A FAMILY butcher choked to death on an ‘exceptionally large’ piece of meat he was eating in his West Somerset home a week before Christmas, an inquest heard.

Albert Hartgen, who retired in 2017 with his wife Heather from the butcher’s shop he ran for more than 30 years in the centre of Minehead, died on December 17 last year.

Senior Somerset Coroner Samantha Marsh said: “He was eating a roast dinner when he began to choke, having put an exceptionally large piece of meat in his mouth.”

Mrs Marsh said Mr Mr Hartgen’s airway became obstructed by the food and he asphyxiated.

She concluded the death was accidental.

Mr Hartgen was a former Minehead Royal National Lifeboat Institution crew member and in 1975 received a bravery award for his role in the rescue of three people from a yacht off Porlock, and his son Ross is now a lifeboat helmsman.