Thomas/Koshevnikova Heir Hunters

Heir Hunters earn their money tracing relatives of people who've died without leaving a will.

They hand over thousands of pounds to family members who had no idea they would inherit.

Could they be knocking at your door?

-On today's show...

-Is this all of them, yeah?

..the heir hunters have a surprise in store for two long-lost nieces.

I was very shocked to find out that I was going to be one of the heirs

because things like that don't happen to people like us.

And has the team struck gold

in the case of a family of Russian aristocrats?

We could be dealing with an estate worth tens of thousands of pounds,

possibly even millions of pounds.

Plus, how you could be entitled to unclaimed estates,

where beneficiaries still need to be found.

Could you be in line for an unexpected windfall?

Every year in the UK, an estimated 300,000 people die without leaving a will.

If no relatives are found,

then any money that's left behind will go to the Government.

And last year they made £12 million from unclaimed estates.

But there are over 30 specialist firms competing to stop this happening.

They're called heir hunters, and they make it their business

to track down missing relatives and help them claim their rightful inheritance.

That's what I enjoy most about it.

The personal satisfaction that I've cracked the case,

and I know that it's maybe been unsolved for 15 or 20 years.

It's 7am on a Thursday.

At midnight last night

the Treasury released their weekly list of unclaimed estates.

And in central London,

the list is being carefully scrutinised

by staff at the country's largest heir hunting firm, Fraser and Fraser.

All we know about him is that he's dead.

I haven't been able to find his address.

Partner Neil Fraser has already spotted a potential case.

We're going to look at a case of Robert William Thomas.

He's from Orpington in Kent.

Death is not too long ago, January of 2010.

So fingers crossed, it's quite recent,

and there's a possibility there's going to be a property on that.

At the moment, I haven't got any idea of the value.

The Treasury's list is a major source of work for heir hunters.

It shows the names of people who've died without leaving a will,

and also lists their date and place of death.

But it doesn't show how much money they've left behind,

and amounts can range from £5,000 to many millions of pounds.

Thanks, bye.

When the values are unknown like this,

the heir hunters usually work for a pre-agreed percentage of the estate.

And this makes their job a real gamble.

For us to receive a workable budget, a workable amount of money,

we have to have a reasonable-sized pot to start with.

The first thing the heir hunters want to find out

is whether Robert William Thomas owned his own home.

But they've already hit a problem.

Robert William Thomas is a popular name, and he could have been born anywhere.

All we know is he dies in 2010 in Orpington, so got to start there.

The team will have their work cut out.

Thomas is the ninth most common surname in Britain.

Robert Thomas grew up in the 1920s.

After serving in the Second World War,

he returned home to marry his sweetheart Winifred.

The couple didn't have any children,

and according to neighbour Lily Young,

Robert was passionate about two things in life, his wife and his car.

His car was always immaculate.

He'd come down with his bowl and go out there with his chammy leather.

If he was going to take Winnie out,

he made sure it was all polished before he took her.

I think that was all part of how he felt about Winnie

cos he always spoke about her.

Robert was a caring and dedicated husband,

and in later life, he also became a keen gardener.

His garden was immaculate. He used to grow all his own vegetables.

He used to love to be able to say to Winnie,

"What do you want for vegetables today?" And run down and get them.

You wouldn't find a weed down there. Now you can't find his shed in the corner.

I think he was quite lost without her after she...

I think this happens in lots of cases where people have to do a lot for a person.

When that person dies, they are really lost.

They don't know what to do with theirself.

Sadly, Winifred died in 1994, leaving Bob a widower

until his own death 16 years later at the age of 88.

In the office, the race is on to try and find beneficiaries to Robert Thomas's estate,

and with rival firms competing to be the first to find and sign up heirs,

the team must work fast.

I'm hoping to find addresses,

and from the addresses, trying to work out a value.

The team is trying to find out if Robert owned his own home, and it's not looking good.

