Willerton/Edwards Heir Hunters

Every year, thousands of people die without leaving a will.

If no relatives come forward, their estates go to the Government.

Keeping this money in the family is a job for the Heir Hunters.

-On today's programme, the Heir Hunters grapple with the unknown...

-I don't like a mystery.

..as they investigate a woman who can speak to spirits beyond the grave.

You cannot contact the dead, they have to contact you.

It's like a telephone line and, with Gladys, it was a very clear telephone line.

And in the quest for heirs, they uncover a heartbreaking story

of a loss of life that affected not just a family, but a whole nation.

It was just a tragedy, and other families were the same.

They were just wiped out with this.

Plus, how you may be entitled to inherit some of the unclaimed estates held by the Treasury.

Could thousands of pounds be heading your way?

In the UK, approximately two-thirds of people don't have a will.

If they die without having made one and with no obvious heir, then their money goes to the Government.

Last year, the Treasury pocketed a staggering £18 million in unclaimed estates.

That's where the Heir Hunters step in.

I'm trying to get to speak to Lillian from number 146.

There are over 30 companies whose business it is

to trace the rightful heirs to this money and help them claim it back.

Fraser & Fraser is one of the oldest firms of heir hunters in Britain.

It's run by Andrew, Charles and Neil Fraser.

They make their commission by solving cases and signing up heirs.

In the last ten years alone, they have enabled over 50,000 heirs to claim over £100 million.

It's 7am at Fraser & Fraser's central-London office

and the Treasury has just published its weekly list of unclaimed estates.

None of the estates is listed with their values, so the first

and most important job is to identify the ones worth the most

because they'll bring in the highest commission but, this morning, boss Neil Fraser isn't happy.

It's looking like slim pickings.

Although we've started off looking at 14 cases today,

it doesn't look like we've got any with any value at the moment,

which is a bit unfortunate, so we're now starting to look at our secondary sort of cases -

the small low-value stuff - and trying to send people out

and utilise the staff we've got at the moment.

Although it looks busy, everyone's working on very low-value things.

The delay is frustrating for the whole team.

As well as all the staff in the office, there's also a band of travelling Heir Hunters

like Dave Mansell, who are based all over the country and poised to go wherever the hunt takes them.

Although every estate that appears on the Treasury's list should be worth at least £5,000,

Frasers need to be pretty sure that a case is worth a lot more than that

before they throw all their resources at it,

so until they find one, Dave will just have to bide his time and wait.

Finally, one entry on the list does catch manager Bob's eye -

the case of Gladys Willerton.

He thinks it looks like it could have value, so he goes ahead and starts to investigate.

Gladys passed away in August 2008 at Gwendolen Lodge Nursing Home in Leicester.

She was a widow and didn't have any children.

Sadly, Gladys didn't leave a will, and unless heirs can be found

to her estate, her money will go to the Government.

The first piece of information Bob needs is Gladys's date of birth.

That will lead him to her birth certificate, which will tell him where she was born

and her parents' names, giving him a good place to start in the search for living family.

We've got two possible births there, one in Burnley.

This is the most likely cos she's supposed to be born in Lancashire, as opposed to Liverpool.

It's still only 8am, so while he's waiting

for the register offices to open, Bob's trying to find out Gladys's date of birth by other means.

He calls the nursing home where she died

and speaks to the manager, who remembers her and can help his investigation.

How long was she with you for?

February in '08.

Do you have a note of her date of birth on file,

and her maiden name if you've got that as well?

The other question, if I can ask you, about Gladys - as we're a business,

we need to know that it's going to be worth our while.

Are you aware of whether she had property or anything like that?

OK, and you're not aware of any money in bank accounts or anything like that, no?

At least now he's got something to go on, but from what he's hearing,

it doesn't sound like Gladys left much money.

But then Bob does get some surprising news.

According to the nursing home, Gladys did have children after all, four of them.

Right, do you know the details of the children?

Oh, right. Oh, I see. No information at all.

I just wonder how that information came about because, as I say,

from the public records, we can't find any trace of any births,

particularly from her marriage to Mr Willerton.

It could be of course that she had illegitimate children or adopted children.

It seems that Gladys's life was full of mystery.

