A dynasty fights back
By ROBERT FAIRBURN

A MEMBER of the once-powerful Usher dynasty id to take legal action over the loss of the family's estates.

Stuart Usher is determined to recover the vast assets which he claims were lost through incompetence.

He accuses a legal firm, which ran the family affairs, of mismanagement.

He has lodged a complaint with the Law Society - but spoke yesterday of his frustration after 14 months the matter is no nearer being resolved. He said: 'I am determined to fight on until this is put right.'

Stuart, 56, has taken up the mantle of his brother Sir John Usher - the seventh baronet of Norton and Wells - who died in South Africa last weekend.

Sir John, 58, had dedicated himself to recovering the fortune.

Stuart says the problems began with the death of is uncle, Sir Stuart Usher, the Fouth Baronet in 1963. The estate came into the ownership of brothers Peter and Robert, who both had Down's Syndrome. As they were unable to manage their own affairs, a number of lawyers and advisers did so on their behalf.

Peter had been confirmed as the fifth baronet and as he could not make a will estates in the Borders had to be liquidated after death duties.

Stuart Usher of Jedburgh, said it had been assumed the estate would go to his father Robert, not the brothers. He claims the firm, who acted as incapaxes between 1962 and 1994, did not manage the estate properly and is poised to raise court actions for the loss of Sir Robert's executry.

A spokesman for the firm said last night: 'We refute any suggestion of wrongdoing. We are not aware that this complaint has any substance.'

The Usher dynasty flourished under the charge of Sir Robert at the turn of the century. The family owned 6,000 acres in the Borders and gifted the Usher Hall to Edinburgh.