Clarke/Thornton Heir Hunters

Today, we're searching for the heirs of a skilled craftsman

who's rumoured to have left an estate of £40,000 in cash.

Somewhere out there are some long-lost relatives

who have no idea they're in line for a windfall.

-Could the heir hunters be knocking at your door?

-Hello?

On today's programme, it's all in the name.

The name Clarke is awful.

You only need to drop the E and you're really in queer street.

It's tough times for the heir hunters, as they tackle

-one of their most demanding cases yet.

-No luck?

And the death of a bricklayer from Bradford

leads all the way to a legendary Derby winner.

I've spent the inheritance!

Plus, how you may be entitled to inherit an unclaimed estate

held by the Treasury.

Could thousands of pounds be heading your way?

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.

Last year, they made £14 million from unclaimed estates.

That's where the heir hunters come in.

They make it their business to track down missing relatives

and help them claim their rightful inheritance.

We reunite family members, even decades after they've lost contact with each other.

It's seven in the morning at the offices of heir hunters Fraser & Fraser.

The Treasury has just released its weekly list of unclaimed estates.

In the UK, if someone dies without leaving a will,

has no known relatives, and their estate is worth £5,000 or more

then it will appear on this list.

-Debbie?

-Yeah?

-Can you take this?

The team's first job is to try and identify the high-value cases.

The death of Gordon Clarke. Died in Birmingham in Ladywood.

With only a name and place of death to go on, it's not easy.

Boss Neil Fraser has singled out one case that may not immediately

look like it's worth a lot, but he's got a good feeling about it.

We're going to work on the case of Gordon Clarke.

He died in 2009, in Birmingham. We don't know a huge amount about it.

It doesn't look like there's any value, but who knows?

We may find a little bit of cash hidden in a drawer or something.

The value of estates is really important to the heir hunters

because they work on commission, earning a percentage

of the amount that's claimed by each heir they sign.

So Neil is hoping that his hunch is going to pay off.

Gordon Clarke died, aged 65, on the 24th January 2009.

He lived in this block of flats in the Ladywood area of Birmingham.

His friend, Nilesh Patel, lives nearby.

He'd always be there to help everybody.

He'd always put other people first, before himself.

He'd always be up for a good conversation,

he'd always be there as a good listener.

He'd be like a breath of fresh air. You know?

Although Gordon was quite a bit older than his friend,

he was definitely young at heart.

Not many 60-year-olds are keen followers of rave music.

I mean, I was surprised when I first met him,

that, "Hold on, you're this age and you listen to this type of music?

"You should be down there on Broad Street, clubbing every night."

He was a fantastic person, one in a million.

I really lost a good friend that day.

I'd say he was more than a friend - I'd say he was a family member.

Back in the office, and the question the heir hunters need to answer is,

does Gordon have any family members who would be eligible to inherit?

And if this case is going to be worth enough

to merit a full investigation.

The best place to start looking for answers is at Gordon's home.

Case manager David Milchard, known around the office as Grimble,

has been given responsibility for this case

and he gets straight on the phone to Bob Barratt,

one of the company's senior researchers on the road.

'It's on a case called Gordon Clarke.

-'We think it's a low-value estate.'

-Right.

'We need an enquiry to see if we can get any value on it.'

Yeah, sure.

Heir hunting relies heavily on research done in the office,

but it's senior researchers on the road, like Bob Barratt,

who are the public face of the company.

They're based all over the country and it's their job to follow up

any lead and make sure they get to the heirs ahead of the competition.

Hello?

-Do you want me to let you in, love?

-Yeah, thanks.

Bob arrives at the block of flats where Gordon lived.

He wants to talk to the neighbours

to see what he can find out about the deceased.

'He's always lived on his own there, has he?

'Did he own the premises or property or are they all council owned?'

Bob's first findings aren't encouraging.

The neighbours never saw any of Gordon's family,

who might be able to help with the investigation.

Crucially, it appears he didn't own his flat,

which would mean the estate could be worth much less

than the heir hunters had hoped.

But Bob is a pro and doesn't take just one person's word for it.

So he heads off in search of more people to talk to,

and his persistence pays off.

It could be there's some value here.

-I spoke to a neighbour who knew him quite well...

-HE COUGHS

Excuse me. ..and he had several pensions

and just one cash sum that came out.

She reckons his estate might be about 40,000.

-'Right then, Bob. Thank you.'

-OK.

This is the news the heir hunters have been waiting for.

£40,000 is a decent-sized estate,

and worthy of an investigation, so it's all systems go.

-How many children are there?

-Five alive, one dead.

Grimble assigns senior researcher Alan

and researcher Eesha to the case.

They get hold of Gordon's death certificate,

which shows that he was born in Birmingham.

They can then access his birth certificate,

which reveals that his parents were Frederick Clarke and Lily Bowen,

and that he was an only child. They now know there is no near kin

or brothers and sisters on this case.

They need to go further back in the family tree and look for aunts,

uncles, and eventually cousins.