If she did have children, then they would be the joint heirs to her estate,

but if not, then the team will have to look further back in her family tree.

According to the law, they can go back as far

as the deceased's grandparents, before then tracing their line forward to find any heirs.

As I noticed the people around, so the sign stopped.

Not much is known about Gladys's early years, but her adult life in Leicester was centred around

her membership of the Leicester Progressive Spiritualist Church.

In the early 1980s, Gladys was president of the church,

leading the congregation and even officiating at weddings.

The current president, Marion, was married by her

and has fond memories of Gladys as a forceful member of the church community.

We all knew her as Whacker Willerton.

We knew Gladys as Whacker Willerton

because she could be quite physical at times.

If there was somebody misbehaving in the service, she would think nothing

of picking up a hymn book and lobbing it across the room

to call them to attention.

There were two sides to Gladys - the tough side and the very sensitive side.

She was very devoted to the church, to the people that came here.

The Spiritualist Movement came to prominence in America in the 1850s

when two sisters, Margaretta and Catherine Fox,

claimed to have made contact with a spirit at their home in New York State.

With high rates of infant mortality at that time,

the idea of communicating with dead loved ones was very appealing

and, soon, groups of people were meeting to conduct seances.

In her own church, Gladys often presided over these meetings

and was recognised as a very gifted medium and clairvoyant.

You cannot contact the dead.

That's not possible.

They have to contact you.

It's like a telephone line and, with Gladys, it was a very clear telephone line.

Whatever her gifts, it seemed that Gladys was loved and trusted

by her friends and fellow church members.

When the chips were down, you could rely on Gladys.

You know, she was there for the people that came to the church and for her friends.

Indeed she was.

Back in the office, there's a bit of a buzz as more details of Gladys's life have emerged.

Gladys was born in Burnley in 1922.

Her parents were Susannah Rushton and Thomas A Woods,

and she had a sister Amy who died in infancy.

The team have also confirmed that Gladys married an Arthur Willerton in 1946.

Only seven years after their marriage, disaster struck.

On Coronation Day in 1953, Arthur was seriously injured in a motorbike accident,

and overnight, Gladys became the family breadwinner

and Arthur's carer until his death 30 years later.

Bye.

Research has turned up a copy of Arthur's will,

which contains some very interesting information.

I've established that the husband of the deceased died in 1983

and he left £25,000 to the deceased.

Now, £25,000 25 years ago...

may perhaps mean that there is a value on the estate.

We're hoping sort of £40,000 to £50,000.

This is good news for the Heir Hunters, and Bob has made another important break-through.

He managed to trace Arthur's sister and, after speaking to her

on the phone, he's solved the mystery of whether or not Gladys had any children.

She'd told the workers at the care home that she had four -

two boys and two girls - but there were no records to confirm this.

This lady was obviously a sister to the deceased's husband.

She has informed me that the deceased had no children, definitely had no children.

She had five or six miscarriages, but certainly no children,

so we can now concentrate on going back through the mother's and father's family.

In the spiritualist religion, we believe that,

when a woman has a miscarriage, the child continues to grow in the world of spirit.

I do know that, when questioned about her children,

she totally closed up.

She wouldn't say anything.

It's the end of the day. It's almost my bed-time, actually.

No, I think now there's not a lot more I can do.

It's been a frustratingly slow day for the Heir Hunters.

Bogged down with wrong turns and blind alleys, will tomorrow shed new light on this case?

-Good morning.

-Later in the show, the hunt is on for the heirs

-to Gladys Willerton's estate, and now the leads are coming thick and fast.

-We've got him.

Some cases stand out more than others, and when they came across the estate of Gillian Edwards,

the Heir Hunters were about to uncover an incredible story of hardship and family tragedy.

Gillian died on the 15th of August 2008 on the Isle of Wight,

leaving an estate worth £280,000, which included her house on the island.

Her neighbour Judy remembered her as a good friend and fellow dog-lover.

We moved here a couple of years ago and she became quite friendly

quite quickly, mainly through our two dogs, George and Wellington.

Everyone knew of Gillian but, at the same time, I think she was also

quite a private person, listening to what other people have said.

