ROYAL OAK PENSION

Taranaki Daily News, 14 September 1934, Page 11

ROYAL OAK PENSION

PERPETUAL, PAYMENT MADE.

DEATH OF A RECIPIENT.

Vancouver, July 4.

A pension that dates’ back to the reign of Charles IL is automatically surrendered by the death in Florence last week of Professor Francis Cox Walker, of the University, of British Columbia, who was a descendant of. the Penderell family, that saved .Charles Stuart after his defeat by Cromwell at the Battle of Worcester, in 1651. : Fleeing from the Roundheads, Charles crept into he grounds of the Penderell' home in Boscobel. Approaching Elizabeth, he told her who he was, and that he must be hidden. So she summoned her five brothers;and held a conference. At first they were for hiding him in some cupboard, but, assured that the Roundheads would make an exhaustive search, they decided he should climb an old oak tree with a heavy trunk and thick branches. For a whole day Charles sat cramped in a fork of the tree, while Cromwell’s Ironsides passed and re-passed below*. Afer sunset he climbed down and escaped. Ascending the throne, as Charles 11, the fugitive did not forget Elizabeth, who was credited with the plan to hide him in the oak—the Royal Oak to this day. He awarded annuities in perpetuity to her and her brothers. Elizabeth’s share was £5O. The pensions, which in those days were more than ten times their present value, were charged upon certain fee farm rents payable to the Crown. They were handed over to trustees to administer for the benefit of the Penderells and their descendants. On the failure of all the descendants, the rents were o divert to the Crown. E«pe years ago the British Government disposed of his revisionary interest, and the Penderell pensions ape now paid'by private trustee?. Elizabeth’s pension passed to her eldest son, a Yates. From the Yates family it went to. the Dysons, who changed their najne to Walker. For a short during the life of Professor Walker’s grandfather, the pension, lapsed, but' was restored. ' Professor Walker visited England in 1928 arid was. presented with young green shoots from Charles’ tree.