Hodgson/McHugh Heir Hunters

Every year in the UK, thousands of people die with no will,

and no obvious relatives.

Tracking down their long-lost families

is a job for the heir hunters.

Could they be knocking at your door?

On today's programme, will Fraser & Fraser's travelling heir hunters be able to cope with the pressure?

It's got somewhat bigger to say the least.

Hey, Dave, hang on a minute, I'm flogging myself to death here!

And in tracing the heirs to a 500,000 fortune,

the probate researchers uncover a family looking for answers.

"What did he do?"

That's what went through my head.

"Where did this money come from?"

And we'll have details of some of the hundreds of estates still waiting to be claimed.

Could you be in line for a windfall?

One in three people in the United Kingdom do not have a will.

If no next of kin are found when they die, their money ends up going to the Government.

Last year alone, the Treasury made a whopping £18 million from unclaimed estates.

That's where the Heir Hunters step in.

Pleased to meet you.

More than 30 companies make it their business to track down long-lost relatives.

As they charge a commission, it's a rewarding business

and between them, they've returned £6.5 million to the rightful heirs.

It's 7am on Thursday, and one of London's oldest heir hunting companies, Fraser & Fraser,

is combing through the Treasury's list of people who've died without leaving a will.

One name has already caught the eye of senior case manager, David Pacifico.

This is a case called Hodgson, Dorothy Iris Turner Hodgson.

It looks like a valuable case.

She was born and she died in Newcastle upon Tyne.

Dorothy Iris Turner Hodgson died on 26th October 2008.

She left behind a bungalow in Newcastle, which is estimated to be worth around £170,000,

making this a potentially lucrative case for the heir hunters to pursue.

Initial investigations show that Dorothy

married Lawrence Hodgson in 1944 and they didn't have any children.

Brenda George helped Dorothy care for her husband after he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's.

I met Dorothy about 15 years ago when I first started on the home care

and I was her husband's care worker, Larry Hodgson.

He had Alzheimer's and I used to go in five or seven days a week, just to let Dorothy get out.

After Lawrence passed away, Dorothy didn't seem to have any friends

because she'd spent as much time indoors with Larry.

I went every week, just to have a chat and a cup of tea with her

and then it got where I noticed things weren't getting done.

Red letters were coming in, so I used to call in every other day, take her shopping,

do a bit of housework for her and just help her any way I could.

Before Lawrence's illness, Dorothy had worked in the centre of town.

Dorothy managed a shop in Newcastle, a big pram shop,

and I think being in charge of a big pram shop,

you'd have to be a strong, confident person.

I believe that was what Dorothy was like before Larry's illness.

But stuck indoors looking after Lawrence, Dorothy became withdrawn and isolated.

Sadly, after her husband died, she went downhill herself.

Caring for Larry with his Alzheimer's for years and years and doing it so brilliantly,

she got Alzheimer's herself and there was no-one there for her, nobody at all.

In the office, David knows that with a valuable bungalow

as part of the estate, this case is going to attract a lot of competition.

He starts getting his team in place and already has a couple of leads.

Hello? 'There is a brother of the deceased.'

I'm sure he's probably died out, we've got to check this out.

Let's go and see what I can do with the troops downstairs.

As David rallies the troops on the inside, there's an army of travellers working on the outside,

waiting to be deployed wherever the office sends them.

They pick up records, gather intelligence from neighbours and most importantly, sign up the heirs.

Today's destination is Newcastle, and it's ex-policeman Dave Mansell who gets the call.

It's a three-hour drive from his Bolton home,

so while he heads up there, back in the office, David Pacifico starts tracking down Dorothy's neighbours

as one well-placed call can save them hours of research.

-PHONE RINGS

-'Hello?'

I'm sorry to trouble you so early in the morning, I'm speaking from London.

It's concerning a neighbour of yours that passed away, Mrs Dorothy Hodgson.

It turns out Dorothy's neighbour knew her well

and is able to confirm that she had no children or close relatives.

I think it's all going to go down on the research.