His address belongs to a housing association,

which suggests the estate may be low in value.

Normally a case like this would go on the back burner,

but today is quiet, so manager David Pacifico decides to take it one step further.

I've got Bob Smith doing an enquiry.

I'm hoping that enquiry will come up with

some more definite information to help us,

because we're dealing with very common names here.

The company employs a network of regional heir hunters

who are on standby from 7am every morning.

Covering all corners of the country,

they're ready to go wherever the search takes them.

Whether they're speaking to neighbours or picking up certificates from register offices,

they leave no stone unturned in the race to find and sign up heirs.

Ex-Customs official Bob Smith enjoys life at the sharp end.

Phone calls may glean some information,

but it's always better for someone to be on the doorstep.

It's a bit like a detective,

knocking on doors, asking questions about people

and their lifestyle, their family, information, that sort of thing.

You know, it's just something different.

And Bob's experience has given him a hunch about the deceased.

I wouldn't mind betting that he probably originally came from Wales.

Surname Thomas. Just a guess.

If Robert is Welsh, the team will have a real headache.

In Wales, nearly six per cent of the population has the surname Thomas.

But Bob's first concern is to speak to Robert's neighbours.

Did you know him as Bob?

-Oh yeah, they used to just call him Old Bob.

-Right.

As Robert didn't own his own house,

Bob Smith is looking for any other signs of wealth,

and one of the neighbours is particularly helpful.

-Right. But he didn't own this property?

-No, he rented it.

-I know he had two, er, company pensions that he...

-Right.

He phones back to the office with this new information.

Well, they said he was quite old,

and obviously he's drawing a pension.

Yeah. So basically, he could have been living a comfortable lifestyle.

Well, he's got two pensions and a state pension

and he's just bought an £800 plasma TV.

Well, it's certainly worthwhile...

I don't think it's going to be a big estate,

but it might be one of those 20, 30, 40 grand, maybe you know.

Yeah. The question is, where was he from?

We've got a potential birth in Shoreditch.

We'll have to get the death day. That's the thing, isn't it?

Bob's estimate of £20,000 to £40,000 is good news for the team.

It means this case is worth working.

If the person lived in rented accommodation,

it doesn't mean to say he had nothing in the bank.

Looks like he may have had a spare few bob or so there.

Now it's all systems go in the office,

as the team begins the search for relatives.

Robert Thomas's neighbour told them he hadn't had any children,

so the team must look to his wider family tree.

Although Thomas is a difficult name to research,

David decides he's willing to take a chance on the possible birth he's found in Shoreditch in 1921.

And if this is the correct Robert Thomas,

they have already found a brother.

-Henry Charles Thomas.

-That's your brother, yeah?

-Still alive in Gillingham.

This would be a significant breakthrough. Have they found the first heir?

Noel, in searching, identifying the deceased's birth,

found what could be a brother,

which has the same mother's maiden name

and born in the same district.

Born as Thomas, mother's maiden name Dyer, born Shoreditch.

So it looked like two brothers.

And if that is the case,

we think that this brother may still be alive

and he found a probable address for him by virtue of the electoral rolls

in Gillingham in Kent.

The heir hunters are working on the idea

that Bob and Henry Thomas are brothers

because they were both born in Shoreditch,

and have a mother with the maiden name Dyer.

It looks promising,

but so far they have no proof that this is the right Robert Thomas,

let alone that he had a brother Henry.

To confirm their research, they need Robert's death certificate,

which will show his date and place of birth.

So Bob is sent to Bromley Register Office.

If they've got it right,

this case could be sewn up before midday.

I'd like a copy of a death certificate if I may.

Straight away, Bob can see that one of his early fears was unfounded.

Robert Thomas wasn't Welsh after all.

Oh, he was born in London.

It doesn't say where.

-Oh, well. Thank you very much.

-OK, thank you. Bye-bye.

-Take care.

Bob needs to pass the rest of the information on to the office.

Hello?

