The family of a divorcee who died with her cats in a house fire say they are happy with a coroner’s verdict.

Angela Midgley’s eldest brother John Storer said his sister had survived a fire six months earlier she had deliberately started at her “pride and joy” home at Boldshay Street, Barkerend, but had died in a blaze that started accidentally.

He said: “We desperately tried to help her after the first fire but she spurned our offers of help. Dad wanted her to live with him, social services offered her somewhere to go but she spurned all offers of help.

“We had no idea she had gone back to live there. She should not have gone back to the house, there’d been no insurance so it was a state. There was no electricity so she had to use candles. I’d even offered to have it rewired for her.”

At the time of the first fire, Mrs Midgley had texted a former partner saying: “I’ve set the house on fire. The cats are out.”

A neighbour on her way to work on the morning of October 25 last year saw the second fire and raised the alarm.

Firefighters found the 48-year-old former traffic warden in bed in an attic room with her cats next to her.

Yesterday a Bradford inquest heard Mrs Midgley, who had suffered bouts of depression and drank excessively, had not suffered any burns but had died from smoke inhalation.

Despite there being no signs of life at the scene, firefighters and then medics at Bradford Royal Infirmary had battled in vain to revive her.

The fire had started in an attic room next to the room where Mrs Midgley was discovered and despite initial suspicion from fire investigations the blaze had been started deliberately, Coroner Roger Whittaker said he thought it was “too far fetched” and was not satisfied she had taken her own life.

He said: “On the balance of probability, the electricity was off, she was substantially inebriated and she was separated by a door from the fire.

“I take the view she did not know the fire had started and it was a candle she used to illuminate the attic that caused the fire that led to her demise. It was an accidental death, more likely than not.”

After the inquest, Mrs Midgley’s other brother, Stephen Storer, paid tribute to his sister saying she was an “intelligent, generous” woman, a highly-qualified administrator who had travelled and lived for a time in the south of France.

“We’re happy with the Coroner’s decision. The cats were on the bed with her, she would have put them out first if she’d meant herself harm,” he said.