No close family, the brother died in the war.

David's enquiries show that Dorothy's only brother, James Moat,

died in Italy while fighting in the Second World War, in 1944.

When I first met Dorothy, she talked a lot about her brother, Jimmy, who she loved.

I remember her telling us they were waiting to get a telegraph

to say he was coming home from the war and how excited they all were, waiting to see him.

Then they got another telegraph to say he'd been killed.

He was on his way home, coming through Italy and he was bombed and killed,

and how was devastating for the whole family. She was just

a little girl and she had to run down the street and get friends because her mam was hysterical.

She didn't know what was going on. And her mam and dad,

especially her mam, was never the same once he'd been killed.

It just devastated the whole family.

The loss of her only brother had a lasting effect on Dorothy.

Dorothy used to often talk about Jimmy. If he'd still been alive, how she'd have had a sister-in-law

and maybe nieces and nephews around her,

and I think she'd really missed him and started to think what she's missed

because she had no children of her own.

She'd have had nieces and nephews of her brother's, there for her to love and care for.

Dorothy had no close family, so it's down to the office

to discover who now has a rightful claim to her estate.

They'll need to look up through the generations

to find out if she had any aunts or uncles.

Assuming they have all probably died out,

they would then need to turn their attention

to their descendants, Dorothy's potential cousins,

as they would be her closest blood relatives.

It's a valuable property and I know we're going to get competition on this case,

so it's getting it sorted as soon as possible.

With speed of the essence, the office starts trawling through birth, death and marriage records

to build and verify Dorothy's family tree.

I've got two people looking for the deaths of the parents,

I've got two people looking for the census on the father and the mother.

Researcher Amy is cross-checking the marriages.

Looking from the marriage of the parents of the deceased,

I'm looking for the mother's name.

The finding of a UK census provides them with a lead.

Produced every 10 years, it lists all the members of each household

and can give key information to the search.

This is a possible 1911 census on the Turner side, the mother's side.

If this is correct, the mother has got a, or had, a brother.

They've discovered that Dorothy was the daughter of Sarah Turner and Frederick Moat.

The census shows her mother Sarah's parents had three children - Sarah, Ellen and William.

Sadly, Ellen died aged 14, so it's William,

Dorothy's uncle and his descendants,

who could have a claim to her estate.

I don't think, and hope, it's going to be too large a family.

One side might only be one uncle which is good news,

and the other side may only be about four or five aunts and uncles

so it doesn't look like we may...

I say "hope" because I could be proved wrong.

With a a tree starting to form in the office, travelling heir hunter Dave Mansell

needs to be in place to sign up any heirs they find.

He's been driving for nearly two hours and is making good progress

which is just as well, because Dorothy's family tree is starting to balloon.

What I was saying about not being a large family, is proving otherwise now.

On Dorothy's father's side of the family,

the team has discovered a number of aunts, uncles and cousins.

Dorothy's father, Frederick Moat,

was the son of Frederick Alexander Moat and Eleanor Hadley.

As well as Frederick, they had four other children -

Florence, Grace, Elizabeth and George.

One of Dorothy's aunts, Florence, went on to have six children.

David is currently focusing his attention on this stem of the family tree.

The cousin whose death we're trying to obtain is somebody called Austin Robert Carlisle.

Now, he would be the son, we believe, of Florence May Carlisle, formerly Moat,

because earlier on we found a 1911 census.

-I've got a phone number.

-For who?

Austin's daughter.

Right. This person would be a cousin once removed, and because the father is dead,

we believe she'd be an heir along with possibly many others, but I'm hoping to speak to her now.

As the family tree keeps on growing, could Dorothy's estate be more valuable than they first thought?

Her estate was around £614, which was quite a lot of money in 1925.

So it could be worth a fortune now.

Although heir hunters aim to find relatives as quickly as possible,

the more complex cases can leave them foxed for weeks, months or even years.

Celtic Research was handed the case of Michael McHugh in 2001.