-David, hi, it's Bob.

-Hello, Bob.

-Hi.

-I've got this death now.

-Yeah?

-Died 16th January 2010.

-Yeah?

Born 4th March 1921.

London.

London, right.

Even though the death certificate doesn't specify where in London Robert was born,

it's still great news for the office.

It looks like the birth and the brother are right.

The brother might be at this address in Gillingham.

OK, all right, no, I'll go and do that now.

If Henry Thomas is the brother of Robert Thomas,

he could be the sole heir to an estate worth £20,000 to £40,000.

It's likely that rival firms will also be looking at this case,

so Bob must get to Gillingham as quickly as he can.

It'll be interesting just to speak with him and, er...

Cos he obviously is almost certainly unaware that his brother has died.

And if the information from the neighbours is anything to go by,

he never kept in contact with him either,

so it'll be interesting to find out the circumstances

as to why that is.

Back at the office, there's been another breakthrough.

The team has found Robert Thomas's birth certificate,

which confirms his parents are Robert William Thomas and Rose May Dyer.

The possible brother we thought we may have an address for,

we've now proved it correct.

It was a Henry Charles Thomas,

so it looks like he's still alive, living in Gillingham in Kent,

where Bob Smith is on his way to see him.

From this, they've established that as well as Henry,

Robert seems to have had a second brother.

We'd identified one brother, Henry Charles Thomas born in 1930,

but having gone back and checked on a different computer system,

we found an extra brother, Albert G Thomas,

who was born 1924 in Shoreditch.

So very close in area and in age to the deceased,

so the combination of names is right as well.

On top of that,

we've now discovered that he died in Lewisham in November 2005,

which is the sort of area where his brother Henry Charles was too,

so it's all looking quite good.

But if it's been this easy

for them to crack a potentially difficult Thomas case,

it could have been easy for other heir hunting companies too.

They need to stay ahead of the competition.

So before Bob Smith reaches the house of Robert's brother Henry,

David gives him the latest information.

PHONE RINGING

Bob Smith?

-Hi, Bob, just to let you know, it's going to be right.

-OK.

Um, the other thing is,

there's another brother, looks like, who died.

-And he may have children. Died in Lewisham, 2005. Albert George.

-Yeah.

Might have at least four children. Maybe more, maybe less.

OK.

All right, thanks, Dave.

The team now knows that Bob Thomas,

son of Robert Thomas and Rose May Dyer

had two brothers,

Henry Thomas, who's alive, and Albert, who's deceased.

Albert may have left four children,

which would give them five possible heirs.

But when Bob gets to Henry's house...

Does Mr Thomas live here?

..it's bad news.

-Henry went on holiday this morning.

-Blimey.

Granddaughter Jenny is looking after the house.

Does she know about the other brother Albert and his children?

-They obviously didn't keep in contact.

-No.

-Were they were separated when they were younger?

-Yeah.

What was the situation with that, then?

Well, um, Granddad was taken to Somerset.

Right.

And then, Albert and Bobby, as they know him,

was taken... they was in the army.

-Right, OK.

-But they didn't stay in contact.

I don't think. I know...

PHONE RINGING

Jenny helps Bob by getting her mum on the phone.

Do you know anything about Albert's children?

-Lynda.

-Yeah.

-Lynda's married.

-Oh, she is?

-To Martin.

-To Martin. Do you know his surname?

-Do we know his surname?

-No, she doesn't know his surname.

-OK, that's all right.

Any of the others?

What about any of the others? What about Iris?

-She's not married.

-Thank you very much for that.

Really appreciate that. Sorry to call you out of the blue.

That's very helpful. Obviously, I'm sorry to say that Bobby's died,

um, but as a result, your granddad and Albert's kids will benefit now.

I don't think it's going to be a great deal of money. All right?

-I'll leave my card with you.

-Right, thank you.

-Thanks very much, anyway.

-Bye.

-Cheers.

