By HAROLD HEYS

Local historian

DARWEN is fortunate to have not only an excellent charity trust to help local worthy causes, but also a dedicated team to administer it.

Regular, small bequests help to keep the charity buoyant. Occasionally it gets a hefty boost.

But it has never been handed a legacy as big as the one given recently … nearly half a million pounds!

Retired accountant John Jacklin, secretary of the WM & BW Lloyd Charity Trust, said: "It just shows the love that folk have for Darwen. It's always been a friendly little town and is just the right size for that friendship to foster."

The latest bequest has come from former Darweners Tom and Jean Richards who married at Holy Trinity (now St Peter's) in 1949 and went on to make a good life out in Australia.

Tom lived up Kelvin Street and Jean lived on Worth Avenue. By the time they were 16, during the war, they were courting and were inseparable for the rest of their lives.

Tom left Darwen Grammar School and went to work for Walpamur while Jean got a job in the office in the nearby Hollins Mill.

Tom was a bright lad and did well for the company, eventually going out to Melbourne to help run a big paint company it had just taken over.

He spent many years with the firm and later took on top jobs with other companies in oil and paint. They travelled the world and had some lovely homes, but, sadly, no children.

Mr Richards came back to Darwen a few years ago and met John Jacklin. He was interested in the work of the Lloyd Trust, which now has £3.5 million invested. Each year it distributes income of around £100,000 to local causes.

Tom, who served in the Royal Navy in the closing years of the war, wrote a memoir before his death in 2013, aged 86, looking back to his younger days in Darwen. Jean died four years later.

Their solicitor Linton Lethlean travelled to Darwen to personally hand over the cheque to Mr Jacklin. Tom and Jean, he said, had always kept in touch with happenings in Darwen and their love for their home town was undimmed.

They never forgot the church where they were married and a cheque for £27,500 was handed over to the vicar, Canon Fleur Green.

Also at the presentation, at the church, were members of the Lloyd Trust and Joe Devitt, MD of Crown Paints, which was formerly Walpamur.

"A lot of people remember Tom Richards from his days with our company," he said. "He was very popular. A typical Darrener, from all accounts."