When she was a little bit younger, she used to dress up quite...

quite fancy, I think. She'd put lots of jewellery on

and I think she was quite the lady.

I used to go round there every day.

I wasn't really aware of any other family.

There was pictures in there, but I don't know who they were.

It seemed clear that if Gillian had any surviving blood relations,

she wasn't in touch with them when she died,

and as she didn't leave a will, her £280,000 legacy

was on the verge of going straight to the Government.

Veteran heir hunter Dave Pacifico has seen his fair share of high-value estates,

but even by his standards, £280,000 was a lot of money to lie unclaimed.

The case, though, didn't get off to a good start.

He couldn't find any record of a Gillian Violet Edwards.

Although she was known as Gillian Violet, she was actually born

as Violet Gillian, so there's a slight variation on her name,

but nonetheless, we managed to identify a birth fairly early on

and, from that, we were able to start identifying other members of her family.

Once they had her birth certificate, they could now identify Gillian

by her real given name of Violet Gillian Kemp.

She was born in Hammersley Street in Bedworth, Warwickshire, in 1933.

The family had recently moved from Mansfield into a brand-new

council house there to make a better life for themselves,

while her father Arthur, a coal miner, is believed to have worked in the nearby Newdigate colliery.

A mining family moving here from where they'd been, would be delighted

because it would be a two or three-bedroomed house

with proper foundations, and a bathroom and toilet.

Even so, for a family of five, six, seven children, it would still have

been a pretty tight squeeze, but a huge improvement on what they had before that.

The children lived and played together in the street,

and were constantly in and out of each other's houses.

Violet's next-door neighbour and childhood friend, Ennis Sparrow, still lives in the same house today.

She had a photograph of Violet, taken when they were young girls on a Sunday-school outing.

This was a Whit walk,

and I think maybe Violet Kemp would be about 16, something like that.

Other Sunday schools, they all congregated

and the churches all walked together, and it was a nice experience.

We used to love it, really looked forward to it every year, you know.

But that's the only one I've got of Violet, the only one I've ever had, I think.

We didn't have our photographs taken that often - on special occasions.

And then you lose touch because they move away.

I was sad to hear she'd died.

For Violet Kemp and her friends, life as a teenager

in a Midlands mining town was very far removed from what it is today.

I think, for a modern generation, to step back would be a huge culture shock.

Televisions and iPods and all these other things that youngsters take for granted now did not exist,

and life was hard and work was hard, and hours were long and wages were low,

and employment was hazardous,

so there were all sorts of possible areas for disaster, really.

Families lived on the edge very often.

The Newdigate colliery was notorious for its harsh conditions.

Ex-miners Tony Lloyd and Ken Tullis have lived in Bedworth

for over 50 years, and remember the hardships all too well.

Don't forget, men were still digging the coal out with picks and shovels

and what you had to was A - get the coal out

and then girder your own...to keep the roof up.

And you know, any danger of any slippage or anything, you really had to be careful.

One slip of concentration when you were on these heavy jobs

and these accidents can happen.

Newdigate itself was finally shut down in 1982 as the coal industry began to contract.

Every trace of the colliery has since disappeared,

but for the miners themselves, old memories die hard.

It really is part of our heritage, and we never, never forget it.

We mix with miners, you talk mining, you know, if you have a pint

with anybody in the club, so it's always with us.

Memories.

Stories from close communities are very helpful to the Heir Hunters' investigations.

By now, they had established Violet's roots in Bedworth, but before exploring

her family tree any further, they had to rule out the possibility of her having any family of her own.

Early on in our research, we need to identify

who she was married to and whether or not there was more than one marriage, just to make sure

there's no really close family - in other words, confirming she had no children herself.

We identified that, although she died as Edwards,

she was actually first married to somebody called Bernard Holmes.

In fact, Violet was married three times, but she never had any children.

She died a widow, so there's no surviving husband.

We then identify the next closest family. Now, bearing in mind

her parents would have been long since deceased,

we were looking at the brothers and sisters.

Tracking down large extended families and multiple heirs

is in all in a day's work for the Heir Hunters,

but Dave wasn't prepared for what he discovered when he started to research Violet's siblings.

We identified the names and years of birth of her brothers

and sisters, and suddenly realised she came from a large family.

