0:00:02 > 0:00:07Heir hunters spend their lives tracking down families of people who've died without leaving a will.
0:00:07 > 0:00:13They hand over thousands of pounds to long-lost relatives with no idea they were in line for a windfall.
0:00:13 > 0:00:17Could they be knocking at your door?
0:00:32 > 0:00:36On today's programme, the heir hunters research
0:00:36 > 0:00:39a family's history in record time but have they got the right heirs?
0:00:39 > 0:00:45There's a witness, Eric, who we didn't know about, wasn't on the tree at all.
0:00:45 > 0:00:51And the story of a war-time evacuee who defied authority to escape the Blitz.
0:00:51 > 0:00:55The Government would not have been interested in her being evacuated.
0:00:55 > 0:00:59They wouldn't have given her any help at all.
0:00:59 > 0:01:05Plus, with thousands of pounds sitting unclaimed in the Treasury vaults, could you be a beneficiary?
0:01:10 > 0:01:14More than two-thirds of people die without leaving a will.
0:01:16 > 0:01:19If they have no obvious relatives, their money goes to the Government,
0:01:19 > 0:01:24who last year made a staggering £18 million from unclaimed estates.
0:01:28 > 0:01:32Hoping to gain a commission, more than 30 probate research companies
0:01:32 > 0:01:37race against one another to track down and sign up long-lost relatives entitled to inherit.
0:01:37 > 0:01:39Hello, Sheila Kingsland?
0:01:39 > 0:01:41- Yes. Hi, David.- Hello there.
0:01:41 > 0:01:45Fraser and Fraser have been tracing beneficiaries for over 30 years.
0:01:45 > 0:01:50The company has successfully reclaimed more than £100 million for heirs.
0:01:50 > 0:01:56But solving these cases can use up many hours of manpower and resources.
0:01:56 > 0:02:02The work we have to do, whether a case is worth £5 or £5,000 or £5 million, is exactly the same.
0:02:02 > 0:02:06With small cases, we don't want to throw the resources at it,
0:02:06 > 0:02:09because we won't have the return.
0:02:09 > 0:02:12This is because the heir hunters work on a commission basis.
0:02:12 > 0:02:16So a large estate can make a big difference to paying for their overheads.
0:02:21 > 0:02:25It's 7am at Fraser's Central London office
0:02:25 > 0:02:29and the Treasury's list of unclaimed estates has just been published.
0:02:29 > 0:02:35Because none are listed with their values, the first hour of the team's day is probably the riskiest.
0:02:38 > 0:02:43They need to be mindful about which estates look more likely to bring in a commission.
0:02:43 > 0:02:46There's sheltered accommodation but there's nobody we can get to speak to.
0:02:48 > 0:02:54With no obvious big property cases to follow, Neil wants the team to look into a case in Leeds.
0:02:54 > 0:03:01What we have here is the case of David Luty, which to me sounds a very, very good name.
0:03:01 > 0:03:03Without looking a bit more into it, I won't know.
0:03:03 > 0:03:05Looks like a very uncommon name.
0:03:05 > 0:03:10Born in 1914. We've got that off the deaths. We know he dies in Leeds.
0:03:10 > 0:03:13Now he lives in a council property.
0:03:13 > 0:03:18I want to make sure, I'm going to do a bit more in-depth enquiries
0:03:18 > 0:03:20and see where we go.
0:03:23 > 0:03:27David Luty died in Leeds on April 1, 2008.
0:03:27 > 0:03:34He'd never married or had children and had worked as an accountant for the Yorkshire Electricity Board.
0:03:36 > 0:03:41Sadly, this picture of him, aged seven, is the only record left.
0:03:43 > 0:03:49For the latter years of his life he lived at this address in Holbeck, as neighbour, Iris Spink, remembers.
0:03:49 > 0:03:53David was a very quiet man who kept to his-self.
0:03:53 > 0:03:58He would say good morning and things like that, like you do.
0:03:58 > 0:04:02That's all I know. He wasn't one that would keep a conversation up.
0:04:02 > 0:04:07I hadn't seen him for a while at the bus stop and some children
0:04:07 > 0:04:10or somebody must have broke his window downstairs
0:04:10 > 0:04:13and two police were walking round and they must've seen
0:04:13 > 0:04:17the window broken, you see, and they happened to see me and talk to me.
0:04:17 > 0:04:19I said to them I hadn't seen him for a while.
0:04:19 > 0:04:22Then they went in and broke in and they found him.
0:04:22 > 0:04:25He was dead upstairs in his bedroom.
0:04:30 > 0:04:34Case manager, Fran Brett, has been appointed to run the investigation.
0:04:34 > 0:04:37We need to find a record of his birth
0:04:37 > 0:04:39and ascertain his parentage.
0:04:39 > 0:04:43Luty is not a name that I've ever come across before.
0:04:43 > 0:04:50It's an unusual name and we'll easily find a record of his birth.
0:04:50 > 0:04:56A birth certificate should contain precise information about David's parents.
0:04:56 > 0:04:59They can then begin to map out the family tree,
0:04:59 > 0:05:02generation by generation, until they find David's heirs.
0:05:04 > 0:05:08It doesn't take the team long to find out if David had any brothers and sisters.
0:05:13 > 0:05:17I've just been told that our deceased, David Luty,
0:05:17 > 0:05:22was the only child born to a Lawrence Luty
0:05:22 > 0:05:25and a Carrie Elsie Wright, who married in Leeds.
0:05:25 > 0:05:29They've managed to find a death record for Lawrence Luty...
0:05:30 > 0:05:33in 1987 in Leeds.
0:05:33 > 0:05:36Looking at that death record,
0:05:36 > 0:05:38it gives him a date of birth
0:05:38 > 0:05:42of December 1, 1908.
0:05:43 > 0:05:48From the information they have, they can see David's father was born
0:05:48 > 0:05:51in Holbeck, just before the 1911 census.
