Hilda Levi passed away in a care home in Manchester in 2022, and gave £1.4 million to various Kent charities and organisations, despite them not being aware of her previously.
Finn Macdiarmid reports.
Finn Macdiarmid reports.
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00:00Whitstable is mainly known around Kent for oysters, its seafront and as a summer holiday
00:04destination, but one local who lived there never revealed she was actually a millionaire
00:09until she passed away. She fled Nazi Germany, became a millionaire and chose to give her
00:14wealth away in her will to supporting local causes in and around Whitstable.
00:18Hilda Levy passed away in a care home in Manchester back in 2022, but it wasn't until semi-recently
00:24that people realised just how much money she actually had, with the Friends of Kent and
00:28Canterbury Hospital receiving a £500,000 gift from Hilda in her will, their largest
00:34ever single legacy. They received the money at the end of the process of the will, with
00:38it already being paid into their account, with some saying they didn't even know who
00:42she was until they received the money.
01:08Hilda also gave money to the charity Age UK and the Friends of Whitstable Healthcare,
01:13who say they'll use the donation to buy a new x-ray machine for the Estuary View Medical
01:17Centre.
01:18One Whitstable local and social history enthusiast, Julie Hunt, took it upon herself to research
01:23Hilda, using publicly available documents and information to trace the course of her
01:27life.
01:28Julie noticed that one of her husband's ancestors shared a last name with Hilda, which
01:32got her interested in her life, and using records she was able to work out that her
01:36parents were Dr. Friedrich Hermann Levi and Irma. In 1941, she was a student at Redhill
01:41School in Sutton in Kent, and was interred as a refugee, with many of her family dying
01:46during the Holocaust in the Second World War.
01:50She also discovered that she worked as a secretary in Maidstone and for the Duke of Edinburgh
01:54Awards Office in Westminster.
01:56Julie believes that the source of Hilda's fortune could come from her uncle, who ran
01:59a company that imported and exported coffee. He died a bachelor and split his wealth between
02:04his family and various charitable causes, just like Hilda.
02:08The Kent charities that she gave money to all have praised her generosity, especially
02:12as many didn't even meet her, and Hilda Levi's name will become far better known in Whitstable
02:17as their hidden millionaire.
02:19Finn McDermid for KMTV