She had eleven brothers and sisters.

A family as large as this would present a huge challenge for the Heir Hunters investigating the case,

but they couldn't have guessed the tragic events that they were about to uncover.

For every case that is solved, there are still thousands that remain a mystery.

Currently, over 3,000 names drawn from across the country

are on the Treasury's unsolved case list.

With estates valued at anything from 5,000 to millions of pounds,

the rightful heirs are out there somewhere.

Today, we've got two cases Heir Hunters have so far failed to solve. Could you be the key?

Could you be in line for a pay-out?

Sidney George Alfred Dancey died in Bath on the 27th of July 2006.

Was Sidney a neighbour or work colleague?

Could you even be related to him and entitled to his legacy?

James Colin Joss passed away on the 9th of October 2006 in Leicester.

So far, every attempt to find his rightful heir has failed.

If no relatives can be found, his money will go to the Government, but could it be meant for you?

If the names George Dancey or James Joss mean anything to you

or someone you know, you could have a fortune coming your way.

-Still to come on the show...

-I want that marriage and then

I want to do an issue search from that marriage to September 1911.

The team are closing in on the heirs to what they hope

will be a £50,000 estate left by spiritualist Gladys Willerton.

Back on the Violet Kemp case, Dave had discovered that she was

one of 12 children, which was a huge family even by the standards of the day.

Arthur and Elsie Kemp had seven sons and five daughters.

Three of them - Walter, Thomas and Phyllis - had died in infancy,

a tragic but all too common occurrence at that time.

No sooner had the team confirmed the number of siblings that Violet grew up with when they came across

some new and disturbing evidence - three more death certificates for Violet's sisters, Rose and Evelyn,

and her brother Kenneth, who all died within a year of each other when they were young adults.

We subsequently found out from a member of the family

that the cause of death for these people that died in their teens was tuberculosis.

In the 1940s, Britain was in the grip of a TB epidemic so highly contagious

that it ripped through close-knit working communities, killing one out of every two people infected.

In Bedworth, the Kemp children contracted pulmonary TB, the most common strain of the disease.

This is the sort of X-ray that the persons who died

with pulmonary tuberculosis would have had, who died in the 1940s.

Professor Peter Ormerod is the president of the British Thoracic Society

and has made a lifelong study of TB.

TB is a bacterial infection and it's passed by person-to-person spread.

Somebody with lung TB who's coughing out TB germs in the phlegm

will have droplets in the air that you can't see which will contain TB bacteria and those are inhaled.

If some other people inhale those bacteria, they will get infected, and some of the people

who are infected will go on and get disease and be ill.

You usually need fairly prolonged exposure to catch tuberculosis, and if you're living in a house

with somebody seven days a week, that's prolonged exposure.

Out of the surviving nine Kemp children, six of them contracted TB.

Jean Kemp, widow of Violet's brother Stan, remembers hearing about the family members affected.

They told me that there was a big thing with TB in the family

and a fair few of them contracted it, including my late husband.

I know Violet had to go to Hertford Hill for treatment.

Hertford Hill sanitorium in Warwickshire

was one of the many facilities that housed some of the 50,000 people that contracted TB every year.

Violet and other TB sufferers were sent to sanitoria

to be treated with a strict regime of bed rest and fresh air

to rest their damaged lungs and give them a chance to fight the disease.

Now, this is me in all my glory.

This must've been taken late in 1948 or early 1949...

Like Violet, Herbert Williams

was only a teenager when he contracted TB and was sent to a Welsh sanitorium.

The fresh air was fulsome, was more than adequate,

because they had French windows in the ward I was in.

They were always flung open, night and day.

We had red bed jackets to wear, but it wasn't much help with the windows open all the time

and the freezing cold of a Brecon Beacons winter.

For some patients, the only hope of survival was to undergo a horrific treatment

known as collapse therapy, where the lung was forcibly collapsed to deprive the TB bacteria of oxygen.

In the most agonising and dangerous of these procedures,

surgeons would break or remove up to eight of the patient's ribs.

It's a bit like if you imagine taking a...when you take half a chicken, if you break all the ribs

off the breastbone and push on, the whole thing collapses in, and that's similar to what happened there.

