House where Christie lived

Queen of whodunit Agatha Christie’s best-known novels, many of them first editions, are being offered for sale to help to conserve the author’s former home in Devon.

Thirty of her best known novels, are in a 719-lot auction of art and antiques expected to fetch about #200,000 in Exeter. "I suspect these books will be the nucleus of the sale. They are inscribed to various members of her family, her daughter Rosalind, her brother-in-law James Watts, her nephew and so on, so they are intensely personal because they come directly from the home she loved," Andrew Thomas, a partner at Bearne’s, the auctioneers, said.

The author, who died in 1976, grew up in Edwardian Torquay. But when she learnt that the Greenway estate at Churston Ferrers on the banks of the river Dart was about to be sold she bought it in 1938.

The house, a Grade II listed property set in 278 acres, was gifted to the National Trust by Rosalind and her husband Anthony Hicks six years ago. The gardens were opened to the public in 2002 and the couple continued to live in the house. The author’s grandson, Matthew Prichard, has now granted permission for the house to be opened to the public. — ANI

HOME