MAN WON £30,000

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 18687, 22 April 1935, Page 7

MAN WON £30,000

GONE IN THREE YEARS FAILURE AS FARMER LONDON. March 30. Three years ago this month a foreman ganger, employed at a Cheaiiire factory, won £30,000 *in the Irish sweep over Forbra's victory in the Grand National. lie died last October, and his will, just published, shows estate valued at £2015, with net personalty 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 Coffin, who died, aged 68, at Meadow House Farm, near Chester—for shortly after his good fortune he had left his employment to take up farming. 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. Coffin's £30,000, is a farmhouse and 177 acres of land, but Mrs. Cuff in will not know how much she has until it is sold.

Mr. Cuffin was living happily with bis family when ho 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 mouths later, in August, Coffin was summoned at Chester tor neglect to maintain his wife and her children.

"Since winning the Irish sweep," Mrs. Cnffin's legal representative stated, "he has been drinking heavily, and has frequently ill-treated his wife, who complains'that he has been associating with another woman." Mrs. Coffin, in evidence, said: "I know this; there was more comfort without the money than with it. I wish we had never won it."