The case was handled by Peter Birchwood and wife, Maria, from their office in Wales.

They have extensive experience of tracking down next of kin in Ireland,

but nothing could have prepared them for this estate.

A little bit of a confusing case from the start.

Irishman Michael McHugh died in America without leaving a will.

His assets included 70,000 in the US and a farmhouse in Ireland.

But this wasn't simply a case of him dying intestate.

Peter found out that he also left a whopping 500,000 trust fund in the

name of his niece and goddaughter, Rosemary McHugh.

It started off with one account and then it mushroomed,

so I'd say that's not just unusual, that's unique

in all of the cases that I've worked on over the past 40 odd years.

The US company dealing with the trust fund believed that

Michael's niece had died, so it was left to Peter to trace the rightful beneficiaries.

Initial investigations showed that although he died aged 78 in a nursing home in Chicago,

Michael had been born into a very poor farming family in County Cavan, Ireland.

Mary Daly from University College Dublin is an expert in Irish history.

Farming life in County Cavan in the '20s and '30s would have been tough.

It would have required constant hard work.

It would be classified as one of the less developed parts of Ireland.

It's Drumlin soil, there's a lot of lakes,

it's badly drained, it's very hilly.

It's northerly so it's colder, it gets more frost.

So the combination of small farms,

shorter growing seasons and not very good land means that this

would be one of the toughest parts of Ireland to farm in.

Michael's family lived with these hardships, and when he was just eight years old, tragedy struck.

His mother died of tuberculosis and the family was ripped apart.

His elder brother, Frank, was sent to live in a home

while Michael and his younger siblings

were farmed out to various neighbours' houses.

Life was tough and tragedy struck again

when Michael's father died of a heart attack

while working in the fields.

His brother, Frank, took over running the farm

but unable to make a decent living, he left Ireland in the 1940s

in search of a better life in England.

Michael bought the farm from Frank, but by 1951, he too had become disillusioned

and booked a ticket on a boat bound for America.

Irish emigration to America goes back for well over 200 years.

It seemed the land of opportunity, and it was for many of them.

He'd have been moving from a house which was fairly spartan, no running water and no electricity

and he's moving from a rural community where he knew everybody,

going into this big city with all these modern conveniences, technology.

Huge numbers of anonymous people round him, so the whole scale of things - the anonymity,

the type of job, the place he lived in - would have been very, very different.

Michael left Ireland with just £5 in his pocket,

but when he died 50 years later, he'd amassed a 500,000 fortune.

He left it in trust to his niece and goddaughter, Rosemary,

but the US company looking after his estate hadn't been able to unearth her.

Assuming she'd died, Peter took on the case to find her rightful heirs.

Firstly, it was a negative search.

We looked through the death records to see if there was a death for a Rosemary,

and there wasn't.

With no death certificate, Peter started to consider the possibility

that perhaps Rosemary was still alive and unaware of the amazing 500,000 windfall

that was awaiting her, so he started to dig deeper.

We had to do a lot of research to find Rosemary.

The electoral registers then were not organised as they're now,

so it was a question of going through all the records for a particular area.

It was a painstaking task, but Peter's patience was rewarded.

He found out that Rosemary was in fact alive and living in Leeds.

All that was left for Peter to do was to make the kind of call that we all dream of receiving.

I was totally shocked.

There was no... I couldn't even... tell you how or what I was going to do with it.

Or what went through my head, because I went totally blank.

Which I did, and I did for days.

The news came totally out of the blue.

Rosemary hadn't seen her uncle for over 25 years.

It's hard to believe that,

first of all, there was this money that was around.

Secondly, how did he make it?

And thirdly, why me?

The half-a-million dollar trust fund couldn't have arrived at a better time for Rosemary.

Several months earlier, she had been diagnosed with cancer.

I was taken into hospital and, of course, they did everything and

they found cancer in the stomach and I was admitted straight away.

The money made life easier for Rosemary as she battled the disease.

I could get my own home, pay for it outright.

My children could have a better life.

We moved down to Leeds.

