INGRAM WILCOX, SEPTEMBER 2006 He bought an island in France

QUIZZING enthusiast Ingram was broke from his divorce and living in a one-bed flat when he became the fifth winner in September 2006.

After scooping the prize he quit his £20,000-a-year job as a civil servant in Chippenham, Wilts, spread £250,000 among his five children and bought a VW Touran.

A year later, he splashed out on a five-bed, £250,000 property with its own island in Miramont-de-guyenne, near Bordeaux in France.

Ingram, 76, now married to his second wife, Pat, 57, spends his days birdwatching, reading books and “pottering about”.

He says “life was pretty quiet” before he scooped the jackpot, adding: “It wasn’t too bad but I could have done with a change. I wasn’t particularly struggling – a civil servant’s life [is] fairly secure. I had a steady overdraft which wasn’t growing enormously. I was getting by.

“Where I really felt the pinch was cars. I lost my first car, which I inherited from my dad, when my crazy neighbour set fire to it.

“After that it was difficult to get a car I wasn’t afraid would fall apart under me. My only dream was to have a nice solid car that would still be going when I got from A to B.”

Ingram, who had reached the final of Mastermind and appeared on Fifteen to One, had used up all his lifelines when he reached the

£1million question, but correctly

I went to a posh shop and bought a £250 lamp. It was outlandish to spend that INGRAM WILCOX ON HIS FIRST BIG PURCHASE AFTER THE WIN

LIFE OF LEISURE Ingram is living his dream

HITTING JACKPOT On the show answered that the boxer who strikes the gong at the start of J Arthur Rank films is Bombardier Billy Wells.

The first thing he bought was a green banker’s lamp. He says: “I don’t know what it is about them, they’re quite peaceful. So I went to a posh shop in Bath and got an antique one for £250. To spend that on a lamp seemed quite outlandish to me.

“I went back to work just to clear my desk and that was it.”

Ingram says he also lent £25,000 to a friend who asked for a loan because he couldn’t pay his mortgage, but never paid him back.

He said: “He stopped answering his phone. I later found out he had sold his house.”

Ingram admits: “Quite a bit’s gone, but I’m not hard up. Strictly speaking I’m living off my civil service pension, but I’ve got the capital as a cushion.

“I’m now living in a watermill by a river and my biggest expenditure is on camera equipment so I can photograph the birds. Thanks to the show I’ve been able to live a life I never dreamed of getting to live.”