Four years and five days after his dying father promised to give him his $2 million Tucker’s Town cottage, Alex Scrymgeour’s family can at last move in following the end of a bitter legal wrangle.

Mr. Scrymgeour’s wife Julie and five-year-old daughter Joanna have spent the past few years in Toronto, Canada, because of a dispute which could have resulted in the family surrendering Greensleeves Cottage against the late John Scrymgeour’s wishes.

Now the legal row has finally come to an end after Appeals Court judges threw out a suggestion that Mr. Scrymgeour Sr. had not meant to give the home to his son. Speaking outside court yesterday, a tearful Mr. Scrymgeour, 33, told The Royal Gazette: “It’s been four years and five days since my father said: ‘Son, that’s your house’. Now at last I can move over my wife and daughter.

“My daughter was 18 months old when it all started. Now she’s five years old. I’m so relieved, thankful, emotional and happy.”

Before he died from cancer in August 2003, Mr. Scrymgeour Sr. transferred the property into The Interior Trust, of which the sole beneficiary was his son.

The father, who lived in New York for his final days, also paid $1.1 million into the trust to help his son complete the purchase of the home.

However, an argument erupted after his death, when The Interior Trust claimed the $1.1 million was merely a loan and must be repaid to Mr. Scrymgeour Sr.’s estate.

The son argued it was a gift as his dying father had told him on numerous occasions the cottage would soon be his.

If the judges had ruled in favour of The Interior Trust, Mr. Scrymgeour would have had to either get out of the home or repay the money.

During the appeal hearing, Andrew Martin, representing Wendell Hollis and Joseph Johnson of The Interior Trust, said that from the beginning the father had meant the cash to be a loan and there was no evidence to suggest he had changed his mind.

Mr. Hollis and Mr. Johnson — both long-standing friends of the late man — were appealing a ruling from an earlier civil trial, in which a judge ruled in favour of Mr. Scrymgeour Jr.Yesterday, Appeals Court President Justice Edward Zacca released a judgment backing the son, stating: “The evidence clearly shows that John did not wish Alex to have the cottage encumbered by a loan which would have defeated his wish for Alex to have the house for himself and his family.”

After the hearing, Mr. Scrymgeour said: “It’s been a long fight. I’m so happy that my father can finally rest in peace. He gave me the house and said: ‘You are going to carry on the Scrymgeour tradition.’”

“I’m never going to leave here. I’m Bermudian until I die. It’s what Dad wanted.”

Mr. Scrymgeour said his father would have laughed at previous reports in this newspaper describing Greensleeves as a “luxury cottage”.

“It’s a small Bermudian cottage. Luxury it’s not,” he said. “There’s still a lot of work to be done on it, but I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t put a penny into the house with all this hanging over me.”

“He talked to me at 7.30 on the phone four years and five days ago. He said: ‘Son, I’m not coming back to Bermuda’. Dad was very clear to me many times.