Patsy Cline's brother sued her sister over Patsy's stage clothes, and a judge ordered the dresses sold to pay the lawyer

Patsy Cline was 30 when her plane went down in Tennessee. Her mother, Hilda Hensley, sewed many of her stage costumes and kept her clothing and papers in Winchester, Virginia. Hilda Hensley died around late 2000. Her will gave each of her two surviving children a 50 percent interest in her personal property. Patsy's brother, Samuel L. Hensley, sued their sister, Sylvia Wilt, in Winchester Circuit Court in 2001. He alleged that she seized Cline clothing, a trunk and a manuscript from the estate. In March 2002, after a two-day trial, a jury found that Wilt had not taken items from her mother's home. The estate administrator, Charles Alton, ran up $50,000 in legal fees. A clothing auction of the Hilda Hensley and Patsy Cline collection took place on 19 December 2002. In August 2003 Judge John E. Wetsel Jr. ordered the remaining items sold to pay Alton, including clothing and jewelry Cline may have worn. The most valuable item on the inventory was a dress appraised at $6,000. Cline's Grammy, Country Music Association and Commonwealth of Virginia awards were excluded from the sale. Wilt said she was listing her house to raise money to pay Alton. Wetsel said: "This has taken too much time, money and anguish." In 2026 no later court proceedings in the Hensley estate have been found.