The reason why was because the work situation was much better for the girls as well.

And there was further good news for the family when Rosemary was given the all-clear from her cancer.

Uncle Michael's trust fund had helped Rosemary in ways he could never have imagined.

But what about his remaining assets,

which were still being held by the US government?

Who was going to benefit from these?

Peter now focused his investigations on finding the rightful heirs.

Thankfully, it was a simple tree.

As well as Michael,

Martin and Mary McHugh had three other children -

Frank, Rosemary and Patrick.

Patrick died of an appendicitis aged 13,

so it was just Frank and Rosemary and their descendants

who were heirs to Michael's remaining assets.

Peter found out that Frank died in 2003,

and left his entire estate to his daughter.

But what about Rosemary Senior?

She was an heir too. Her niece, who had been named after her,

wasn't able to shed any light on her whereabouts.

She came to my mam and dad's wedding which was in the Holy Rosary, in Leeds.

That was the last time they ever seen her.

With little to go on, Peter started delving into Rosemary's past.

There are different stories.

Some say that she married a man and is living in Wales,

some say she married another man and is living in Birmingham.

As far as I could make out on my investigation,

she might be living in County Wicklow or County Wexford in Ireland.

Until Peter is able to find Rosemary Senior, Michael's remaining assets won't be released to the family.

The missing piece, we've got a jigsaw and the missing piece doesn't fit.

It doesn't fit in. Yes, I'd love to know where Rose McHugh went.

I'd love to know what she did for a living,

because I believe she got married, and I would definitely love to know what happened to her.

Especially with being named after her.

Despite being left 500,000, Rosemary Junior still knew very little about her uncle, Michael.

In actual fact, I'd like to see things of his memorabilia.

Pictures.

What he worked as, what he did in general,

and what sort of person he was.

With so many questions still unanswered, will Rosemary

manage to find any answers when she takes an emotional trip to Ireland?

Look at this.

Well, would you believe that?!

For every case that's cracked, there are still

thousands on the Treasury's list that remain a mystery.

The deceased's assets are kept for up to 30 years,

in the hope that eventually someone will remember and come forward to claim their inheritance.

And 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 been unable to solve so far.

Could you know the answer?

Maybe you're in line for a payout.

Keith Reynolds Miller passed away on 15th March 2005 in Haringey, north London.

Do you know him? Was he a neighbour of yours?

Maybe you're even related to him and entitled to his legacy.

Leslie John Mylam died in Burghfield Common, Berkshire, on the 1st February, 2006.

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

Could you be a beneficiary?

If no relatives of found for Keith Miller or Leslie Mylam, their money will go to the Government.

But could it be meant for you?

Fraser & Fraser are investigating the case of Dorothy Iris Turner Hodgson.

The widow died without leaving a will so her estate, including her bungalow,

which is estimated to be worth £170,000,

will go into the Government's coffers,

unless her rightful heirs are found.

Dorothy never left a will and I think once Larry died,

that's when Dorothy started to go downhill

and I don't think she'd have been capable of doing one herself.

Dorothy died ten years after her beloved husband, Larry,

and didn't appear to have any obvious relatives.

But the team's research has already unearthed a number of her cousins.

And the family tree just keeps on growing.

What I was saying about not being a particularly large family, it looks like I might be wrong on that.

Senior case manager David Pacifico

has been investigating Dorothy's father,

Frederick Moat's side of the family.

He's discovered Frederick had four siblings

and that his youngest sister, Florence,

went on to have six children herself.

It's been a tricky task but David has found an heir,

the daughter of Florence's son, Austin.

Great. Great.

I've now spoken to a cousin once removed and have arranged for Dave Mansell to call and see her.

Things are progressing fast.

It's only 9:30am but they have already found their first heir.

It's now down to travelling heir hunter Dave Mansell to sign her up.

Whilst I've been en route these past few hours,

we've now traced an heir.

Evidently, she works in a cafe in Hebburn, in Newcastle,

but David from the office has spoken to her this morning

and she's expecting us as soon as we can arrive.

