The strange story of Emma Searson

SHE LIVED ALONE BUT LEFT ALMOST £½ MILLION

Our social history is best told through the lives of the people and the times in which they lived and the place to find these facts is in the pages of newspapers from the past. Those published locally are a rich vein for the historian for here are recorded those events and occasions that ruled their lives and although these happenings appear to be less important than those reported at national level, they are at the very heart of life because we can relate to them for they may well have involved our next door neighbour or even ourselves. Such is the strange tale of Emma Searson.

In the late winter of 1934, an elderly widow was burned to death at her home in Gladstone Street, Bourne. Attempts were made to save her but her injuries were so extensive that she had no chance of survival and died soon afterwards. In the months that followed, while her affairs were being settled, it was revealed that this lady who lived alone and without any resident domestic help, was extremely rich and could have afforded a small army of servants and yet she chose a solitude that may well have contributed to her death because had there been someone in the house when the accident occurred, she might have survived or indeed, it may never have happened. The full story of her tragic death was reported in the Stamford Mercury on Friday 2nd February 1934:

WOMAN BURNED TO DEATH - SHOCKING TRAGEDY AT BOURNE

WOMAN'S CLOTHES CATCH FIRE: A graphic story of how a man, hearing a cry, saw flames coming from the bedroom window of a Bourne house, climbed a ladder to the rescue and discovered an 87-year-old woman kneeling on the floor covered with flames from head to foot, as the result of which she has since died, was related to Major C W Bell, the district coroner, at an inquest at the Butterfield Hospital on Wednesday on the body of Mrs Emma Searson of [No 1] Gladstone Street, Bourne.
Florence May Barnatt, of Stanley Street, Bourne, a neighbour of Mrs Searson, said she used to go into the house every day to do household duties. On Tuesday morning she left the house in Gladstone Street at eleven o'clock when deceased was in her usual state of health and quite well. A neighbour, Mrs Turner, was going to take Mrs Searson's dinner that day and witness intended returning about 4 p m. Deceased was a widow, her husband, Robert Searson, having been a farm foreman.
In the ordinary course of events, deceased could get about the house quite well and could do a certain amount of cooking. She used to get up in the morning without any assistance and could wash and dress herself and do light household duties.
Alfred Woolley [a carpenter], of 39 North Road, Bourne, said on Tuesday at about 2.50 p m, he was coming out of his house with a truck when he heard a noise of some description, almost like a cry. He looked round and a blaze of fire from Mrs Searson's window attracted his attention. He started to run down the yard and called to his young man in the shop to help him. Witness went to the house and as he got to the passage he took with him another youth named Moisey, who was on the road.

ONE MASS OF FLAMES; "The back door of the house was locked", said witness, "and I took a ladder of the wall in the passage and raised it to the bedroom window. The window was open, but I could not get into the room through the window as it was all aflame. I took a bucket of water up with me. Mrs Searson was about a yard from the inside of the window on her knees. She was alight from head to foot and was one mass of flames."
She should have been smothered but as there was nothing handy, witness threw over her the bucket of water. The water practically put out the flames. The room was too smoky for them to be able to go in, and they had to wait a minute until it cleared.
Witness sent in his assistant and he went through the bedroom, down the stairs and unlocked the door. Witness then went upstairs and saw a small fire in the bedroom and also a larger fire in the kitchen. Mrs Searson seemed sensible and said something about "Do something for me." She didn't say anything about how the accident happened, nor anything about her apron catching fire. When the flames were put out, he sent for Dr Galletly, but as he was not at home, he sent the boy down to the hospital. The district nurse came back with him.
The coroner: Can you tell us about the condition of the room?
Witness: It almost looked as though she might have got her clothes smouldering at one of the fires, had then come to the window to call for help, and the flames set fire to the curtains. I noticed no signs of fire downstairs.

DEATH DUE TO SHOCK: Dr J A Galletly said she was very badly burned from head to foot and was suffering from shock. She was sensible and knew him but she did not say anything about the accident. He asked her no questions as she was not in a fit state to be questioned. She died from shock. The coroner returned a verdict the deceased died from shock following upon burns accidentally sustained.

Mrs Searson died on Tuesday 30th January 1934 but had already made a will on 18th June 1929 with two codicils added on 2nd October 1930 and 15th September 1932, which revealed that she was a wealthy woman leaving an estate valued at £7,962 5s. 4d. (almost £440,000 at today's values). Probate was granted to John Arthur Halfpenny, a Congregational minister of Maldon, Essex, and Albert William Gunstone, the Baptist minister in Bourne.

The will included various small bequests of £50 and £100 to family and friends and the house at No 1 Gladstone Street where the accident occurred and the contents and personal effects were equally divided between Sarah Elizabeth James and Florence May Barnatt. She also owned the house next door, at No 3 Gladstone Street, where her brother William Knott had lived until he died in February 1929, and which was left to Sarah Elizabeth James.

Among the other bequests were £100 to the London Missionary Society, £100 to the Peterborough War Memorial Hospital and £100 to the Butterfield Hospital at Bourne. Mrs Searson also owned several parcels of land in the Bourne area, in West Road, Mill Drove, North Fen and elsewhere, and she instructed that these be sold and the proceeds distributed to various religious and charitable institutions including those mentioned above and the Congregational Chapel in Eastgate, Bourne and the Congregational Union of England and Wales to promote the interest of religious life in Lincolnshire.

One of the most mysterious bequests was that the proceeds of the sale of a substantial farm in Dyke Fen, covering in excess of 64 acres, should go to Stockwell (commonly known as Spurgeon's) Orphanage in Clapham Road, south west London, for the purposes of that institution although the reason for this legacy is not known.

Mrs Searson also owned shop premises at No 46 Eastgate run by Joseph Bradley but she instructed that this property also be sold and the proceeds be divided between various relatives although Mr Bradley remained as the tenant.

But the bulk of her estate went to charity and the Emma Searson Nursing Fund was founded. It exists to this day and is one of those administered by Bourne United Charities and so her money continues to be of benefit to the town. She herself however, is no longer remembered and her grave in the town cemetery is overgrown and neglected with the once grand tombstone toppled over on its face, hiding the name and the inscription, for there is no one left from her family to tend it.

And so Mrs Searson died and her estate was divided up but the unanswered questions remain. Where did her vast fortune come from? Why did she not spend some of the money she had on domestic help that would most certainly have avoided such a terrible accident? Why should a woman living in a small Lincolnshire market town leave money to an obscure London orphanage? What connection did she have with it? The answers died with Emma Searson and we can only speculate on her motives but these events add to the rich tapestry that is our daily life.

See also Bourne United Charities

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