Total Pageviews

Thursday 3 June 2010

Richard Hamlyn Gidley of New Zealand

The death of Richard Hamlyn Gidley was reported as follows in the Ashburton [NZ] Guardian, 22 July 1913:
"Palmerston North July 21
Richard Howlin [sic] Gidley, 40 years of age from Devon, committed suicide at Pamerston North in a family hotel by shooting himself in the mouth with a revolver. Papers on the deceased indicated that he had recently arrived from Home. He had realised on some property there, but no money was found on the body. He had a wife and 2 children in England. No cause is assigned for the deed. Today at the inquest a verdict of "Suicide" was returned."
Richard Hamlyn Gidley was the eighth and last child of George Wills Gidley and Elizabeth Hamlyn. George was born in Chagford, but became a reasonably prosperous farmer in Whitchurch, Tavistock and Lamerton, Devon. He died in 1912, the previous year. Doubtless this was the meaning of the phrase "realised on some property there", as George's estate was valued at over £575. Richard had married in 1902 Alice Ann Hodge, a widow, who in 1901 was an innkeeper at the Cattle Market Inn in Tavistock. They had two daughters. In 1911 the family was living at Trebarwith, Glanville Road, Tavistock, where Richard, who had previously worked on his father's farm, was a farm bailiff.
Richard's will was proved in Palmerston North in September 1913. He was described as a labourer.
Alice Ann Gidley remained in Devon with her two daughters. She died in 1927 in the Exeter area, where her older daughter Kathleen also married. The younger daughter, Vera, I have not been able to trace after 1911.