FROM POVERTY TO WEALTH.

Otago Witness, Issue 3330, 9 January 1918, Page 54

FROM POVERTY TO WEALTH.

STORIES OF UNEXPECTED WINDFALLS'. It is usually relatives who die abroad who enrich their kin by unexpected windfalls. In many cases persons have been raised from poverty to riches by legacies from testators on whom they have never set eyes, and of whose existence even they were'hardly cognisant. Vittorio Mariana, a ticket office clerk in the Tivoli Railway Station, in the suburbs of Rome, working at a salary equal to £1 a week, came in for a windfall exceeding £1,000,000. Forty years ago his uncle, Signor Allesandro Corrandoini, who was then Italian Consul at Alexandra, was obliged to fly for his life during an anti-Christian persecution. He went to Buenos Aires', where he succeeded in amassing a huge fortune. After his death it was found that his entire fortune had been left to his nephew, the ticket office clerk at Tivoli, who had been kept in absolute ignorance of the good luck awaiting him. When Mr Lightfoot, an Englishman long resident in France, died intestate, leaving an estate valued at over £60,000 lawyers searched far and wide an heir. At last he was found in John Kirkley Lightfoot, a journeyman printer, and grandson of the dead man, who knew nothing whatever about his benefactor, except that, some 50 years earlier, he had gone to France. Another French case, even more remarkable, was that of a lady who, after ignoring the existence of three humble relative.!, died and left £120,C00 to be divided amongst them. One of the lucky ones was a navvy, earning the equivalent of £1 a week, the second was a clerk in an oil factory, the third was a cattle dealer on a small scale. —£1,400,000 for Factory Girl.— It was a poor factory girl named Esther Sleight, of Kingston, New York, to whom Mrs Charles Vandewater,' widow of a Vancouver "lumber king," left her entire fortune valued at £1,400,000. When Mrs Vandewater made the girl's acquaintance she was working as a servant in an Atlantic City Hotel, and she was so attentive to the widow that a friendship sprang up between them, and this was maintained up to the widow's death. When this took place Miss Sleight was employed in a cigar factory and helping to support her parents. The "lumber king's" widow had no children, and in leaving her estate to 20-years-old Esther Sleight she wrote of her as the girl she regarded as "a dear daughter." The great wealth amassed by Frank A. Morrison, of California, was left to William Warren Morrison, a young lad employed in a Boston printing office, and who happened to be a grand nephew. Despite the fact that he had inherited the enormous fortune of £4,000,000, William Warren Morrison continued for some time to carry on at his job of trotting around with proofs, answering the telephone, and miscellaneous errands. —£15,000 for Revue Artiste.— By a few lines written in the paybook of a lieutenant of the Gordon Highlanders, who fell at Neuve Chapelle, a chorus girl -inherited £15,000. This was the sequel to a probate action heard in December of last year before Mr Justice Horridge. The ladv sought to have the contents of the will, which had been lost, established. Early in 1915, when in England on leave, the lieutenant showed her a will written at the end of an army paybook, which, she declared, read: "In the event of my death I leave all my property and effects to a time. Most of the legacy was in stpeks and shares. These amounted to about £15,000. Then there were two small properties in Ireland, and a house in South sea as well. When Mr William Ranse Whittingham, of Guestling Hill, near Hastings, died three years ago, it was found that he had left nearly all his estate of £45,000 in equal shares to his son and daughter. The son, however, had been lost sight of for some years, having sickened of doing nothing and gone to London to earn his own living independently of his parents or rich relatives. The missing heir was found in the top floor of a Soho lodginghouse, and he was earning his living as a taxi-driver. Some of the jobs he had filled included attendant in a picture house, film actor, mail van driver, and omnibus driver. When discovered, he owned a taxi cab, and was on the point of purchasing two additional cabs when the news of his good fortune was conveyed to him. —Windfall for Labourer.— While -working as a pavior's labourer for the Bolton Corporation, William Tunstall received information that his father-in-law in Australia, a man named Westwell, had left him his fortune of £2CO,COO. Westwell left Lancashire many years a°o for West Australia, where he amassea a fortune in the silk and pearl industries The will set forth that Tunstall should receive £30,000 in cash, and each of his four children £15,000, besides silk and pearl fishing plants, and an estate of several thousand acres, the whole being computed _ at £200,000. For some time after receiving news of his good fortune Tunstall continued to work as usual, earning a wage of 28s per week, and living in a cottage rented at 5s per week. Some years ago a pauper in a London workhouse became the heir to real and personal estate valued in the aggregate at £300,000. It appeared that a sister of the pauper's father died intestate, leaving a personality of £140,000, and a considerable amount of property in the West End of London valued at £160,000 more. This handsome fortune went begging for several years, when the next of kin was discovered in the person of the pauper referred to, a man well advanced in years, and who was an inmate of a workhouse

at the time he heard of his unexpected slice of luck.

After a hard life, and at the age of 59. Mr James Currie, of Blackpool, unexpectedly found himself in the possession of £20,000, left to him by a cousin whom he had only seen once, and that when he was just eight years of ago. • £lOO for Smiling.—

Among bequests by a Chelmsford lady was one of £IOO to the wife of a cashier at a local bank. The legacy was received simply for smiling pleasantly at Miss Hodges as they left church. " When told of her good fortune the bank cashier's wife said she used to sit near Miss Hodges in church, and as they came out she smiled at her and exchanged a few pleasant words. An elderly gentleman was walking down a Liverpool street when a sudden gust of wind blew his hat off and carried it down the street. A young man pursued and captured the hat and politely returned it to its owner, who expressed his hearty thanks, and offered to exchange cards. A warm friendship sprang up between the two men, and in the course of time the elder gentleman died, leaving his young ' friend a welcome legacy of £SOOO. A solicitor's clerk in Belfast was in the habit of giving a civil greeting to a crusty old gentleman who did business with his master. He would als_o help him off and on with his great cd'at and take charge of his umbrella or walking-stick. For these courtesies he rarely received so much as a grunt. Judge the clerk's surprise when on the death of the old gentleman he learned he had been left a legacy of £SOO. Befriending an Orphan. — A few years ago two women in Rossshire got the biggest surprise of their lives—each receiving a legacy of several hundreds of pounds. It was one act of kindness which brought them their good luck. Over 40 years ago an orphan lad in Easter Ross made up his mind to go to Canada, tut he had difficulty in finding his passage money. His going abroad was opposed by his brothers and sisters, who refused to help him in any shape or form. A young married woman whose home the lad frequently visited took pity on him, however, and fitted him out for his journey across the sea. Never a letter did he write home, and 40 years rolled by. Then word came that the orphan boy who 'had become a prosperous farmer had died and left a will in which it was set forth that his money was to go to the woman who had befriended him and her daughter —the latter being brought in becauee she had the same name as his mother.

Such are a few of some of the romances of sudden leaps to fortune which can be related. Amons; others which may be mentioned are those of the million pounds that fell to Richard Roberts, a Durham *andwichman, and that of Edward Corcoran, a Dublin saddler, who succeeded to £365,000 left to him by an old friend, John Sullivan, who in his youth had gone to Canada and "made good."