Meanwhile, back in the office, there's been an exciting development,

prompting company partner Charles Fraser to get involved in the case.

We've established that the grandmother of the deceased left a will when she died in 1925.

One of the executors is her son-in-law, Frederick Moat,

and her estate was about £614, which was quite a lot of money in 1925.

So you could have two or three houses for that amount.

So it could be worth a fortune now.

The office has found Dorothy's grandmother left a large sum of money.

Could any of it have been passed down to Dorothy?

At the moment, the office don't know the exact value of the estate,

but finding out that it could be even more valuable than they first thought

puts more pressure on them to track down the heirs first.

Luckily, Dave Mansell is already close to signing up the first one.

Carol, Dorothy's cousin once removed, is working in a cafe in Newcastle,

so Dave has arranged to meet her and her husband, Michael, there.

-Florence May Moat married Robert Carlisle.

-That's right.

-Had Edward, Austin, Margaret, Florence and Thomas as children, and you're from Austin?

-Yes.

-Are you an only child?

-Yes.

Until today's phone call, Carol had no idea that her father had a cousin called Dorothy.

I think it's marvellous. It's wonderful to find out you have

got relatives, because to be honest I thought most of our family had died.

There's quite a lot.

I may go to try to trace them myself and find out from the family tree who's who and what's what.

It's been a great day for Carol.

Not only has she found a new side to her family, she's discovered she's in line for a windfall.

She signs with Dave, ensuring that the company will get their commission from assisting her claim.

But this is just the beginning for Dave.

-While he's been talking to Carol, the family tree has continued to grow.

-Have you got Sellotape here?

We're now off to see somebody on another stem, another branch of the family.

It's turning out to be quite... quite a large family at the minute.

It looks like there's a lot of work ahead.

What seemed to be a simple family tree has snowballed.

One of Dorothy's cousins, Edward, had eight children, and they are all heirs to the estate.

It's a marathon task, but with the competition hot on their heels,

Dave Mansell needs to try and sign them all up before the end of the day.

I've got more information on his tree, which I'm just getting, and I can brief you more on that.

It's got somewhat bigger, to say the least.

I'm going to try some of these addresses, otherwise we'll be here this time next week, at this rate.

Thanks, Dave. Bye.

With the family tree sprouting more branches all the time, it's relentless out on the road.

Dave Mansell has been driving all over Newcastle in the search for heirs.

-But just as he signs up one, the office find him someone new to visit.

-'Hello, Dave.'

Hiya. I've signed Christopher,

Thomas, Sheila, and Joyce.

'I still can't get through to another person that I'm hoping you might be able to do later.'

DAVE LAUGHS

Flogging myself to death, here!

Dave Mansell.

Newcastle.

Heired up to the eyeballs.

But he's going to be "heired up" for a while, as there's still a whopping 21 heirs to go.

The way it's gone today, up to now, where we've sorted about eight heirs out...

Eight, nine heirs out...

I feel that we've broken the back of this side of the family.

There are some other stems with descendants on it.

The bulk of the work now, hopefully, has been done.

And I can't say that I'm...

not ready for a break, because it's been a long day.

The chase has taken them all across Newcastle but it's been worth it.

Nine heirs have signed up already and there are more to come.

The next day, David reflects on a successful case.

We have broken the back of it, so we've now got the...

basic make-up of the family now.

Obviously, I'm grateful for the team down here that's

been working this, as well as Dave Mansell on the roads,

who's been seeing various members of the family,

together with our guy in the register office up in Newcastle.

They've done a good job, the team.

It's been a positive outcome for the beneficiaries as well.

The amount of the estate is yet to be confirmed

but it's estimated at £170,000 and could even rise further.

If it's a nice amount, I'll look after my son

and my daughter and their family, because that'll be nice.

Then we'll have maybe a nice cruise if there's enough left!

Dorothy had an abundance of relatives that never knew she existed.

Thanks to the heir hunters, they will now have something to remember her by.

