William Castledine was chairman of Bourne Urban District Council from 1912-13 and a magistrate and when his wife Annie died in 1938, aged 77, he engaged a housekeeper to look after him.

He died at his home in North Road in March 1954 at the age of 94, and the main bequest in his £13,000 will, published the following September, was £10,000 [£162.000 at today's value] to Miss Ethel May Cooper who had cared for him during the previous 16 years.

Miss Cooper, an enthusiastic worker for the community, received the news calmly and said that the money would not change her life. She would continue living in and caring for the house Mr Castledine had built 45 years before, tending the garden and looking after the furniture and the car, all of which were included in the legacy.

She also intended to continue as secretary of the Darby and Joan Club, a member of the Red Cross, treasurer of the Bourne Free Churches organisation and with an active participation in the Baptist Chapel at Dyke, the village where she had previously lived. Mr Castledine also left bequests to his hairdresser, William Teat of North Street, his gardener, William E Cooper, the London Missionary Society, Bourne Congregational Church and £500 [£8,000 at today's value] to Bourne United Charities for the improvement of the Wellhead.