LONDON -- The wife of 1960s pop star Georgie Fame died in a fall from a 245-foot-high bridge earlier this month in what British newspapers suggested Tuesday was a suicide. Her death was not announced until after the funeral.
Nicolette Powell, a 52-year-old former debutante who was first married to the Marquess of Londonderry, died Aug. 13 in a fall from a suspension bridge in the Clifton suburb of Bristol in central England.
The bridge, which spans the Avon river, is a well-known suicide spot. The Samaritans, a volunteer group that runs telephone hotlines for people in distress, recently installed a phone near one end of the bridge.
Newspapers said Powell reportedly was depressed before the incident. An inquest into the death has not yet been concluded.
Funeral services were conducted Monday, followed by a private cremation ceremony.
Powell, formerly Nicolette Harrison, married the Marquess of Londonderry at age 17 in 1958. She married Georgie Fame in 1972 after a bitter divorce case with the marquess in which Fame was cited for adultery.
Fame, whose real name is Clive Powell, became a pop star in the 1960s with his band, The Blue Flames. He had three No. 1 hits in England -- 'Yeh Yeh' in 1964, 'Get Away' in 1966 and 'The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde' in 1967.
Both 'Yeh Yeh' and the 'The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde' made the Billboard Top 40 list in the United States. 'Yeh Yeh' climbed to 21st and was on the charts six weeks, while 'The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde' made it to No. 7 and stayed on the charts for 12 weeks.
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