And her friend Brenda will never forget her, either.

I feel in the end we became more like a family,

rather than friends, because we seen each other every day.

I miss that little smile on her face when I used to knock on the door and she'd get the door.

I miss her.

Back on the McHugh case in Leeds, niece Rosemary had been left a staggering half a million dollars

in a trust fund by her uncle Michael McHugh who she scarcely knew.

"What did he do?"

That's what went through my head.

"Where did this money come from?"

In 1951, Rosemary's uncle Michael had taken a boat from Ireland to America with just £5 to his name.

But when he died 50 years later, he left behind a fortune.

But what did he do out there and how did he make his money?

His niece and goddaughter Rosemary only remembers meeting him once, when she was 21 years old.

It was my mother that said to me, "Do you know who this is?"

I says, "I'm not quite sure. He looks like Columbo."

My mother said, "No, it's your Uncle Michael, your father's brother."

Michael left a real impression on Rosemary.

My Uncle Michael would have been about my height, 5ft 5", 5ft 6".

He wasn't very tall. And he looked very small compared to my father.

With a rain mac on and things like that. And his trilby.

And it looked rather strange.

It was all before his time.

That was what I found, you know.

And once he returned to the States, Rosemary made sure they kept in touch.

I always wrote to my Uncle Michael at Christmas.

Of course, I got married and I sent him photographs.

I sent him the children.

I sent him photographs of my dad.

But despite writing to him every year, Michael sadly never visited the family again.

No one realised that that would be the last time that I would see my Uncle Michael alive.

When Rosemary found out that she had been left such a large sum of money, she was bowled over.

She wanted to find out more about her generous Uncle Michael,

so she rang the American lawyer who was looking after his affairs.

I believe you know some information about my uncle, Michael McHugh?

'Yes, a little bit.

'He lived in the same apartment for decades with his wife, Anne.'

Oh, Anne, oh, yes, lovely.

'When he retired, the building that he lived in hired him as their super.'

Could you tell me how my Uncle Michael made his money?

-Would you know that?

-'Yeah, just working for Peoples Gas all these years.

'Him and Anne never had any children and they lived frugally

'and he saved his... He was a saver.'

A constant saver.

That's what he was, aye.

Finally, Rosemary knew the truth about how Michael made his fortune.

He'd worked as an engineer and saved hard all his life.

I feel great after that.

He's not a gangster after all, is he?

SHE LAUGHS God love him!

Rosemary also had another number she wanted to call, Michael's neighbour in Chicago.

'He was a very, very giving kind of a guy.

'He'd come over and he'd walk by.

' "Is there anything to do?"

'He'd help my wife if she was carrying packages, if he saw her.

'And I just remember him so fondly and he was just such a part of the neighbourhood. Everybody knew Mike.

-'Everybody loved Mike.'

-Isn't that lovely?

I'm pleased to hear that.

I think it's rather nice, I do. What respect they had for him, in America.

It's building up such a nice picture.

I really do wish I did know him more.

Although Michael left a trust fund to his niece Rosemary, he didn't leave a will.

So nine years after his death, most of his remaining assets are still left unclaimed.

Celtic Researcher's Peter Birchwood

has been investigating this case.

He's discovered that there are two rightful heirs to the estate - Michael's niece, and his sister.

But no one has heard from Rosemary Senior since the 1950s.

If she has died, then providing she leaves children,

they'd inherit her share.

If she doesn't, then there's a strong possibility

that it would all pass back to Rosemary, her niece.

However, the American government will not release Michael's assets

to his family until Peter can prove once and for all what happened to Michael's sister, Rosemary.

As she had strong links to Ireland, he decides to take a trip over to the register office in Dublin

with his wife, Maria, who is also helping him on the case.

Well, I'm going to start searching for marriages and deaths of Rosemary McHugh the elder.

If I can find anything, that will be great.

Michael's niece Rosemary is also looking for answers about her aunt,

so has decided to join Peter and his wife on their trip.