0:05:52 > 0:05:58This population survey should give more details about David's father's parents and family.
0:06:03 > 0:06:05Right, so...
0:06:07 > 0:06:09we've got Lawrence Luty on the 1911 census.
0:06:09 > 0:06:14It appears his parents are Lawrence and Ellen, who have been married for only two years in 1911.
0:06:14 > 0:06:17So they're gonna have married around 1908, 1909.
0:06:17 > 0:06:20And he's got one brother who's younger than him, he's aged one.
0:06:20 > 0:06:22They're living in the Leeds area.
0:06:22 > 0:06:24That's good, so we can crack on with them.
0:06:26 > 0:06:29Gareth's now identified that David's dad, Lawrence,
0:06:29 > 0:06:34had a brother called Henry, who sadly died when he was only a child.
0:06:34 > 0:06:40However, there could be more siblings born after 1911, so the team need to check.
0:06:45 > 0:06:48Searching later birth records, it doesn't take long to find
0:06:48 > 0:06:50that Henry wasn't the only brother.
0:06:50 > 0:06:56Having ascended it after the 1911 census, we found one in 1918 of a William.
0:06:56 > 0:06:59We found him being born in 1918, in the right area,
0:06:59 > 0:07:02with the right surname, so we're fairly sure it's the right one.
0:07:02 > 0:07:05He seems so far to be the only other sibling.
0:07:05 > 0:07:10What we're going to do now is look for a marriage of William, to see if we can locate him
0:07:10 > 0:07:12and his wife, or failing that, any kids they might have.
0:07:14 > 0:07:17At the same time Dom is looking at the paternal side of the family,
0:07:17 > 0:07:20Gareth is searching on the maternal side,
0:07:20 > 0:07:22under the mother's name of Wright.
0:07:22 > 0:07:29Wright as a surname is actually quite a common name, but, Carrie, Christian name, is very unusual.
0:07:33 > 0:07:34Right, here are the Wrights.
0:07:34 > 0:07:38That's quite interesting, it looks like they've had three children.
0:07:38 > 0:07:42So the parents of Carrie are John Arthur and Daisy Wright.
0:07:42 > 0:07:47They've been apparently married for seven years and had three children,
0:07:47 > 0:07:51but the peculiar thing is there's clearly four children here.
0:07:52 > 0:07:58We've got a Filma Lushington Wright, aged eight.
0:07:58 > 0:08:01So we're gonna have to work out where he fits in
0:08:01 > 0:08:07but Carrie also has, who are definitely going to be her brothers, a John Arthur and a Lena Ellis.
0:08:07 > 0:08:10We've certainly got three people to follow up.
0:08:10 > 0:08:16It turns out that Filma was Daisy's illegitimate child, born before she married.
0:08:16 > 0:08:21Although a half-blood sibling, Filma wouldn't be an entitled heir.
0:08:21 > 0:08:25John Arthur Wright died when he was only nine years old.
0:08:25 > 0:08:28With these two siblings now eliminated from their searches,
0:08:28 > 0:08:31the team can now concentrate on looking for a marriage
0:08:31 > 0:08:35for Lena Wright and whether she had any children.
0:08:36 > 0:08:41Back on the paternal side, Dom was looking to find a marriage for David Luty's uncle, William.
0:08:44 > 0:08:52Right, found William Luty's marriage to Irene Sharp and looked on the computer, like they've got two kids,
0:08:52 > 0:08:54William and Michael. We've got William up to date.
0:08:54 > 0:08:56Up to date, brilliant.
0:08:57 > 0:09:00The team has discovered that William Luty was married to Irene Sharp
0:09:00 > 0:09:04and they had two children, Michael and William.
0:09:04 > 0:09:08Further research shows that Michael died when he was just 18
0:09:08 > 0:09:12but with William still alive, the team have a positive result.
0:09:12 > 0:09:15At the moment it's one heir on the Luty side.
0:09:17 > 0:09:18That's brilliant,
0:09:18 > 0:09:20and relatively easy as well.
0:09:20 > 0:09:22So that's good.
0:09:22 > 0:09:23It's been a productive morning.
0:09:23 > 0:09:27In only an hour they found a cousin for David.
0:09:27 > 0:09:32The Luty name and Leeds location really speeded up their research.
0:09:32 > 0:09:36It's helped because they're staying exactly within the same area.
0:09:36 > 0:09:42Whenever we found anything, we found a marriage for William Luty in Leeds, it's our William Luty.
0:09:42 > 0:09:46We found a birth of a child, William Luty, in Leeds, it's our William Luty.
0:09:47 > 0:09:50I think that's what's made it very easy.
0:09:50 > 0:09:56Back on the maternal side, the team have found a marriage in Leeds for a Lena Wright to a John Walton.
0:09:56 > 0:09:59If they had children, they will be heirs.
0:09:59 > 0:10:05What we'll do now is we'll start doing a birth search from 1933
0:10:05 > 0:10:09going up for about 20 years, to see if we can identify any births.
0:10:09 > 0:10:14It may be that we'll find a couple, it maybe we'll find quite a lot. So we'll just see as we go.
0:10:16 > 0:10:20The researchers find five children with a mother whose maiden name is Wright.
0:10:20 > 0:10:23What they still don't know is if they're all Lena's.
0:10:23 > 0:10:28The shortcut to working out who Lena's children are will be via her death certificate.
0:10:28 > 0:10:31The death certificate will be extremely useful
0:10:31 > 0:10:35in the hope that one of her children will have registered that death.
0:10:35 > 0:10:40Now I'm not sure whether I'm going to have anybody to send to the register office in Leeds.
0:10:40 > 0:10:43Unfortunately it will be tomorrow
0:10:43 > 0:10:48before we can sort out which of these people were her children.
0:10:48 > 0:10:53And the case is about to reveal something even more interesting for the heir hunters.
0:10:55 > 0:10:58The indication is that there may be a little bit of money in this,
0:10:58 > 0:11:01reports up to almost £50,000.