Violet's brothers Stan and Arthur both underwent collapse therapy,

but the agonies of TB did not stop there.

Stan was affected by the disease for the rest of his life.

He had a big scar on his back

that sort of started

round by the rib cage, went round the back,

and it ended up at the top of the shoulder.

And in the summer, he would never take his clothes off.

He was very self-conscious about this scar and he said people would know

what he'd had as a child, and I think he was ashamed to a degree.

Sadly for Stan and other survivors who suffered from the stigma

of having had TB, there was escape from this cruel and misguided prejudice.

If I'd have told my step-father that Stan had had TB,

he would've been banned from the home.

Like Violet, Stan and Arthur eventually recovered.

Their sister Rose, who died in Hertford Hill,

and Evelyn and Kenneth, who died at home in Bedworth, were not so lucky.

TB had decimated the Kemp family.

It was just a tragedy, and other families were the same.

They were just wiped out with this.

It seemed that, by the time she died, Violet had left any trace

of her difficult childhood and humble beginnings far behind her.

At her death, Violet was a very wealthy woman,

but she had also completely lost touch with her family, so who stood to inherit her £280,000 estate?

We knew almost certainly there had to be some close kin still alive.

It would've been very unusual if all the eleven had died without children,

and we suspected maybe a very large number of nephews and nieces.

When estates are divided up between siblings, the money is split equally between them.

Any descendants of deceased siblings will then carve up their father or mother's share.

In Violet's case, the estate was split four ways.

Half went to her two siblings, a quarter was split between her

brother Alfred's three children, and the final quarter went to the descendants of her brother Stan.

That was your dad many years ago, before I even knew him.

Stan and Jean's daughter Jane was amazed when she heard

she was going to inherit money from an aunt she barely knew.

I didn't really know what to think at the time.

It was just a bit of a shock.

I met her at my dad's funeral.

She asked me who I was, and I told her that I was Stan's daughter.

I've heard stories about her, but I didn't know her,

so I was just surprised to be getting any cash from it, really.

I wanted to pay my mortgage off with whatever I get.

It'll make me better off!

I'll have some money to spend on myself for a change.

Jane also had a sister Susan, who sadly passed away when she was only 33, leaving two children,

Adam and Lauren, the final two heirs to Violet's legacy.

Heir-hunter David Pacifico remembers the moment when he first contacted the family.

I felt better that we could tell them some good news,

but it was awful to find out, speaking to the family,

that they'd a traumatic loss with the death of their mother at a very, very young age.

How many did I do?

Both Adam and Lauren are legally classified as minors,

so all contact has been through their father Trevor.

I was told by my dad that my great-aunt

Violet

had passed away and some of the money that she'd left had been divided by the blood relatives.

It was shocking,

just it appearing out of the blue without knowing who she is.

Hearing about their inheritance made the children think about

what life was like for their great-aunt and her family.

I think it would be quite different for Violet and her brothers and sisters

cos they wouldn't be able to eat a lot of food and do what we do

and go out, cos they'd have to be in when the bombs came and stuff.

I felt as if I wanted to find out more about her...

..and where the Isles of Wight is.

For Violet's great-niece and great-nephew, their share of the £280,000

inheritance is an opportunity that won't be going to waste.

I've restricted them to just having £100 each to spend on they want, and then put the

rest of the money away so they can use it in the future for something more beneficial in their lives.

We'll never know why Violet didn't leave a will but,

thanks to the Heir Hunters' successful investigations,

her money will now go on to benefit future generations.

Fraser & Fraser have been investigating the case of Gladys Willerton,

a gifted medium and clairvoyant who died aged 86.

After initial doubts that her estate would be worth very much, the team uncovered a bequest

from her late husband, which means it could be worth a lot more.

We're hoping sort of £40,000 to £50,000.

Now that the case looks like being more valuable,

Frasers have decided to unleash one of their travelling Heir Hunters to help speed up the investigation.

Gladys's family were all based in Burnley

so, as Dave Mansell is already in the area,

he's heading over to Preston register office to gather any information he can find.

-Morning.

-Back in the office, manager Frances Brett has taken over the investigation.

Hi, Alan, I understand you've got this Willerton job.