It's a frustrating setback for the team,

who are under pressure to sign up an heir before the competition.

He flew out to Turkey today.

-Hah!

-He's got a home in Turkey.

He was delayed because of the volcano.

Right, shame it wasn't tomorrow, isn't it?

All they can do is courier a letter out to Henry in Turkey,

and hope they can find other heirs to Robert's £20,000 to £40,000 estate.

-You're the daughter of Albert, is that right?

-Yeah.

In 2009, the heir hunters looked into

the estate of a quiet lady from Buckinghamshire,

who seemed to have led

a fairly unassuming life.

But little did they know

they were about to uncover

a tale of incredible wealth,

world travel,

and international espionage.

Alexandra Koshevnikova died in June 2008 in Beaconsfield.

She'd lived to an incredible 100 years old

and was fondly remembered by friends like Hazel Francis.

Alex was kind, loving and very friendly,

and everybody adored her.

Sometimes she used to skip along the balcony, "Hello", waving,

and that was it, you know.

But she always said hello to you.

Alexandra was a keen poet

and an accomplished pianist,

but she was also a very modest lady,

and for the most part,

kept herself to herself.

Janet Smith was Alexandra's neighbour for 44 years.

Alexandra lived immediately above us.

Um, it was just a three-bedroom maisonette.

When Sandra was playing the grand piano,

we would turn the television off, just to sit and listen,

because it was so beautiful and it used to come down through the floor.

And we did enjoy that.

Because Alexandra Koshevnikova died without leaving a will,

her estate was advertised by the Treasury in 2008.

Her unusual surname caught the attention of Neil Fraser,

partner at heir hunting firm Fraser and Fraser.

On this particular case, we started looking around the surname,

trying to play with the surname

to see if there were other people in the UK records, with the same surname.

A rare name like Koshevnikova

could make the search for relatives quite easy.

And initially, they made quick progress.

We were able to identify not only the mother, but also her brother.

Um, so that's two hits, really.

It certainly helps form a family tree.

It's two steps in the right direction, at least.

Alexandra's mother Susanna

and her brother Vladimir

had both died in the UK,

but they were unable to find any other relatives in the country.

The only other information they had was that the family came from Russia.

One of the things which we have to do

is try and locate a place of birth.

The majority of the time, when we have someone who's born overseas,

the death certificate just gives the country of birth, not the place.

Without knowing the exact place of birth in Russia,

the teams had no real way of finding any family.

Neil had no choice but to call a halt to the research.

But then, something remarkable happened.

Although we'd stopped research on this case,

our feelers had already gone out to try and find a place of birth,

and we've had letters back from America,

which have indicated some more information about Alexandra.

Neil had ordered the family's naturalisation papers,

which detailed their journey from Russia to the UK.

Unlike a usual naturalisation which we'd find,

which may be two, three, four pages long,

this one had 50 or 60 pages in, and a very, very detailed history

about the life which the family had had in Russia,

and their journey throughout the world before they came to the UK.

But a significant piece of information in the records

was that in 1921, Alexandra, Vladimir and their mother

had spent several months

living at one of the world's most expensive hotels,

the Waldorf Astoria in New York.

An immigrant family living in, not just a hotel,

but the Waldorf Astoria,

um, you suddenly think, they must be very, very rich indeed.

Now the case looked very exciting.

It suddenly makes us see that

maybe we're not dealing with a small estate,

but we could be dealing with

an estate worth tens of thousands of pounds,

possibly even millions of pounds.

And there was more good news.

A university in America had sent Neil letters and poetry

written by Alexandra.

When we eventually got sight of her letters,

they came back, and they were all in Russian,

for a start, which is slightly problematic

because I don't speak Russian.

Having had them translated,

the team noticed that Alexandra sometimes used the alias Tulunova,

meaning Lady from Tulun.

This Tulun is the place where she's actually born originally.

So having searched for quite a while,

trying to find the place of birth,

all the time it was staring me straight in the face, really.