0:11:10 > 0:11:16On the 5th of April, 2008, Sylvia Casson died in a North London care home, aged 97.
0:11:17 > 0:11:22She came from a Jewish East End family and appeared to have no heirs or beneficiaries.
0:11:26 > 0:11:29Her case was passed on to the Treasury's estates division
0:11:29 > 0:11:32and was advertised on their list of unclaimed estates.
0:11:34 > 0:11:39Her details were picked up by heir hunter, Peter Birchwood of Celtic Research.
0:11:39 > 0:11:43Celtic is one of over 30 companies who specialise in trying to solve
0:11:43 > 0:11:46these difficult cases, in order to earn themselves a commission.
0:11:47 > 0:11:51As a family-owned firm with researchers in Wales, Scotland
0:11:51 > 0:11:54and Ireland, it's run by Peter and his stepson, Hector.
0:11:54 > 0:11:59Researcher, Saul Marks, investigated the Casson case.
0:11:59 > 0:12:05With an expertise in Jewish genealogy, Saul loves the thrill of solving a mystery.
0:12:05 > 0:12:08One of the best parts of my job is the detective work, the sleuthing.
0:12:08 > 0:12:12You start off with just a scrap of information, a name or a date
0:12:12 > 0:12:18or something and turn it into a whole tree with all the different branches. It's really creative.
0:12:18 > 0:12:21To create something like that is really wonderful.
0:12:21 > 0:12:25Very, very satisfying. The other side is the heir hunting side,
0:12:25 > 0:12:28visiting families and explaining to them
0:12:28 > 0:12:31that they're entitled to something which they perhaps never expected.
0:12:31 > 0:12:34It's really great to explain that and share knowledge, really.
0:12:34 > 0:12:40Although Sylvia had spent the last years of her life in a care home, for most of her life she lived
0:12:40 > 0:12:43in Dron House in Stepney in the East End of London.
0:12:46 > 0:12:51She'd been a popular resident, as estate manager, Michael Punter remembers.
0:12:51 > 0:12:53She was quite a character, she was.
0:12:53 > 0:12:55She was a very nice lady.
0:12:55 > 0:13:00She often used to carry a packet of sweets around in her pocket which she would give to children.
0:13:00 > 0:13:03There's a picture of Sylvia on the wall.
0:13:03 > 0:13:05That's Sylvia in the middle with her friend, Lily.
0:13:05 > 0:13:07She was quite a cheery lady.
0:13:07 > 0:13:11She liked going out, she liked socialising and she had many friends.
0:13:13 > 0:13:19This network of friends seems to have become something of a surrogate family for Sylvia.
0:13:19 > 0:13:24One of the unusual things about the Casson case was the fact that, although this was a Jewish family
0:13:24 > 0:13:29and many Jewish families are close-knit families, this one was much more fragmented.
0:13:30 > 0:13:34Saul's starting point was to check whether Sylvia had married,
0:13:34 > 0:13:37and if she had, whether her husband was alive.
0:13:37 > 0:13:40Many Jewish families put in notices in the Jewish press
0:13:40 > 0:13:44for births, marriages, deaths, engagement - anything like that.
0:13:44 > 0:13:51So we had a look in the Jewish press and here is a death notice of a Leonard or Lou Casson in 1983
0:13:51 > 0:13:53and the death notice is put in by Sylvia.
0:13:53 > 0:13:55So it looks like he's the right man.
0:13:55 > 0:14:00Finding Lou's death notice had given Saul hope that Sylvia and Lou
0:14:00 > 0:14:03may have had a family who would be entitled heirs,
0:14:03 > 0:14:06but Saul made a gloomy discovery.
0:14:06 > 0:14:12There's a very important phrase that I noticed in this notice, it says, "Now at peace with our dear son."
0:14:12 > 0:14:18So they've clearly had a son who's died and obviously that son's surname would be Casson.
0:14:18 > 0:14:23With a bit more digging, we've gone to a death notice
0:14:23 > 0:14:29for a Robert Casson on March 7, 1972, the only son of Louis and Sylvia.
0:14:29 > 0:14:33We know they had only one son and he died, which really proves
0:14:33 > 0:14:38she had no heirs from her line of the family.
0:14:38 > 0:14:42Just to prove that, his death certificate here,
0:14:42 > 0:14:48proves the date of death and that he died at their house in Stepney
0:14:48 > 0:14:52and to collect his birth certificate,
0:14:52 > 0:14:57it proves that his parents were Louis Casson and Sylvia, formerly Greenblatt.
0:14:58 > 0:15:02Now that Saul had proved there were no heirs from Sylvia's marriage,
0:15:02 > 0:15:07he had to see whether Sylvia had any brothers or sisters.
0:15:07 > 0:15:10Looking back over Sylvia's birth certificate, he was able to find
0:15:10 > 0:15:15Sylvia's parents names, Joseph and Rebecca Greenblatt.
0:15:15 > 0:15:22Armed with this information, he was then able to look up the family's details on the 1911 census.
0:15:23 > 0:15:28This is the census return showing Joseph and Rebecca Greenblatt,
0:15:28 > 0:15:32her parents, and all Sylvia's brothers and sisters.
0:15:32 > 0:15:37And one of the interesting things is that her parents
0:15:37 > 0:15:40were Russian Polish immigrants.
0:15:42 > 0:15:45The story of Sylvia's parents is not uncommon.
0:15:45 > 0:15:52From the early 1880s up to the start of the First World War, millions of impoverished Russian, Ukrainian
0:15:52 > 0:15:58and Polish Jews fled their homeland, fearing persecution at the hands of the Russian Tsar.
0:15:59 > 0:16:03The random and often murderous attacks on the Jewish community
0:16:03 > 0:16:07came to be known as pogroms, the Russian word for devastation.
0:16:07 > 0:16:10For the families who fled to save their lives, they headed west
0:16:10 > 0:16:15to the UK and America, in search of a better life.