And the first thing she does

is get up to speed on the latest developments from her colleague Alan, who'll be working with her.

A routine check of the 1911 census has revealed a tantalising fact

that could provide the breakthrough that the team so badly needs.

It seems that Gladys's mother Susannah

was married to a John Thomas Kay and that they had a child.

If Dave can find a record for this child, then the Heir Hunters will have found a half-sister or brother

for Gladys and the new lead that they've been looking for.

It will be a lot easier to follow up a child born

between 1907 and 1911

rather than have to go back to the 1870s,

'80s and '90s,

so fingers crossed.

With such a strong lead to pursue, the team is hoping that Dave can get some results fast.

Sunny Preston.

One of the things that can make or break a case is quick access to official records.

Dave has been working for Frasers for many years

and he's on very good terms with the ladies in the Preston register office.

This couple, John T Kay and Susannah Rushton, married in 1907 in Burnley,

so I want that marriage and then I want to do an issue search from that marriage to September 1911.

-Right. So any particular district?

-No, all districts.

-Right.

Dave is looking for every child with the surname Kay who was born

in the area, but with a relatively common surname like that, it can be a long and arduous process.

These index books have been going for some considerable time because that's how they end up.

Once he's got a list of names, he can then access the birth certificates and see if the parents'

names match those of Gladys's mother and her first husband.

That's the first district I've done.

There's 29 on there that need verified. That's the first district!

He's found around 70 possible births, but so far no-one that could be Susannah's son.

The 1911 census that they've got access to in the London office

is not always 100 per cent reliable, so Dave needs to find

a birth certificate to prove a child did exist and keep the investigation alive.

Well, if there's no children, the likelihood that there are any descendants from which heirs...

would result would seem slim.

-There you go.

-Finally, he gets the news he's been hoping for.

-Thank you.

-Milton. Posh name.

It is a posh name, isn't it? Milton Kay.

-Milton Kay.

-That's great.

Dave has been able to prove that Gladys did have an elder

half-brother called Milton Kay, who was born in 1908.

When his father died and his mother married again, it's likely that 12-year-old Milton moved with her.

Two years later, Gladys was born.

There are no photos of the two of them from their childhood, but could they have grown up together?

Yeah?

Back in London, the team has been working hard as well,

and they've also come across the name Milton.

-PHONE RINGS

-Here's Dave. Hi, there.

Have you? Is it called Milton? Do you know,

I was... So hot off the...

I was just literally this second got off the phone to Alan...

Frances tells Dave that Alan has found Gladys's mother's

death certificate and her son Milton Kay is listed as the informant.

We've got him, and he's just going back inside now to order a copy of his death.

As Milton was 46 when his mother died, it's very probable

that he too is dead, but Frances is keen to see who the informant was on HIS death certificate.

Let's hope the informant is a child, and that that child's still alive.

It's not long before Dave has got his hands on the proof.

Right, Milton Kay, a textile warper, retired.

-Textile warper?

-Yeah.

-You've got your warp and your weft, haven't you?

Yeah. Well, this one was a warper.

-OK.

-And the informant was son Donald Hamilton Kay who was present at the death.

The pieces are falling into place.

Milton Kay was married to Violet Heseltine

and they had a son Donald, born in 1930, who would've been Gladys's half-nephew.

That means that Donald was only eight years younger than Gladys.

Could they have known each other?

Sadly, a quick search reveals that Donald passed away in 1984,

but the team has discovered that he did get married to Joan, and here they uncover good news...

-Hi, there.

-..which Fran is quick to pass on to Dave.

Joan - she's still alive.

Joan won't be eligible to inherit because she's not a blood relative,

but then comes the news they've all been waiting for.

They have two children, Margaret J Kay.

There is another child, Richard M Kay.

Bingo! The Heir Hunters have found their heirs, but they still don't know

where Richard and Margaret live.

However, Frances does have an address for Joan, their mother.

Dave wasn't far away, so he hot-foots it over there.

Hi, sorry to bother you. Are you Joan Kay?

Hi, my name's David Mansell. I work for a firm of probate researchers by the name of Fraser & Fraser.

What's happened is, a member of the family

has died intestate,

and your daughter Margaret and your son Richard will be heirs to the estate.

