The Top Five Weird Wills of the World

Recently I published an article Ensure You Have a Will. This article let me to do some further research and I found some weird wills throughout the history of Mankind. Here is my top five weird wills:

Weird Wills #1

In 1926 a Canadian Lawyer, Charles Vance Millar died as a bachelor. He bequeathed the bulk of his estate to any woman of Toronto who gave birth to the largest number of children in ten years after his death.

Four women eventually won the ‘Toronto Stork Derby’ as aptly dubbed by the media. Each had nine children, and they shared between them $750 000.

A fifth woman who had ten children was ruled out because five of them were illegitimate.

Weird Wills #2

A Mr. Dickens left one of the world’s shortest wills. It just read ‘All to Mother’. This will was contested in 1906 but the Court upheld it.

Weird Wills # 3

A Londoner, John Nicholson was so obsessed by his name that in 1717 he bequeathed most of his money to assist poor people who had the same name. £100 a year was left to be given to any poor couple who wanted to marry, on condition that both their names were Nicholson. Another £100 was left to poor boys and girls named Nicholson who wanted to learn a trade.

The executors and trustees of his will of his will were the Lord Bishop of Carlisle, his son and 3 other men, all of whom were called Nicholson.

Weird wills #4

Then there was the hen-pecked Londoner who, when he died at the end of the 19th Century, left his valuable property to his wife – with a catch.

The condition was that every year, on the anniversary of his death, she walked barefoot to the local market, held a lighted candle, and read out a full confession of her nagging nature towards him when he was still alive. The basis of the confession was that if her tongue had been shorter, her husband’s days would probably have been longer.

Should she failed to do this, she was to receive no more than £20 year – just enough to live on.

Weird Wills #5

A parson of Ontario, Canada left his daughter $3000 on condition she gave up singing!

Daniel