0:16:15 > 0:16:20In England they migrated to London's poorer districts.
0:16:20 > 0:16:25During 1887, a staggering 17,000 Jewish immigrants ended up
0:16:25 > 0:16:30in the Whitechapel area and it soon became known as the Jewish quarter.
0:16:30 > 0:16:34At the time the 1911 census was taken, Sylvia's parents were living
0:16:34 > 0:16:37in Spitalfields, close to Brick Lane.
0:16:37 > 0:16:43We can see from the census return that Sylvia's parents and her family
0:16:43 > 0:16:47all lived together in three rooms and there were nine of them.
0:16:47 > 0:16:50When Sylvia was born, that would make ten.
0:16:50 > 0:16:57Ten people living in three rooms, in the East End of London, in relatively poor conditions,
0:16:57 > 0:16:59surrounded by a great many other immigrants.
0:16:59 > 0:17:04Sylvia would have had to do quite a bit for her parents.
0:17:04 > 0:17:09But the language of the street would have been Yiddish and Joseph and Rebecca would have spoken almost
0:17:09 > 0:17:15entirely Yiddish and it would have been their children who would have interpreted for them and helped
0:17:15 > 0:17:21them learn a bit of English, because the children were born here and went to school here.
0:17:21 > 0:17:25Along with giving Saul a picture of the family's social standing,
0:17:25 > 0:17:29the census also enabled him to fill out the family tree.
0:17:29 > 0:17:33Joseph and Rebecca Greenblatt had eight children.
0:17:33 > 0:17:38As the youngest, Sylvia had five older sisters and two older brothers.
0:17:38 > 0:17:41Now all Saul had to do was try and track them down.
0:17:41 > 0:17:47Once again, finding Lou's death notice provided Saul with clues.
0:17:47 > 0:17:53From one of the friend's tributes, he found Carol Levy, the daughter of Sylvia's best friend, Kitty.
0:17:53 > 0:17:58Sylvia played an important role in Carol's life.
0:17:58 > 0:18:04When I was growing up she was always there, because my mother and Sylvia worked together as teenagers.
0:18:06 > 0:18:09My dad and her husband were also friends.
0:18:09 > 0:18:11So she was always in our home.
0:18:11 > 0:18:13We were always there.
0:18:13 > 0:18:16To me she was little Auntie Sylvie.
0:18:17 > 0:18:19She was quite an intelligent lady.
0:18:19 > 0:18:24She was a machinist. A dress machinist in the East End of London
0:18:24 > 0:18:28and I think that she probably worked all her life.
0:18:28 > 0:18:34In the Jewish community in the East End, at that time, probably everybody knew one another.
0:18:34 > 0:18:39My mum, Kitty and Sylvia were friends. They worked together.
0:18:39 > 0:18:42They were best friends but they were like sisters.
0:18:42 > 0:18:47Although not a blood relation, Sylvia was like an auntie to me.
0:18:47 > 0:18:49She was always part of my life.
0:18:49 > 0:18:53Birthdays, anything, there was always lovely presents.
0:18:53 > 0:18:55She would take me out.
0:18:55 > 0:18:59She was just a little lady with the biggest heart,
0:18:59 > 0:19:05kind to everybody, even though sometimes life wasn't kind to her.
0:19:09 > 0:19:14Until Sylvia's death at 97, the East End remained her much-loved home.
0:19:14 > 0:19:17But it could so easily have been very different.
0:19:17 > 0:19:22In 1939 when she was only 28 everything was about to change.
0:19:24 > 0:19:29Suddenly life as Sylvia had known it was under threat.
0:19:30 > 0:19:32It was the height of the Blitz.
0:19:32 > 0:19:37The sustained bombing of London by Nazi Germany in World War II.
0:19:44 > 0:19:51The first phase in 1940 saw the Luftwaffe bomb the city for 57 consecutive nights.
0:19:55 > 0:19:58In anticipation of this, the Government embarked
0:19:58 > 0:20:02on the biggest mass movement of people in the country's history.
0:20:02 > 0:20:05An estimated three million people were transported
0:20:05 > 0:20:09from towns and cities under threat from enemy bombers to places
0:20:09 > 0:20:11of safety in the countryside.
0:20:13 > 0:20:19James Rothy, Chief Executive of the Evacuees Reunion Association, was evacuated from London.
0:20:19 > 0:20:22In the first big evacuation
0:20:22 > 0:20:26it wasn't only school children that we evacuated because
0:20:26 > 0:20:31the Government also made provision for mothers with children
0:20:31 > 0:20:35under school age - they could be evacuated together.
0:20:35 > 0:20:39Expectant mothers, they could be evacuated.
0:20:39 > 0:20:41Infirm, blind people.
0:20:41 > 0:20:46A lot of the mental hospitals, they were evacuated.
0:20:46 > 0:20:51One of the reasons for that was to get the hospitals empty,
0:20:51 > 0:20:57ready in case there was bombing and they could cope with the casualties.
0:20:57 > 0:21:00Still in her early 20s, and yet to have children,
0:21:00 > 0:21:08Sylvia didn't fall into any of these categories so she was forced to tough it out in her own home.
0:21:08 > 0:21:12Fortunately she and her family survived the worst of it but over
0:21:12 > 0:21:1821,000 Londoners were killed and over one million houses destroyed.
0:21:18 > 0:21:24After the defeat of the Luftwaffe in 1940, the threat of bombing tailed off
0:21:24 > 0:21:27and London life returned to something like normality again.
0:21:29 > 0:21:31But the calm wasn't to last.
0:21:31 > 0:21:38By 1944 the Germans had developed a new and lethal weapon, the long-range missile.
0:21:38 > 0:21:42Once again, Londoners found themselves under attack,
0:21:42 > 0:21:46this time from V1 Doodlebugs and V2 rockets.
0:21:51 > 0:21:56This new menace saw a second wave of families being evacuated.
