The will has now been proved in London of COLONEL JOHN JACOB ASTOR, of Fifth Avenue, New York, who died in the wreck of the Titanic, aged 47. The personal estate in the United Kingdom has been sworn for probate as of the net value of £90,965.
His will is dated September 18 last (shortly after his second marriage), and the English grant has been issued to his brother-in-law, Mr. James Roosevelt Roosevelt, of Hyde Park, Dutchess County, New York, and power is reserved to grant probate also to the other executors, Mr. Douglas Robinson, Mr. Nicholas Biddle, and (on attaining majority) his son William Vincent Astor.
He stated that he had made provision for his second wife, Mrs. Madeleine Talmage Force Astor, by settlement, but he left to her also $100,000 (£2,000), his horses and other live stock, his carriages, motor cars, and consumable stores absolutely, and the use during widowhood of a trust fund of $5,000,000 (£1,000,000) and of his residence at the corner of Fifth-avenue and Sixty-fifth-street, New York, with remainder to his son William. He left $5,000,000 upon trust for his daughter, Ava Alice Muriel Astor, until she shall attain the age of 21 years, and then to her absolutely; $3,000,000 (£600,000) upon trust for each child other than his son William and his said daughter, and he left all the property of which he had power of appointment by his first marriage settlement, dated February 11, 1891, and all his real and personal estate at Rhinebeck, New York, and at Newport, Rhode Island, and all his pictures and statuary left to him by his father, as well as all his personal effects and jewelry, his yachts and boats, to his son William. He left some personal legacies, including bequests to his secretary and steward.
He directed his executors to pay to the New York Yacht Club each year until his son William shall attain the age of 21 $1,500 to be applied in the purchase of two silver cups, one to cost $1,000, and to be sailed for by sloop yachts of the New York Yacht Club at Newport, Rhode Island, in August of each year during the club's annual cruise. The committee may allow any foreign yacht in American waters at the time to compete. He requested his son, on attaining his majority, to continue this yearly gift to the club.
All other his property, of whatever nature, he left to his son William absolutely.