She seemed to disappear from Dowra sometime in the early 1950s,

around about the time that your father came over.

That was right, because the last time that there was...

My Aunt Rose was spotted there was at my mother's wedding, when my mother and father got married.

And that was...?

That would be about 56, 57 years ago.

Based that people knew your father, that they knew your Uncle Mike, why didn't they know your Aunt Rosemary?

Why didn't they keep in touch?

This is what we can't understand. We don't know where she went.

Once they arrive in Dublin, Peter goes straight to the register office and starts his investigations.

We're starting off by doing a marriage search for Rosemary McHugh.

We're going to make notes of any that we find

and order up the certificates to see if we can find that elusive marriage.

Meanwhile, hoping that Michael's old farmhouse holds some clues to her family history,

Rosemary heads up to County Cavan.

It is absolutely beautiful.

Feeling nervous.

Very nervous now.

Oh, I'm getting butterflies.

Although Rosemary has the keys to the farmhouse,

her aunt would also be entitled to a share of the property.

But only if she, or any of her relatives, can be found.

This is amazing, isn't it?

I know we're somewhere here.

And that's it there, I think.

Look at it!

I've got butterflies in my stomach and everything!

This is part of...my... our family history.

It feels so nice. There we go.

Look at this.

Come and have a look at this.

Look at the dresser.

The house is just as Michael last left it.

I'm totally amazed...

that the house is still standing the way it is.

Now, this is where my Uncle Patrick died.

This was the room that he died in.

This is...

Died of appendicitis.

He would have been 13.

Yeah, 13.

No age.

Hot water bottle.

And a towel.

What dates are these, now?

'61, there.

October '61 there.

Although Michael emigrated to America in 1951,

it's believed he made regular trips back to County Cavan.

Right, this is... We're going into my grandparents' bedroom here, now.

This was where my granddad and my grandmother lived.

Well, slept, sorry. Slept.

There's your mattress.

There would be an awful lot of laughter and happy memories in here.

But there would also have been some very sad memories, as well.

Now, this is the fire, that they would have made all their meals on and everything.

And this is where you would put your pieces that hang onto the fire,

and your pots and pans.

Maybe down on here they would have the turf here.

I think my Uncle Michael would have used this house when he came over,

for the couple of weeks or whatever he was here for.

Definitely he would have been here.

But that's amazing, that bit.

Rosemary heads up to the attic.

Oh, just look at it!

I'm frightened in case I pick up a mouse or something.

You will hear some screams then.

This is your... They used to use these years ago.

It's fantastic.

It is absolutely amazing.

Found a picture.

That's my Uncle Michael!

My Uncle Michael!

Oh, my God!

Oh, my God! I've got some pictures.

Oh, I don't believe none of this now.

There he is.

That's me and Michael, when we were babies!

That is totally amazing.

God love him. He must have brought these over.

That's my Uncle Michael dancing.

He'd probably be doing The Siege of Venice there.

Looks like The Siege of Venice.

There's my Uncle Michael having a cigarette.

A crowd around him.

The family photos are the link to the past that Rosemary has been looking for,

and she needs time to reflect.

There's a passport here, from the United States of America,

with my Uncle Michael in it.

Michael John McHugh.

He was only 5ft 6".

There's pictures of the car he would have hired.

It's just been a blessing, coming back to this house

to find out what I have found out.

Going back to Michael's house is the end of a long and emotional journey for Rosemary.

Her life was changed forever when she was left a staggering half a million dollars

by an uncle she barely knew.

But she is now much closer to knowing the truth about him.

But what about her aunt?

Back in Dublin, Peter's searches have drawn a blank.

Maybe something happened to her.

Maybe she just had to get out of Ireland and go somewhere.

Where she went we don't know.

We're still trying but we've come to the point where there are just not too many other things to try.

So the case of Michael McHugh remains unsolved.

Could you provide the missing piece of the puzzle?

Are you Rosemary McHugh or do you know what happened to her?

Could you be entitled to a share of the assets that Michael left behind?

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

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