0:21:56 > 0:22:01This time, Sylvia's best friend, Kitty and her baby daughter, Carol,
0:22:01 > 0:22:03qualified to be evacuees.
0:22:05 > 0:22:09I was born in 1944 in East London.
0:22:09 > 0:22:16My mother always tells me the story of how her parents and Sylvie were evacuated.
0:22:16 > 0:22:22My dad was in the Army here and Lou, Sylvia's husband, was in India.
0:22:22 > 0:22:26So Sylvia came with my mother and my grandparents to Nottingham
0:22:26 > 0:22:30and in Nottingham, where we all lived,
0:22:30 > 0:22:36I've got here my identity card and it shows we went to Nottingham
0:22:36 > 0:22:38in 1944.
0:22:38 > 0:22:40We were there for a year.
0:22:40 > 0:22:47It has the address where I lived in London and it has the address in Nottingham, which was Zulu road.
0:22:47 > 0:22:51I don't remember anything about it, obviously, at six weeks old.
0:22:51 > 0:22:55I was a very fat baby, my mother tells me and Aunty Sylvie
0:22:55 > 0:22:59would wheel me in the pram and everyone would think I was hers.
0:23:01 > 0:23:04As a mum with a newborn baby, Kitty would have been regarded
0:23:04 > 0:23:10as a priority evacuee but it's unlikely Sylvia would have qualified.
0:23:10 > 0:23:15Although married she had yet to have children, so would have had to make her own way to Nottingham.
0:23:15 > 0:23:19Throughout the war, as well as the government evacuation schemes,
0:23:19 > 0:23:24there were thousands of people who made their own arrangements.
0:23:24 > 0:23:31Everybody was war weary and also the tremendous housing shortage, which was being made worse again,
0:23:31 > 0:23:33more and more houses being destroyed.
0:23:33 > 0:23:38An awful lot of people decided to leave London at that time.
0:23:41 > 0:23:46Sylvia's case was... There must have been a lot like her.
0:23:46 > 0:23:50The government would not have been interested in her being evacuated.
0:23:50 > 0:23:53They wouldn't have given her any help at all.
0:23:53 > 0:23:57They would have probably discouraged her
0:23:57 > 0:24:00because they would want her to work in a factory.
0:24:00 > 0:24:05She would have had to find her own employment, accommodation and so on.
0:24:05 > 0:24:08She wouldn't have got any help from the government.
0:24:08 > 0:24:13Thanks to her dressing-making skills, Sylvia was able to find work
0:24:13 > 0:24:16in Carol's aunt's Nottingham dress-making factory.
0:24:16 > 0:24:19She and Carol stayed there for a further year before eventually
0:24:19 > 0:24:23heading back to try and resume their lives in the East End.
0:24:24 > 0:24:28It's where Sylvia lived for another 60 years before her death in 2008.
0:24:28 > 0:24:33As well as uncovering something of Sylvia's past, Carol also
0:24:33 > 0:24:37knocked Saul's research sideways by revealing some startling news.
0:24:37 > 0:24:41She actually told me that Sylvia had actually made a will.
0:24:41 > 0:24:46Which is absolutely unheard of because all these cases are about people who didn't make wills.
0:24:46 > 0:24:50So rather nervously I said to Carol, "Well, you better tell me what it says."
0:24:50 > 0:24:54Sylvia's will effectively meant that Saul's job was over,
0:24:54 > 0:24:57but it was to have another lasting effect when Carol
0:24:57 > 0:25:01found herself reunited with someone from Sylvia's past.
0:25:02 > 0:25:05Hello, it's been a long, long time.
0:25:05 > 0:25:06Come on in. How are you?
0:25:15 > 0:25:20For every case that is solved there are still thousands that stubbornly remain a mystery.
0:25:20 > 0:25:27Currently over 3,000 names drawn from across the country are on the Treasury's unsolved case list.
0:25:31 > 0:25:35Their assets will be kept for up to 30 years in the hope that eventually
0:25:35 > 0:25:39someone will remember and come forward to claim their inheritance.
0:25:42 > 0:25:46With estates valued at anything from £5,000 to millions of pounds,
0:25:46 > 0:25:49the rightful heirs are out there somewhere.
0:25:51 > 0:25:56Thomas Joseph Clark died in Birmingham in November 2004.
0:25:58 > 0:26:01Was he a friend or neighbour of yours?
0:26:01 > 0:26:06Could you even be related to him and entitled to his legacy?
0:26:06 > 0:26:13Villis Horns died in Wisbech in Cambridgeshire in January 2006.
0:26:13 > 0:26:18So far every attempt to find his rightful heir has failed.
0:26:18 > 0:26:22If no relatives are found, his money will go to the Government.
0:26:22 > 0:26:27Do you know anything about him? Is he your long-lost uncle or cousin?
0:26:27 > 0:26:31Is there a fortune out there waiting for you?
0:26:38 > 0:26:41It's day two on the case of David Luty.
0:26:41 > 0:26:46This photo of David, aged seven, is all that remains to remember him by.
0:26:47 > 0:26:51Tragically, he died in his Leeds home in 2008.
0:26:51 > 0:26:55But Fraser & Fraser feel his professional job as an accountant
0:26:55 > 0:26:59for the Yorkshire Electricity Board, could mean value in the case.
0:27:00 > 0:27:06The inquiries are coming back now and the indication is there may be a little bit of money in this.
0:27:06 > 0:27:10Reports of up to almost £50,000.
0:27:10 > 0:27:14It really goes to show that you can't tell anything from where someone lives.
0:27:14 > 0:27:21But this tantalising figure of £50,000 is still just that - tantalising.
0:27:21 > 0:27:25The team has done the research and found a potential heir on the paternal side
0:27:25 > 0:27:31and five possible maternal heirs but what they don't know is whether they're all Lena Wright's children.