Her alias gave me her place of birth.

Bit by bit,

they were starting to build a picture

of Alexandra's life in Russia.

She had been born into a wealthy mining family

in the Central Russian town of Tulun in 1907.

At a time when most Russians were living in poverty,

Alexandra and her brother Vladimir enjoyed a privileged upbringing.

Both brothers and sisters would go to good schools.

They would also have

a very wide musical education,

they would be taken to museums,

they would travel.

But all that changed in 1917,

as Russia plunged into revolution and civil war.

GUNFIRE

Tsar Nicholas II was overthrown by the working class population

who were starving to death under his oppressive regime.

It was a violent seizure of power.

There was a great deal of bloodshed,

there was a great deal of elimination of groups.

Fighting broke out between the working class Bolsheviks

and the aristocratic White Russians like Alexandra's family.

And in 1921, disaster struck.

Bolshevik soldiers murdered Alexandra's father,

leaving her mother a widow

in a desperate situation.

She would have to try and escape,

because otherwise, er, she could get killed,

the children could get killed

if they found themselves involved in the civil war.

There was really no future for her.

Fearing for the lives of herself and her two children,

Susanna had little choice but to flee her homeland.

It seems she grabbed all the money she could find,

and escaped through Asia to America,

finally checking in to the Waldorf Astoria.

Designed to be the most luxurious hotel in the world,

the Waldorf Astoria oozed opulence from every corner.

But luxury like this came at a price.

A suite cost thousands of dollars a year in the 1920s.

As Susanna's savings began to run dry,

the family was forced to relocate.

For an educated and cultured family like the Koshevnikovs,

the obvious destination was Berlin.

Berlin was certainly an attractive goal.

There were rather different, but still very strong cultural links.

Until the early thirties,

Russians, particularly in Berlin,

were quite numerous,

and were part of the postwar intellectual and cultural life

of Germany in those years, in that decade.

Surrounded by like-minded people,

Susanna and her two children settled in Germany.

Vladimir went to university to study journalism,

and Alexandra indulged in her passion for music and poetry.

The Koshevnikovs seemed to have found their home from home.

Yet in 1951, they showed up in England.

The heir hunters were on the trail

of uncovering what happened to their fortune.

They were about to reveal the family's links to British espionage

in the middle of the Cold War.

They were part of a group of people

um, to whom this country owes its freedom.

Heir hunters solve thousands of cases a year,

ensuring that millions of pounds are paid out to rightful heirs.

But not every case can be cracked.

The Treasury has a list of over 2,000 estates

that have baffled the heir hunters

and remain unclaimed.

These estates stay on the list for up to 30 years,

and each one could be worth anything from £5,000 to many millions.

Today, we're focusing on three names from the list.

Are they relatives of yours?

Could you be in line for an unexpected windfall?

Peter Paul McQualter died in Greenwich in 1997, aged 54,

and may have come from Ireland.

If his heirs aren't found, his money will go to the Government.

Did you know Gordon Lewis Monteith Keevil from Enfield in Middlesex?

He died on 17th May 2008, aged 85.

So far, no-one's come forward to claim his estate.

Also on our list is Graham Colpoys-Johnson,

who was from Richmond in Surrey.

He died in Poole in Dorset in February 2005.

So far, all efforts to trace his relatives have drawn a blank.

If the names Peter McQualter,

Gordon Keevil or Graham Colpoys-Johnson

mean anything to you or someone you know,

you could have a fortune coming your way.

The heir hunters were searching for an heir to a mysterious Russian lady

who died in Buckinghamshire.

They'd uncovered new evidence they hoped might finally give them a lead.

Alexandra Koshevnikova was from a rich family

who'd fled the Communist forces

after the Revolution.

After crossing three continents

and staying in luxurious hotels,

Alexandra and her family had settled in Germany.

Now the heir hunters have been sent her naturalisation papers,

and it seemed that Alexandra could have been very wealthy.

