Grace Aidiniantz

Died: November 28, 2015

LIKE many of us, Grace Aidiniantz, who has died aged 88, was a big Sherlock Holmes fan. In 1990, she sold her house and invested most of her money in founding the Sherlock Holmes museum in Baker Street, London, which ever since has attracted tourists from around the globe. Many of them are still convinced that the intrepid Holmes was a real person, rather than a fictional character created by Edinburgh-born Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. She even won the rights to put the number 221B Baker Street on the building, the detective's famous address, despite the fact that the building was previously 239 Baker Street, a branch of the Abbey National building society. An average 700 tourists now visit the museum every day, adults paying £15, children £10.

Although no physical foul play was involved, Mrs Aidiniantz's death would have fascinated Holmes. Indeed, he might have called it a "three-pipe problem," because of its bitter complexity. Mrs Aidiniantz died in a nursing home "of a broken heart," according to one of her children, after a poisonous family feud over her heritage, i.e. the museum and its multi-million income.

From an immigrant Armenian family who fled Turkish and Soviet communist persecution, she had become a self-made multi-millionaire in London, fulfilling her dream of the museum in a central London building. But, despite having an estimated wealth of £20million, she reportedly died effectively penniless after the family dispute and costly litigation - estimated at £270,000 this year alone. A judge had recommended that she was safer in a nursing home than in the "chaos and war zone" of her family.

Mrs Aidiniantz had started up the museum in 1990, with the help of her eldest son John, despite opposition from Dame Jean Conan Doyle, daughter of Sir Arthur. Dame Jean believed such a museum, with a blue plaque on the wall suggesting Sherlock Holmes, "Consulting Detective," lived here from 1881-1904, perpetuated the myth that Holmes was a real person. American tourists are probably the museum's most numerous visitors.

The family feud when one of Grace's sons and her two daughters accused their older half-brother John Aidiniantz, proprietor of the museum, of "robbing" their mother of shares in the business. Things escalated in October of this year when the family fought in court over whether their mother should be taken into a nursing home.

High Court judge Peter Jackson described the case as "a lamentable and poisonous feud" and ruled she would be best off in a nursing home. "She refused food and drink and died of a broken heart," said her daughter Linda Riley. "I said in court that Grace would die if she was placed in a care home with a broken spirit, and that's exactly what has happened. She died without a penny to her name when she was worth £20million. We want to investigate that."

The eldest son, John, responded: "If I gave them £1million each tomorrow, I will be as good as Mother Teresa in their eyes, but that is not likely to happen."

Grace Aidiniantz was born on 24 August 1927 but whether in Armenia or London is not clear. Her family travelled to London to escape persecution first by the Ottoman Turks and later by the fledgling Soviet Union which came to include Armenia. She spent much of her later years as a director of the London-based charity Aid Armenia International, supporting the Armenian diaspora and spreading the word on Armenia's troubled history.

She is survived by her sons John Aidiniantz, 69, and Stephen Riley, and her daughters Linda Riley and Jennifer Decoteau.

PHIL DAVISON