0:27:34 > 0:27:37To shortcut their research, they hope Lena's death certificate
0:27:37 > 0:27:40will show one of them as the informant
0:27:40 > 0:27:42and be able to confirm the siblings.
0:27:42 > 0:27:48But without a traveller free to instantly collect the certificate from Leeds' register office,
0:27:48 > 0:27:51the team has turned to the next quickest option,
0:27:51 > 0:27:54ordering an express certificate from the General Register Office.
0:27:57 > 0:28:04Located some 250 miles north in Southport is certificate HQ.
0:28:04 > 0:28:10The office is the central repository for all of the birth, marriage and death records for England and Wales.
0:28:10 > 0:28:14It currently holds over 260 million records.
0:28:14 > 0:28:18This is growing at a rate of 1.5 million a year
0:28:18 > 0:28:22and they issue between 5,000 and 7,000 certificates a day.
0:28:22 > 0:28:27The process of recording these civil events provides a remarkably
0:28:27 > 0:28:30complete record of the population's history.
0:28:31 > 0:28:36Civil registration in England and Wales began in 1837 and, obviously,
0:28:36 > 0:28:38much has changed since then.
0:28:38 > 0:28:41I don't think anybody dreamed all those years ago, when events were
0:28:41 > 0:28:46being registered, that the interest would be there 170-odd years later.
0:28:46 > 0:28:50People would be so interested in obtaining copies of those events.
0:28:50 > 0:28:55For the heir hunters, whose hard currency is certificates,
0:28:55 > 0:28:59the General Register Office is key to their work.
0:28:59 > 0:29:02Every time they present a case to the Treasury, they need
0:29:02 > 0:29:06the certificate to prove that the heirs they have found are entitled.
0:29:09 > 0:29:11Have you ordered with us before?
0:29:11 > 0:29:13Good morning, Rachel speaking. Can I help you?
0:29:13 > 0:29:19We have a lot of customers who are probate researchers who regularly use our services.
0:29:19 > 0:29:23Some local authorities can issue certificates over the counters.
0:29:23 > 0:29:26For others, there's quite a delay.
0:29:26 > 0:29:28So a lot of companies use us.
0:29:28 > 0:29:30Primarily for the ease at which they can
0:29:30 > 0:29:35order certificates from us, because we have an online ordering service.
0:29:35 > 0:29:41A company can order from us up to 4pm and have a certificate ready for collection at 10am the next day.
0:29:46 > 0:29:50It's 9.30am in Fraser's office.
0:29:50 > 0:29:56While they wait for the arrival of Lena Wright's death certificate to, hopefully, find one of her children,
0:29:56 > 0:29:59they want to keep the Luty case moving forward.
0:29:59 > 0:30:04So far, it's been an easy piece of research to find David Luty's potential heirs
0:30:04 > 0:30:08but if it's been easy for the team, then it could also be easy
0:30:08 > 0:30:10for the other companies.
0:30:11 > 0:30:15We're going to have keep a close eye on the competition for this one.
0:30:15 > 0:30:17Everybody likes a straightforward case, but,
0:30:17 > 0:30:21you know, when they're difficult, it makes it harder for everybody else.
0:30:21 > 0:30:25To try and keep one step ahead of the competition, the team decide
0:30:25 > 0:30:28to make a move before actually knowing where the informant lives.
0:30:28 > 0:30:31But first, they need to get someone on the road.
0:30:33 > 0:30:38The office employs a squadron of travelling heir hunters
0:30:38 > 0:30:40who are ready to go wherever the hunt takes them.
0:30:40 > 0:30:45Based up and down the country, their job is to sniff out clues to potential heirs.
0:30:45 > 0:30:49Once heirs have been found, the travellers hot-foot it to meet them.
0:30:50 > 0:30:55If the heirs choose to sign up with them, the company earns a percentage of the inheritance.
0:30:55 > 0:31:00Manchester-based, Dave Mansell, is being sent towards Leeds.
0:31:00 > 0:31:06So we're heading across the border into the wild west Yorkshire.
0:31:08 > 0:31:10Hopefully by the time we get there,
0:31:10 > 0:31:12Francis in the office will have some information
0:31:12 > 0:31:16with regard to some certificate applications she put in overnight.
0:31:16 > 0:31:20But without confirmation, heading off to Leeds could be a risk.
0:31:24 > 0:31:30It's now 10am. The urgent death certificate they ordered yesterday from Southport has just arrived.
0:31:30 > 0:31:33I've got the death back of Lena Alice,
0:31:33 > 0:31:37and there's a witness, Eric, who we didn't know about.
0:31:37 > 0:31:40He wasn't on the tree at all. I can't find his birth.
0:31:40 > 0:31:41But...
0:31:41 > 0:31:46he appears to be alive and well at the same address and on the phone.
0:31:46 > 0:31:47Brilliant.
0:31:48 > 0:31:54Although finding Eric Walton is not exactly what they were expecting, if Francis can get traveller,
0:31:54 > 0:31:59Dave Mansell to see him, then he should be able to confirm who Lena's children are.
0:31:59 > 0:32:04The good news is their hunch about the informant being in Leeds is correct.
0:32:04 > 0:32:08Dave quickly makes his way to see Eric Walton and his wife.
0:32:08 > 0:32:10Is your full name Eric?
0:32:10 > 0:32:13- Yes, it is.- It's enough, isn't it?
0:32:13 > 0:32:15Yes.
0:32:15 > 0:32:16Where were you born and in what town?
0:32:16 > 0:32:20I was born in Leeds as far as I'm aware.
0:32:20 > 0:32:22What did you used to do for a living?
0:32:22 > 0:32:25- I worked for Yorkshire Electricity Board.- Did you?
0:32:25 > 0:32:30Dave's hoping this meeting will sort out whether Eric is actually an entitled heir.
0:32:30 > 0:32:38- So your grandfather was John Arthur Wright and your grandmother was Daisy?- Just Daisy...
0:32:38 > 0:32:43But what he really wants to know is who are Lena Wright's children.
