Shane MacGowan left less than €1 million in his will to widow Victoria Mary Clarke.

Shane MacGowan left just €849,733 in his will to his widow

Shane MacGowan left just €849,733 in his will to his widow

The late Pogues frontman only had €849,733 to leave his wife, according to The Irish Mirror.

Most of his income came from royalties from the group's 1988 festive classic 'Fairytale of New York'.

Victoria also inherited their home in Ballsbridge in Dublin, which is believed to be worth a packet.

If his spouse had died before him or at the same time, the money would have been given to his sister Siobhan Hayes "for her own absolute use and benefit".

Victoria was by Shane’s side when he died last November aged 65 after being hit with a series of illnesses that left him hospitalised, including pneumonia.

Victoria – who started grief counselling following Shane’s death – tied the knot with Shane at a lavish wedding in Copenhagen in 2018, with celebrity guests including close friend Johnny Depp.

Recently, Victoria spoke about how children were never on the cards for the couple.

She told the 'What A Woman' podcast: “It wasn’t part of our story. I don’t think children would have really survived, honestly, I don’t.

“I’ve never understood that. That would be like you telling me that everybody should want to be a bungee jumper or a racing driver - I can’t understand that. It doesn’t make sense to me. I can see how people think that having children is going to give them some kind of continuity, something will live on when they die or maybe somebody will look after them when they’re old. I can see that because there’s a practical side to it. But I just never.”

Victoria says the loss feels greater than "depression", and despite being told for decades that Shane "didn't have very long to live", nothing could have prepared her for the magnitude of the loss.

She shared: "It’s nothing that you could ever really prepare for, I don’t think. I’m sure there are people that have had a similar situation, but until it’s happened to you, you don’t know how you’ll react.

“It was something that I would have been afraid of for a very long time, because very soon after me and Shane got together people started telling me that he didn’t have very long to live. That would have been in 1986.

“People started telling me that Shane probably had six months to live, because of the way he pushed himself. I spent most of the time worrying about him and worrying that something was going to happen to him.

“But even then, you might worry about something but that doesn’t mean you know what it’s going to be like. It’s like worrying about a car crash. Until you’ve been in a car crash, you just don’t know what it will really feel like.

“It surprised me that it wasn’t all terrible. I assumed that you would go into a deep depression, and nothing would lift you out of it, that you would lose the will to live completely and stay like that.

“I had experienced depression and that’s what it feels like. I assumed it would be like depression, but worse. It did surprise me that we were able to celebrate Shane. At his funeral there was a lot of laughter, dancing and singing. People enjoyed the funeral."


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