-Really?

-Yeah.

Now, did Margaret marry Ian Rumson?

-Yes.

-Where is she? Where does she live?

-She lives in Burnley.

-Does she?

-Yes.

Have you got an address?

Does your son Richard work?

Richard works at Otham, yes.

Dave's finally cracked his case. He can now contact the heirs in person,

and hopefully help them to submit a claim for their inheritance.

-I've inherited quite a...

-Ohh!

It turns out that Joan has been working on the family tree herself,

and she offers to show Dave some old papers.

Can I look at that piece of paper?

-Thank you.

-I've been trying to fathom out from that.

It lists all the family members who attended Gladys's mother's funeral.

Right, let's make a note of this.

Most of the names have already been checked out,

but a couple of unfamiliar ones are troubling Dave.

Who are Rupert and Margaret?

Could they be a missing half-sister or brother to Gladys?

Thanks very much.

Before they can settle the case, the Heir Hunters need to be certain

that they've not missed any close kin.

What we've read is a cut-out from the newspaper, and it's very, very confusing.

This new development has left Frances feeling uneasy.

I don't like a mystery.

-Is her surname Rupert?

-No.

-There can't be too many Ruperts in Burnley, can there?

-No.

We're just...covering our backs that Rupert isn't...

another sibling of Gladys that we haven't...discovered as yet.

There he is. Rupert Rushton.

Do you reckon that's him?

Let's have a look.

-Yeah.

-That's it.

-That's it.

He's a distant cousin. Yeah, we've just identified this Rupert.

He has the deceased mother's maiden name,

so he's probably a distant cousin which won't affect our research.

As Gladys's cousin,

Rupert is less eligible to inherit than her half-brother Milton,

so he, Margaret and any of their descendants

are now out of the picture.

The Heir Hunters have finally traced Gladys's complete family tree,

and confirm that the true heirs to her estate are Margaret and Richard,

Gladys's great-niece and nephew.

It's a satisfying end to the search,

and instead of disappearing into the Treasury,

Gladys's legacy will now be passed down to her family.

Whether the great-niece and great-nephew

will know anything about Gladys,

I don't know.

It'll be interesting to know

whether the two halves of Susannah's family did maintain contact.

Like all the relatives that the Heir Hunters track down,

Gladys's great-niece Margaret was shocked

when she heard that she was going to inherit some money.

It was quite surprising, really.

It was my mum who'd rung and said David had called on my mum,

and Mum said, "You might have inherited some money from a relative,

"a distant relative that we didn't know about."

We had a vague idea who Gladys was

but we didn't really know properly.

We've put it all together now

and realise that Gladys was my granddad's half-sister.

Yeah, looking at that photograph,

that's Gladys with my dad Donald, which would be...

What they didn't realise was that, all along,

Joan had an old photograph of Gladys on the beach

with Margaret's dad Donald.

There must have been a time when the two sides of the family were close,

but something changed.

My granddad was a very big church-goer

and he was a member of the church choir in the Church of England,

but it looks like Gladys went off

towards the spiritual side of the church, which maybe...

you know, my granddad being set in his ways,

didn't approve of her going, and that may have caused the rift

in the family.

With not having any children of her own,

it just seems quite sad that she was all on her own, really.

We could've been visiting and, you know,

phoning and writing letters to her,

but we didn't know.

Gladys may have missed out on knowing this side of her family,

but it's good to know that her adopted family

in the spiritualist church were there for her at the end.

They did their utmost to give her a really lovely service

in the way that she would've liked it.

We don't wear black, we wear the brightest colours.

It's not a sad occasion at all.

It's a celebration of her life and then a celebration

of the fact that she's now moved upwards and onwards.

This is how many relatives that you've found at the moment - 190.

And this is only really part of the family, isn't it?

Finding out about her long-lost great-aunt

has awakened her interest in the family history

and the work that her mum's been doing on the family tree.

So it'll be quite massive when I've finished it.

Now we've got a few more dates and names,

whereby my mum had come to a full stop,

she can now carry on and hopefully build up

the family tree on Gladys's side.

We can go further than that, really.

We can work together on it

and build it up together.

If you would like advice about building your family tree

or making a will, go to:

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