0:32:43 > 0:32:45Right, your mum was Lena Alice.
0:32:45 > 0:32:50- That's right.- And you said her maiden name was Wright?- Yes.
0:32:50 > 0:32:53- Was your mum born in Leeds as well as your dad?- Yes.
0:32:53 > 0:32:57- How many children did your parents have?- They had three.
0:32:57 > 0:33:01There was Sylvia and John Michael.
0:33:01 > 0:33:03There was no Jean and no William?
0:33:03 > 0:33:04No.
0:33:04 > 0:33:11John Michael, he died about 13, 14 years ago.
0:33:11 > 0:33:13Was your father married more than once?
0:33:13 > 0:33:15No, not as far as I know.
0:33:15 > 0:33:18No. Right.
0:33:18 > 0:33:20- Is Sylvia...?- My sister.
0:33:20 > 0:33:22Five years younger than me.
0:33:22 > 0:33:24She's the next eldest, isn't she?
0:33:24 > 0:33:27Yes. She's the only one surviving, sort of thing, now.
0:33:27 > 0:33:29Is she on the telephone?
0:33:29 > 0:33:32Dave's research has confirmed that although they initially missed Eric
0:33:32 > 0:33:36off the family tree, he is in fact one of only three children.
0:33:36 > 0:33:39It finally removes any speculation.
0:33:39 > 0:33:43Eric's also able to reveal a little more about David Luty's life.
0:33:43 > 0:33:48Even though at this stage in his inquiries, for professional reasons,
0:33:48 > 0:33:51Dave doesn't tell him that it's David Luty who has died.
0:33:51 > 0:33:56- He were into folk music and guitars and that sort of thing.- Right.
0:33:56 > 0:33:58Quite a clever lad, he was, in his way.
0:33:58 > 0:34:03- Was he? How long is it since you've seen him?- 30 years.
0:34:03 > 0:34:05He'll still be around, I think,
0:34:05 > 0:34:08but probably a bachelor.
0:34:08 > 0:34:13And after my aunt Elsie died,
0:34:13 > 0:34:18he...he lived at Beeston with his father.
0:34:18 > 0:34:21His father were a bit of a nut case, really.
0:34:21 > 0:34:23Was he?
0:34:23 > 0:34:26- Thanks for your hospitality. - It's been very nice.
0:34:26 > 0:34:29Especially the Yorkshire tea and the Harrods biscuits!
0:34:29 > 0:34:32It's been a successful morning for Dave.
0:34:32 > 0:34:35Eric has agreed to Frasers taking his claim forward.
0:34:35 > 0:34:39Dave wastes no time in updating the office.
0:34:39 > 0:34:43Hiya, Fran, I've seen Mr Walton.
0:34:43 > 0:34:46- 'Yes.'- And he's signed up.
0:34:46 > 0:34:48Now, there's only three of them, not five.
0:34:48 > 0:34:55- 'OK.'- So there's no William and there's no Jean.- 'All right.
0:34:55 > 0:34:57'Thank you very much for that.'
0:34:57 > 0:34:59'OK. I'll speak to you later.'
0:34:59 > 0:35:02- Bye now.- 'Bye.'
0:35:02 > 0:35:06Thanks to Eric's information, Frasers were eventually able
0:35:06 > 0:35:09to trace four heirs in total on the maternal side.
0:35:09 > 0:35:14In addition to Eric and Sylvia, their deceased brother John's children, Paul and Timothy.
0:35:14 > 0:35:19For Neil, his hunch about David having money seems to have paid off for the team.
0:35:19 > 0:35:25What we're going to look back on with this case of David Luty is that
0:35:25 > 0:35:30you can't judge a book by a cover and you can't judge an estate by the name or even where someone lives.
0:35:30 > 0:35:35Sometimes the people you least expect to have savings and savings accounts
0:35:35 > 0:35:39because of where they live are the people with hundreds of thousands stashed away in the bank.
0:35:39 > 0:35:42This is just one of those cases.
0:35:42 > 0:35:46In the end, despite his lonely death, David's family,
0:35:46 > 0:35:50rather than the Treasury, will now benefit from his estate.
0:35:50 > 0:35:56Along with the four maternal heirs, Frasers also found one paternal cousin, entitled to inherit.
0:35:56 > 0:36:00They will all share David's £70,000 legacy.
0:36:07 > 0:36:13Back on the case of Sylvia Casson, who died in the East End of London in December 2008.
0:36:13 > 0:36:18Heir hunter, Saul Marx, had started unravelling Sylvia's family tree.
0:36:18 > 0:36:24Using the 1911 census, he had found that Sylvia had seven older brothers and sisters.
0:36:24 > 0:36:27This discovery meant Saul was fairly hopeful
0:36:27 > 0:36:31that someone would have married and be able to find entitled heirs.
0:36:31 > 0:36:35To try and shortcut this process, found family friend, Carol Levy,
0:36:35 > 0:36:38but Carol gave Saul some startling information.
0:36:38 > 0:36:45When I rang Carol, explaining that Sylvia hadn't got a will, she said, "No, she does have a will
0:36:45 > 0:36:50"and I've got it here and I've never opened it." Because she didn't know that Sylvia had died.
0:36:50 > 0:36:55Obviously, most of the profession we're in revolves around the fact that there is no known will
0:36:55 > 0:37:01but sometimes a will does come to light, especially if that will hasn't been lodged with anyone.
0:37:01 > 0:37:06Sylvia's will left her £35,000 estate to a number of people
0:37:06 > 0:37:10and Carol and Peter Layton were named as executors.
0:37:10 > 0:37:15Peter was Sylvia's nephew and had stayed in contact with her right up to the end of her life.
0:37:15 > 0:37:20When I spoke to Carol on the phone, she was very upset that she had not been informed of Sylvia's death.