An immigrant family living in,

not just a hotel, but the Waldorf Astoria.

Um, you suddenly think they must be very, very rich indeed.

But did Alexandra

die a wealthy woman?

And were there heirs to her estate?

To find out, the team needed to know

why she, her mother and her brother

all came to the UK.

BOMBS EXPLODING

60 years ago, the family was living in war-torn Berlin.

But the money they'd brought from Russia was starting to run out.

They probably thought,

as many Russians did,

that once things had settled down,

they would be able to go back.

That may be one explanation of why they spent so much money

so quickly,

and then,

suddenly they realised that their Russia was no longer there.

-They

-couldn't

-go back.

With their mother Susanna now in her sixties,

the responsibility of providing for the family fell to Vladimir.

In the late 1940s he moved to England in search of work,

and landed a remarkable job.

After the Second World War, the Government needed Russian speakers

to train British spies.

There were Soviet sympathisers,

not just within the Civil Service,

but actually within

the British intelligence community,

who were meant to protect us from the Soviets.

When that became clear,

it really did make British policy makers understand

that the Soviet threat was a real threat.

In 1951, the Government set up the Joint Services School for Linguists,

and employed native Russians as language teachers.

They quickly recruited Vladimir,

who was a Russian exile opposed to the Soviet regime.

The purpose of the JSSL

was to train British servicemen

to speak and understand

the sort of Russian

that was being used by Soviet tank commanders, Soviet pilots,

Soviet naval captains,

Soviet submarine commanders.

To listen to the wireless traffic that they generated,

and that intelligence was vital,

and it prevented the Cold War

from ever turning into a hot one in Europe.

This World War II airfield in Crail in Scotland

was a base for the top-secret language school

where Vladimir became a teacher.

Dave Allen was taught by Vladimir in the 1950s.

He's now making his first visit back in over 50 years.

At the time, this was a very busy roadway,

with soldiers, sailors and airmen

all going about their Russian language courses,

and I think there were also Polish and Czech courses

going on here at the same time.

But they were in the minority.

Most of the people here were learning Russian.

This is a typical classroom

that we'd have had one of the lessons with Mr Koshevnikov.

We'd have had the tables here,

and Vladimir Koshevnikov would have sat in the front,

usually in a fairly relaxed position, sort of leaning back.

He was quite a big guy and he had sort of brown, wavy hair.

Very good-looking man.

And, er, it would be really quite pleasant.

Dave's not the only former student with fond recollections of Vladimir.

The first really mad Russian

we'd ever met.

It was a sort of, I don't know,

a kind of concept

that Russians were a bit wild.

And that was Vladimir Koshevnikov.

Anyway, Vladimir Koshevnikov was thoroughly eccentric.

We would flop down on the grass.

He would put two bottles of white wine on the grass,

and throw down some packets of cigarettes.

And you had to have a glass of wine

before you were allowed to read or recite a poem.

Because he said the object of drinking wine is to liberate the soul.

That's what the Russians believe. They still believe it, incidentally.

That a bottle of vodka, you drink it to liberate the soul.

Vladimir's informal teaching style appealed to the trainee spies.

Vladimir Koshevnikov was a unique teacher,

and a very gifted man, very artistic.

And he created a very good learning environment.

Because his knowledge of Russian was so good,

we learned a lot about Russian in a kind of literary sense.

The Koshevnikovs had the perfect credentials for the JSSL,

so Vladimir's sister Alexandra was also recruited,

and in 1951, the whole family moved from Berlin to the UK.

There was a sister there, and she went on to teach in later courses.

But the mother must have been a burden to some extent

because she was an old lady

who had to be looked after in a foreign country.

This close-knit family who'd travelled across six countries

finally settled in Beaconsfield in 1966.

Immersed in their work at the JSSL,

neither Alexandra or Vladimir ever married or had any children.

Instead, they lived together with their mother Susanna

for another 25 years,

until she died in 1976.

Sadly, Alexandra's beloved brother Vladimir died just two years later,

and for the first time in her life, she was alone.

Sandra was on her own when her mother and brother had died,

yes, I would say, she was a lonely person to a certain extent,

although she seemed quite self-sufficient in many ways.

But yes, I would have said she was a lonely person.

Alexandra threw herself further into her work,

and became increasingly reclusive.

I gather she'd had a hard life before they came to this country,

and although I know she'd always worked as a translator,

I would have thought she'd have had some money,

but she always appeared not to have a lot of money,

and, you know, I just assumed she hadn't got a lot of money.

Alexandra passed away in June 2008 at the age of 100.

But one question remained.

Having been born wealthy and watched their mother's money run out,

had Vladimir and Alexandra earned enough

as spy school language teachers to leave a valuable estate?

They've lived this very, very exciting life,

and it looks as though it's a family

which has ended up with virtually nothing.

So from wealthy beginnings,

it turned out the Koshevnikovs had died poor.

And with no traces of any relatives in the UK,

Neil had nowhere left to go.

We have spent quite a lot of money.

We spent quite a lot of money sending researchers out,

sending letters to America,

applying for naturalisations,

having an awful amount of documents translated,

and just the research in the first point.

The number of staff we had on it.

We're never going to make that money back.

So this is a case which we unfortunately can't take any further.

Unless we suddenly find out

that the estate's worth a lot more than we thought.

But I seriously doubt that.

But for the heir hunters,

the case of Alexandra Koshevnikova has been a memorable one.

It's been quite a nice journey,

even if we're not going to get any fees or anything out of it.

It's taught us a bit more about research,

which hopefully will come in useful next time we have to do a case.

While the case isn't valuable enough for the heir hunters to continue,

it's believed to be worth between £5,000 and £15,000,

and it's still unclaimed.

Could you be a rightful heir?

The heir hunters are making progress on the case of Thomas,

despite it being one of the most common surnames in the UK.

How many births have we got on that, Noel?

88-year-old Robert Thomas was a widower

who died without leaving a will.

But in a frustrating setback, the team has missed one heir,

Robert's brother, by just hours.

He flew out to Turkey today.

He's got a home in Turkey.

Shame it wasn't tomorrow, isn't it?

Now the team at Fraser and Fraser are racing to find other heirs.

Is this all of them?

-There might be more, but they're the ones in area.

-OK.

The search is focused on Robert's other brother Albert, who has died,

but had four children.

He'd married a lady, Iris D Warren,

and they've had several children.

We've identified at least four children so far.

Luckily, one of them is called Iris D Thomas,

which is the name of Albert's wife,

so it's all tying in quite nicely.

New details for the Thomas family tree

show Bob's brother Albert Thomas married Iris Warren in 1953.

The team's found they had five children,

but one was adopted out of the family, so will not be an heir.

Lynda was supposed to be married to Martin.

We've got that address there.

They quickly find an address for one of the sisters, Iris Thomas.

And for the second time today, Bob's off to try and meet an heir.

Hopefully, she will be in contact with all her brothers and sisters,

or sisters, there are no brothers.

And sign her up and get all their details.

Perfect day.

Bob missed the last heir by a matter of minutes.

He's hoping this time the house visit will produce results.

-You're the daughter of Albert.

-Yeah.

-Is that right?

-Albert, yeah.

And he had brothers Robert and Henry? Is that right?

Yeah, Uncle Henry, yeah.

Right. I don't know if you're aware,

but your uncle Robert, unfortunately died earlier this year.

He never had children. He was married to Winnie.

-That's right, yeah.

-Do you want to come in?

-Is that all right?

The news of Robert's death has come as a surprise to his niece Iris.

It's just a shock to me to know he'd passed away.

I actually thought he'd passed away before my dad

because we didn't see him for a long time

and we was all saying, even my dad kept saying,

"Bobby must have passed away because he hasn't been in touch."

You know, you do get these things happen, don't you?

Bob Smith fills out the paperwork, which Iris is happy to sign.

I'll have the £90 and you can have the £10.

It's a result.

Finally, Bob's found an heir to the Thomas estate.

Obviously, she was happy to sign a contract with us

and I've got all the details of her sisters,

so good day all round.

In the office, David Pacifico is able to contact Albert's other daughters.

Hello?

My name is David Pacifico of a company called Fraser and Fraser.

We've just been in contact with your sister Iris.

Robert Thomas's neices will receive half of his estate.

Right, well, as you know,

we've been trying to track down the Thomas family

regarding an estate of an uncle of yours who unfortunately passed away.

While the other half of the estate,

estimated between £20,000 to £40,000,

will go to his brother Henry.

The big rush is that because it's a new job,

you know, potentially it could be competitive,

and I want to make sure we get all our letters out today.

Almost a month later, the heir hunters have learned their gamble was worth it.

Robert Thomas's estate is worth £20,000.

His neices Iris and Lynda

have both had time to reflect on the unexpected windfall.

I was very shocked to find out that I was going to be a heir, one of the heirs

because things like that don't happen to people like us.

And we didn't honestly think that Bob had money, did we?

No, as far as we know,

he lived in a little council maisonette in Orpington,

um, and, all right, he might have had a big win on the National,

got the bingo up, or whatever.

Maybe that's what happened.

Or the lottery.

Yeah, obviously, as far as I know,

I didn't even know he had money, to be honest.

The experience has brought back fond memories of Uncle Bob.

When the girls' parents split up and they moved in with their grandparents

Bob would drive round to entertain them.

He used to have three cars, a Morris Minor,

a Volkswagen Beetle,

and then, obviously, the Mini, and the Mini was our favourite of all.

And he used to take us out for a little ride,

every Sunday he'd come,

to Blackwall Tunnel and back.

And it was brilliant. We loved it.

We used to say, "Take us for a ride, Uncle Bob, take us for a ride."

He'd say, "All right, then."

And we'd all pile in the back,

and he'd take us all the way to the Blackwall Tunnel,

which is no journey, really, but when you're a kid, it was a day out.

We loved it, didn't we? Always through the Blackwall Tunnel.

Always the same place.

Always the same ride, yeah.

The sisters have dug out a treasured photo

of Uncle Bob and their dad Albert from the War,

that their grandmother treasured.

The story behind this was, um,

Dad being in the Navy and Bob being in the Army,

they was never home on leave at the same time.

And this particular time, they were both home together,

and Nan got a snapshot of her two lovely boys in uniform.

And this always sat, pride of place, on Nan's mantelpiece, remember?

-Always on her mantelpiece.

-In that old-fashioned frame.

-Yeah, it was lovely.

-They look so young, don't they?

Look at the lovely uniforms and that. Lovely.

With no children himself,

Bob was happy to spend some of his hard-earned cash on his neices.

Quite exciting when Bob used to come down, wasn't it?

Yeah, always used to give us our pocket money.

We always used to thought he was rich, didn't we?

Well, we did, because he had no children, I suppose,

whereas our dad had to watch every penny he had.

And I suppose, Bob, not having children,

would give us sixpence here and there,

and we just took it for granted

that he was a cash cow at that point in our lives.

What was it? Ten shillings, wasn't it?

Sometimes a ten-shilling note, yeah.

Now almost 20 years have passed

since Iris and Lynda have seen Bob,

and they wish they'd been able to pay their respects to a much-loved uncle.

I miss not being able to say goodbye

and going to his funeral, that I do miss.

Yeah, definitely.

Because it's something you need to do to someone in the family.

Yeah, it's respect, isn't it?

-But we've got good memories.

-Yeah.

I haven't got a tissue on me. Don't start blubbing. Come on.

I'm all right, Iris.

If you would like advice about building your family tree or making a will,

go to bbc.co.uk

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