Peter Nicklin at 79 “couldn’t cope” Harper-Lee, 2 years old, died in May after suffering injuries from swallowing button batteries. His family is devastated.
A great-grandfather took his own life after struggling with the tragedy of a little girl’s death, his heartbroken family say.
Peter Nicklin, aged 79 “couldn’t cope” Harper-Lee, 2 years old, died in May after suffering injuries from swallowing button batteries.
Now, Peter’s son, Harper-Lee’s grandad Darren Nicklin, said his father just wasn’t himself after the toddler’s death, adding there had been a big change in him.
He was unable to attend the funeral of his wife, so he told his family. “would finish him off”. Stoke-on-Trent Live Reports.
“He loved life. He loved it,” Darren said. “We never thought he’d have it in him.
“You saw the change in him. He went from happy-go-lucky, one of the lads, to he just wasn’t himself. We can’t believe he’s done it.
“He just changed when our Harper passed. He couldn’t cope with it.
“People that age, they can’t cope with losing youngsters, they can’t cope. The day after he said ‘why didn’t they take me instead of her?’ He just couldn’t cope with it.
“We were getting a bit of normality, focusing. He just wouldn’t talk about it. I think he bottled everything up. We’re devastated.
“I think he was thinking about it all the time. He stopped going down to the allotment. He was just sitting in the house.
“I think it just kept running through his head.”
Peter passed away on August 15, at his Hanley home in Ogden Road. This was just a week after Harper-Lee’s death.
His death has been investigated by an inquest. Friday’s hearing heard that the man had been hanged.
Peter was born in Stoke-on-Trent. He left school to pursue a variety of job opportunities, including those as a bricklayer or on the motorways.
He was a man of the family, who loved his children, Darren, Carl, and Claire. He also loved his wife Pauline who he survived.
Darren described it as ‘happy-go-lucky’, Peter was well known around Hanley at the Wetherspoons and the Coachmaker’s, where he once met Gordon Banks when the famous footballer came in to support the pub.
“He loved all his grandkids. He was very family-oriented my dad,” Darren.
“He mellowed as he got older, especially with the grandkids, because we had a fairly strict upbringing, but he mellowed over the years.
“He was one of the lads. He was a hard worker. They knew him around Hanley. ‘The Beard’ because he’d got a big beard.
“He was a character. He was well known up Hanley in the Coachmaker’s and Wetherspoons.”
Peter loved his allotment in his later years. He had a small patch near Joiners Square, where he could be found tending to the many varieties of fruits and vegetables he would grow.
“If we could have got him a bed down there he’d have stayed down there at night I think,” Darren.
“The allotment was his life. He’s had that 10 years. He loved his allotment.
“Everybody had veg off him. Taters, carrots, green beans, peas, tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce cauliflowers. If it was veg he’d grow it. He loved it.
“He used to always get second place, and he used to always say ‘same every year, I’ll get first next time, and he never got there.”
Since Harper-Lee’s tragic death, her mum Stacey, along with StokeonTrentLive, The Sentinel, and local MP Jo Gideon, have been campaigning for new laws to protect children from the dangers of button batteries.
Mrs. Gideon introduced an earlier bill in the Commons in the summer. ‘Harper-Lee’s Law’, which is due to be debated later in the year.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Leader of the Commons Jacob Rees-Mogg have both sent their condolences to Harper-Lee’s family, while more than 5,000 people have signed a petition urging the government to take action to help prevent future deaths from button batteries.