0:37:20 > 0:37:25She couldn't understand why Peter hadn't informed her and the office
0:37:25 > 0:37:31did some further research and found out that Peter Layton had actually died and he had died before Sylvia,
0:37:31 > 0:37:34which explained why Carol had never known.
0:37:34 > 0:37:39Peter Layton died in 2007, a year before Sylvia.
0:37:39 > 0:37:42His death turned the case around again for Saul.
0:37:42 > 0:37:46Just as the will had made Saul's services redundant, Peter's death
0:37:46 > 0:37:52meant that, as a beneficiary, his portion of Sylvia's estate was effectively intestate again.
0:37:54 > 0:38:01Once we knew that one of the beneficiaries had died, and he had no will either, it was then possible
0:38:01 > 0:38:07to simply work as if he had been the deceased and use his
0:38:07 > 0:38:11and distribute his portion of the estate amongst Sylvia's relatives.
0:38:13 > 0:38:19Saul had Carol to thank for putting him in touch with Sylvia's niece and an entitled heir, Nina Herman.
0:38:21 > 0:38:26I had a call from somebody called Saul Marx, completely out of the blue asking me if I was related
0:38:26 > 0:38:30to one Sylvia Casson and I said, "Yes, she was my aunt."
0:38:30 > 0:38:36He told me that she had passed away and I might be a beneficiary from her will.
0:38:36 > 0:38:37I was absolutely gobsmacked.
0:38:37 > 0:38:42I didn't even know she had died because I had lost contact with her over the years.
0:38:44 > 0:38:49Carol's tip-off about Nina really helped to unlock Sylvia's family tree.
0:38:49 > 0:38:54It was a shortcut without having to research all of Sylvia's brothers and sisters.
0:38:54 > 0:38:59It was much quicker to be able to be given a link into the family
0:38:59 > 0:39:03and then to ask Nina all the questions and she was very helpful.
0:39:04 > 0:39:08Nina's additional family information helped Saul discover who would be
0:39:08 > 0:39:13entitled to Peter Layton's £15,000 portion of Sylvia's estate.
0:39:15 > 0:39:21Seeing all her family listed on the tree has been something of an eye-opener for Nina.
0:39:21 > 0:39:26Looking at my father's parents, I had no idea what their names were
0:39:26 > 0:39:30and I was bowled over to see that they were both born in Russia.
0:39:30 > 0:39:33I think they must have come here to escape the pogroms
0:39:33 > 0:39:38and I feel proud that they felt they could make this journey which couldn't have been easy one
0:39:38 > 0:39:44in those times and also to have the money to pay for the trip here.
0:39:44 > 0:39:47So it's fascinating and I feel proud that
0:39:47 > 0:39:55having come from a generation that obviously had to run away from somebody wanting to kill them
0:39:55 > 0:40:00and, obviously, a lot of the people with whom we mixed had the same experience with their grandparents.
0:40:02 > 0:40:05Nina, and many third generation British Jews,
0:40:05 > 0:40:10have their grandparents' bravery and determination to thank for the start they've had in life.
0:40:10 > 0:40:15Arriving in the East End as refugees, with next to nothing,
0:40:15 > 0:40:16Joseph and Rebecca Greenblatt
0:40:16 > 0:40:21must have worked extremely hard to better their family's fortunes.
0:40:21 > 0:40:29For many families, as they began to prosper, they also looked for a better life away from the East End.
0:40:29 > 0:40:32Nina's parents went west to Willesden, while many other
0:40:32 > 0:40:37Jewish families headed north to the more leafy middle class suburbs.
0:40:40 > 0:40:46For Nina, the move undoubtedly made it harder to keep in touch with her remaining East End family,
0:40:46 > 0:40:51but hearing about Sylvia again has prompted her to want to get back in touch with Carol.
0:40:54 > 0:41:00Meeting up with Carol again will give Nina the chance to share some family recollections.
0:41:00 > 0:41:03Hi! Lovely to see! Long time no see.
0:41:03 > 0:41:05Come on in, come on in!
0:41:05 > 0:41:06Thanks.
0:41:08 > 0:41:14This is interesting because it's my mum, my dad and Sylvia, probably in their twenties.
0:41:14 > 0:41:20- and this is exactly the same pose in their 70s.- Gosh. Amazing.
0:41:20 > 0:41:24I have been given a family tree of Sylvie and my father's family.
0:41:24 > 0:41:29- Oh, how interesting.- Which I'd like you to have a look at because I was gobsmacked on a few occasions.
0:41:29 > 0:41:32There were two sisters here that I had never even heard about.
0:41:32 > 0:41:34Sadly, they died when they were young.
0:41:34 > 0:41:37The only two I remember is Rose and Milly.
0:41:37 > 0:41:41Milly lived along the way from Sylvie in the same house.
0:41:41 > 0:41:44Rose was my children's third grandmother.
0:41:44 > 0:41:50She doted on them and then what gobsmacked me more than anything else that my late grandparents,
0:41:50 > 0:41:55Joseph and Rebecca, my eldest son has two children and what are their names?
0:41:55 > 0:42:00Joseph and Rebecca, quite unrelated to this.
0:42:00 > 0:42:01Oh, my goodness.
0:42:01 > 0:42:03That's amazing. That is amazing.
0:42:03 > 0:42:05I don't know if you've seen this.
0:42:05 > 0:42:09This photo was taken at a family gathering in my house
0:42:09 > 0:42:11and I think I'd like to remember
0:42:11 > 0:42:15Sylvie like that because she looked so happy and always smiling.
0:42:15 > 0:42:17- She was lovely.- Amazing.
0:42:17 > 0:42:18Amazing lady.
0:42:19 > 0:42:25For both Carol and Nina, the heir hunting process has been able to let them lay Sylvia's memory to rest
0:42:25 > 0:42:31and Auntie Sylvia has also helped bring their two families closer together again.
0:42:34 > 0:42:40If you would like to find out more about how to build a family tree or write a will, go to -
0:42:43 > 0:42:46Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd
0:42:46 > 0:42:48E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk