ON holiday in South Africa, by chance Blackburn exile Mrs Joan Potter came across a gravestone in a cemetery in the small town of Heidelberg, near Johannesburg -- and at once recognised the connection with her home town, even though its name is omitted from the inscription.

The tomb is that of cavalry officer Major Cecil William Montague Feilden, of the Royal Scots Greys.

He died the day after being wounded in action in February, 1902 -- the final year of the Boer War. His gravestone says he was "of Witton Park, Lancashire."

"Having grown up in the Billinge district of Blackburn, I recognised both the surname and the district in the inscription but was surprised that the town was not named," says Mrs Potter, of Blundellsands, near Liverpool.

In some ways, it is apt that Blackburn escaped mention on the gravestone -- for though Major Feilden had deep roots there, the town was hardly his home.

He was seldom seen in Blackburn. And when he wasn't busy soldiering or in London, he preferred to live at Mollington Hall, near Chester, where he had what was described as a "pleasant little estate."

But if the Major could hardly be said to belong to Blackburn, by contrast, it belonged to him. For, as the squire of the Witton Park estate, he was the town's largest landowner.

The Feildens had been lords of the manor of Blackburn since the 16th century and in the process had amassed large land holdings and influence. But what made them really rich was Blackburn's subsequent rapid growth as an industrial town.

In Victorian times, the demand for building land rocketed the value of the Feilden estate and revenue from ground rents poured in. An insight into the major's wealth at the time of his death was given by the Northern Daily Telegraph, which said that his father Lieutenant General Randle Joseph, who was MP for Chorley when he died in 1895 aged 71, "regarded himself as poor on £150,000 a year."

That was an amount which in 1890 was the equivalent of £8.2million today. It may have been an exaggeration of the Lieutenant General's fortune, but deemed even greater was that of his son who was shot from his saddle when he was in a group cut off by the Boers at Klippan while part of a British force that was moving on the township of Nigel, nine miles from Heidelberg.

For the NDT added: "Under the Major's rule, the estate has been largely partitioned in lots for building purposes, swelling by multiplication the ground rents of an already-considerable rent roll." Earlier, the newspaper reported that he was ground landlord of half the business property in Blackburn.

Indeed, his wealth was the subject of speculation by the national press which said that the death duties he paid on his father's estate had amounted to £160,000 -- equal now to around £8.8million. The old Blackburn Times, however, doubted it was so much. If the figure was correct, it said, the Witton Estate would have been worth £2million at the time -- equal to £110million today.

Whatever the case, the Feilden wealth was indisputably immense -- as a 1908 report of a Liberal Party meeting revealed when it was said that, down the years, the family had acquired more than 1,000 acres of former church-owned land, on which three-quarters of the town was built. "The annual rental is not less than £70,000 and probably nearer £80,000, which amount was still increasing by leaps and bounds," the report added.

But if 38-year-old, Eton-educated Major Feilden had the benefit of this income, he was probably more familiar with South Africa than the Lancashire milltown that was the family seat. For he had spent two years there with his regiment, living "almost a charmed life," according to the Blackburn Times. "For during the whole of the period, he was in the field, pursuing, engaging and defeating the enemy," it said.

"In Blackburn," it added, " he was seldom seen and very little known, though the largest landowner in the district."

Indeed, the family mansion in what is present-day Witton Country Park had been virtually closed since his father's death. And what would have been the major's first public appearance in Blackburn -- as opener of the annual show of the Horticultural Society, of which he was president -- was cancelled when he departed with the Scots Greys for South Africa in late 1899.

Nonetheless, despite his being largely unknown in Blackburn, flags were flown at half-mast on most of the town's public buildings and churches and on the Witton Estate's offices in Richmond Terrace when news of his death arrived. And St Mark's Church at Witton -- where his father was interred in the family's mortuary chapel -- was packed for the memorial service 11 days after his death.

Major Feilden left £101,021 and willed his Cheshire estate to his brother, Lieutenant Percy Guy Feilden and the Witton estate to his other brother, Captain James Hartley Gilbert Feilden.

But though few East Lancashire people will have seen the major's grave in the now rather overgrown cemetery in South Africa, older ones may recall the memorial in Blackburn to his elder brother, Randle Francis Feilden. The memorial stood opposite the Preston Old Road entrance to Witton Park.

Like all the Lieutenant-General's sons who reached adulthood he, too, was a soldier and was a captain in the Scots Guards when he died aged 24 at the family's home in elegant Grosvenor Crescent, London, after catching enteric fever while serving at Aldershot. He also was buried at St Mark's.

The memorial was erected by his mother and incorporated a drinking fountain. It was removed to nearby Pleasington Playing Fields in 1930 when the road and bridge over the River Darwen were widened.

The Feildens' Witton House mansion was visited by the Prince and Princess of Wales, later King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra.

They travelled from nearby Cherry Tree railway station on their visit to Blackburn for the laying of the foundation stone of the town's Technical School, now part of Blackburn College.

The house, built in 1800, was demolished in 1954 because of dry rot and decay after it and the surrounding 485-acre estate were bought by the Town Council in 1947 for £64,000. During the Second World War, Witton Park was used by the military as a convalescent depot and later as a civilian resettlement unit for former prisoners of war until 1946.

Afterwards, it was occupied until 1948 by members of General Anders' Polish Army.