DURING her glamorous life, Hazel Charlton lovingly built a collection of furs, ballgowns and expensive jewellery during two decades touring the globe with her partner.

Childless and wealthy, Mrs Charlton and rubber company director John Fishbein took two trips a year on the QE2 and travelled around the world more than 20 times in their 22 years together.

They died weeks apart in 2006 and Mrs Charlton’s wills made during her years at sea left the vast majority of her fortune to a cousin and her former GP.

But property letting company boss Lorraine Feltham, 51, of Fordingbridge, says the woman she called “grandma” had a change of heart when Mr Fishbein died in January 2006.

She decided to tear up the old will and make a new one, leaving the bulk of her £2.6 million estate to her “very kind” stepgranddaughter from an earlier marriage.

But in her High Court claim, Mrs Feltham says the failure of her gran’s Leicester-based solicitor, Peter Ward, of law firm Freer Bouskell, to act on instructions that she wanted to change the will have cost her more than £1 million.

The mother-of-three says his failure to meet Mrs Charlton’s wishes meant she ended up making a homemade will online, which, although it was admitted to probate, was open to challenge by the cousin and GP, resulting in the massive loss.

“I blame Mr Ward for not carrying out what he was asked to do in the first place,” Mrs Feltham told Judge Charles Hollander QC. “What my grandmother’s wishes were, she wrote down in her will.” She said her step-gran did not appear to be mentally incapable, although she was “paranoid”

about where her furs and ballgowns were being kept once she moved out of her home in White Horses, Barton on Sea, and went into a nursing home.

“I wasn’t after her money,”

she continued. “It was Mrs Charlton’s idea to change her will. You wouldn’t be able to put that idea in my grandmother’s head, she was far too strongwilled for that.”

Mrs Feltham’s barrister, Teresa Peacocke, told the court that Mrs Charlton decided to go into a home almost immediately after Mr Fishbein’s death, because she had already seen everything there was to see.

It was only in the weeks before her death, aged 90 in April 2006, that Mrs Charlton made it known she wanted her stepgrandchild included in her will.

Previously, the estate would have been almost entirely split between her cousin Margaret Atkinson, Dr Surinder Singh Bhangoo and Mr Fishbein, of Barton on Sea, Dorset.

The new one, which Mrs Feltham drew up online at her step-gran’s request, left Mrs Atkinson and Dr Bhangoo just £50,000 each and Mr Fishbein had already died.

But the cousin and GP later challenged the final will and settled for £375,000 each from the estate. Other losses, including legal fees, brought Mrs Feltham’s claim against Freer Bouskell to more than £1 million, Mrs Peacocke told the judge. She claimed Mr Ward had accepted instructions to act on Mrs Charlton’s behalf and had “no justification” for not doing what was asked of him.

However, Justin Fenwick QC, for the law firm, denied there had been any negligence, adding that Mr Ward had done what any reasonable solicitor would have done.

He had been provided with conflicting evidence about Mrs Charlton’s mental state at the time he was asked to begin the process of changing the will.

The pensioner herself had said nothing about wanting to change her bequests during phone calls, he said. In the circumstances, it was perfectly reasonable for him to wait for Mrs Charlton to speak directly about executing a new will.

The High Court hearing continues.