Village organisations get payouts from long lost charity over 100 years old

Local groups in a Nottinghamshire village have benefitted from more than £20,000 after a local woman’s long lost charity fund was released. In 2022 a charity fund management group made Radcliffe-on-Trent Parish Council aware of an unused investment account belonging to the Hartwell Charity, that was lying dormant.

The Hartwell Charity was set up on October 6, 1908, as part of a Radcliffe woman’s will. The woman, Harriett Cooper, lived in a house in Vicarage Lane, Radcliffe-on-Trent, named Hartwell House but the home no longer exists.

The charity she set up was made for “women of irreproachable character”, applying to religious widows or spinsters, who lived in Radcliffe and were in financial need. Up to four women each year were given £12 a year that acted as a pension.

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Notices went up each year for the money, with the first advert going up in 1911. Harriett had made a payment into an investment account that then paid money on into a bank account and collected interest each year.

The Parish Council were made aware that if no new trustees of the investment account were made, the account would be closed with any money being redistributed nationally. A group of new trustees were able to take hold of the account and were surprised at the amount of money it had accrued over 100 years from the initial payments.

Councillor Anne McLeod, Chair of Radcliffe-on-Trent Parish Council, and trustee of the charity, said: “We were gobsmaked at the money, but it wasn’t quite enough to give out bursaries.” Around £12,000 was sat in the investment account which had paid around £9,000 in dividends into a bank account, meaning the charity had around £21,000.

It has been rewritten to align with modern times by including men and women, while beneficiaries do not have to be religious. The account is now down to 37p after its profits have been shared across several organisations in the village.

The Boys Brigade received £5,000 for a new heater, Radcliffe Welcome Spaces received £2,875 in total, Radcliffe and Bingham Advice Centre were given £5,000, Radcliffe Community Garden received £1,000, RadCooks got £1,000, Radcliffe Manor House Care Home received £7,000 and the Memory Cafe was given £2,000. This amounts to nearly £24,000

Carol Chambers, the current chair of trustees for the Hartwell Charity, said: “I’m just delighted we managed to save this money for the people of Radcliffe. I feel that we’ve managed to distribute it in a way that would have some sort of lasting benefit for a wider group of people, for the wider community, we’ve tried to share it out to meet the needs of as many people as possible.

“I’d like to think we have done Harriett Cooper proud, we’ve kept far as possible to her intentions, to make sure her name is carried forward as well.” Ms Chambers believes from her own research Harriett may have been born in Hyson Green in 1825, moved to Radcliffe in the 1880s and died in 1908- but was not buried in the village.