WIDOW'S WANTS.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 231, 30 September 1929, Page 10

WIDOW'S WANTS.

LARGER INCOME SOUGHT. VALUABLE ESTATE INVOLVED. Further light was thrown on a fortune of £344,500 at the Supreme Court this morning, when an application for at increase of annuity was commenced before Mr. Justice Smith. The plaintifi was Jessie Alberta Bell (Mr. McVeagh) wife of the late Alexander Bell, stationholder, of Auckland, and the defendants were The Guardian Trust Company (Mr Boyes). Members of the Bell familj were represented by other counsel. . ■ . Mr. McVeagh said that the application under the Family Protection Act for an increase of annuity, The late Mr. Bell had amassed a fortune by buying stations in the Auckland district. He died in July, 1928. Plaintiff was his second wife, whom he married in 1916. He had left an annuity to his wife of £750, which was later increased by a codicil to £1000. The amount •which Mrs. Bell was now expected to live on was not on the scale -with which her husband had provided her when alive. They had kept, a car, a chauffeur, a cook, and maid, and at intervals a gardener. At times they had gone for a trip abroad. Mr. Bell had left to his wife a property at Eemuera valued at £5500, and she had a small estate of her own, including shops at Eemuera, valued at £1600, and 795 fully-paid shares in the Auckland Gas Co. Mrs. Bell did not-desire that any order should affect charities, which, under the will, had received £2400. A fund of £60,000 had been set up for the annuity. . ' \ ' "< Mrs. Bell was cross-examined by Mr. Richmond, who was appearing for relatives. (Proceeding.) ,