in Chancery ever since. No legal action has bo far placed any of Angell's descendants in possession. " All the Deeds Complete." "Yes my father has all the deeds complete," 'said Miss Garvey yesterday morninn "I have had it drummed into my ears since I was a baby that we were heirs to the Angell millions. And yet, although we have all this money or the right to it—l have to go out to work. It makes me feel wild with fate. But j vou never know how life will work, she : proceeded more hopefully. I may be | lifted from comparative poverty to millions. ... j... "Father made a-fight for the property ' ' some 20 years ago before coming out to ■ New Zealand. He had not enough money - to continue the action and had to abandon it. He is'now living with >my brother at Waikaia, Switzers, Otago. Miss Garvey traces her descent _ from Miss Angell, daughter of the original John Angell. "Miss Angell," said Miss ' Garvey, "married a Hatfield. A daughter of this union married a Wadcungton, of Kettlethorp Hall, Lincolnshire. My great-grandmother was a child of this marriage and she married the , late . °°" Garvey, of Lincoln Cathedral. His son and my grandfather was the Rev. J. Oarvey, of luUbeck, Lincoln Finally there is his son and my father, Mr. John Francis Garvey. My mother was a niece of the late Dr. Waddington, formerly practising in the Waikato. Mr. Mrs. Garvey thus both trace tack •through the Waddinctons and Hatfields to the original Angeil. Family in New Zealand" Other members of the family in New Zealand are Miss Garvey's married sister at Saddle Hill. Dunedm and three brothers, Mr. Waddingten Garvey of Te Awamutu, Mr. Garvey, teller in the Bank of New Zealand, Dunedm, and the one mentioned earlier as being Dress father at WdtaU. It they could press • their claim to* a successful issue, they would be the ■ wealthiest family m new died in 178-1 and since ♦hpn there have been several law su.rs SELg £ hU «SL Indeed ttoi. not - surprising when its contents are el^l n6 will which is dated September 1774 gave te the. Archbishop of CanterWi,"ho, d'ye for S tto? being gto'tZ, of IS ont of jFotaI Anil's Estates at Ewell and Lambeth. £050 out of 1 the "collections of the Spurn li?h at Newcastle, and £250 out of the lightLouses at Sunderland.' +T-nat These sums were to be held in trust end to be paid half-yearr for the support of "a college .5, society of seven decayed or. unprovided gentlemen by descent," two clergymen, an organist, Bix sinrine men, 12 choristers, a verger, a chapS clerk, an d three domestic servants, namely, a butler, baker, and groom. . Queer Provisions in Will. The seven beneficiaries wore to . be called "Gentlemen of St. John College, near Stockwell," and one of the seven was to be styled president. he win provided for "the gentlemen and the.two clergymen to eat together, .he charges SX board and liquor being calculated at £26 per annum each. c "Their clothing,'' it is added was to be a light-coloured cloth, all of one colZr '» ■ for which, and for a hat, which chftil have a narrow gold-lace, is allowed shall have an um B This was the style Stat whfch John Angell himself usually ""tM gentlemen were to be chosen out of the counties of Surrey, Kent, Northfenfford Salop Hertford, Leicester Bedford' Cambridge, Buckingham, and Worcester, Carmarthen, Brecknock, and °j<sr!wn- left £6000 to build the ebllece - the of a P iec ° ground at Stockwell, called ■ Burdenbuah. g Hot built to. his lifetime, it was te •be commenced immediately after his burial. If the college should! be disS by Government, the will provided that the revenues should revert to tie niseZre of the estate. The college at possessors of tne t»iu. (Stockwell has never been built.