The team decide to tackle the paternal side first,

and try to find any siblings for Gordon's father, Frederick Clarke.

Elizabeth May, born June 1907, Birmingham.

Eesha gives Alan a list of five names that she found

on the 1911 census.

It seems he had four brothers, Frank, William, George and Albert.

And a sister, Elizabeth. All very common names for the period.

Combined with the surname, Clarke, they spell bad news for Alan.

Unfortunately, because the name is Clarke,

and they're not good combinations of names,

we'll have to trawl through some very common name searches

to try and identify what we want.

Eesha gets straight onto it, and it's not long

before she's homed in on the correct birth record

for each member of the Clarke family.

Somehow she's managed to make a hard task look very easy,

and Alan can't quite believe it.

How do you know these ones are correct?

They're quite common names.

Yeah, they were like a year apart or something.

Sure enough, Eesha's research is spot on,

and gives them the information they need

to proceed with their investigation.

The youngest of Gordon's uncles and aunts was born in 1907.

They are all now deceased,

so the next step is to look for their marriages

and any children who would be Gordon's first cousins.

Do you want to have a look at Elizabeth, then?

Elizabeth or May Elizabeth?

Eesha now turns her attention to Gordon's aunt Elizabeth,

who married Frank Davis.

It looks like, unfortunately, she's married a Davis,

which doesn't help me at all.

It seems even super-researcher Eesha has met her match.

Davis, as a surname, is about as common as Clarke.

So the chances are there will be thousands of Davis-Clarke births

in Birmingham.

This case is going to test the heir hunters' skills to the limit.

-No luck, Eesha?

-At times like this,

the best thing to do is to consolidate what they already know.

-So Grimble gets on the phone to Paul Matthews.

-I'm all ears.

Paul is another of the company's senior researchers on the road

and is based in the Midlands.

Now, what we want initially are some births, from the same father, definitely.

He's Frederick Theodore.

-Clarke with...?

-The 6th of June 1905.

-Yeah.

So, initially, that's what we need you to sort out, first of all.

Paul heads off to Birmingham Register Office,

to get the birth certificates of all the Clarke brothers and sisters.

That way, at least they can be 100% sure

they have the right family.

This case is beginning to feel like an uphill struggle.

The name Clarke is awful.

Not only is it a common name, you only need to drop the E,

and you're really in queer street.

It's almost as bad as the name Smith.

Paul knows the staff at the register office very well,

and it's not long before John, the registrar,

has found those all-important certificates.

The first one, Frederick Theodore.

He's the man we want!

Frederick Theodore.

OK. The next two are...Frank,

then you've got George, born the 25th of April 1901.

One by one, he reels off the whole family.

Your final one is Elizabeth May. That's who I've got for you.

-OK. That's great, right. Cheers, John.

-OK.

Job done.

'Good afternoon, Fraser & Fraser.'

Yeah, Paul Matthews, after Grimble, please.

Paul reports back to base to get his next instructions.

-Can you try for a marriage of Elizabeth May Clarke...

-Yep.

..to Frank Davis?

September 1913.

Okey-cokie. OK, Dave. Cheers.

They need the marriage certificate

to prove that Elizabeth did indeed marry Frank Davis.

Then they can go on to look for any children.

But Paul's also going to try another angle.

I'm trying to basically find the death of Elizabeth May Davis -

I hope that she never remarried.

Born 1907, so I'm working back from 1990, hoping we get lucky.

Paul's working on the theory that if Elizabeth had any children,

then they are likely to be listed on her death certificate

as the informant.

The team are relying on him to make a breakthrough

on this most complicated and demanding of cases.

But with so many Clarke-Davises in Birmingham,

he's got a mountain to climb.

It's just trial and error, a matter of trawling through it and hoping you'll find it.

The truth is out there.

Coming up, at last David's got something to get excited about...

Oh, terrific. We've definitely got the right family.

..as the hunt for Gordon Clarke's heirs hots up.

Sometimes families lose contact

because one member moves away from their hometown.

Even if it's only a short distance.

Years can go by

and relationships that were once very close can be lost forever.

This was exactly what happened with Jack Thornton.

Jack died, aged 61, on July the 19th 2005 in Bradford, West Yorkshire.

He left no will and only a couple of childhood photos survive of him.

Before he died,

Jack lived in this house in the Laisterdyke area of the city.

His landlord, Graham Swain, a builder, knew him for over ten years.

Jack were a good tenant,

he always understood that one month were four weeks -

that's how much rent we got.

Jack were a builder, a bricklayer,

and he always used to carry a bag of tools around with him.

We used to talk about times on building sites.

Jack originally moved into the house with his elderly father.

But when he died in 2000, Jack carried on living there on his own.

Jack were quite a lonely guy. He kept himself to himself.

He didn't seem to have any family about.

He didn't get out much,

but Jack did have one unusual passion in life.

He loved old Western films.

Jack always used to get himself spruced up in his leather jacket

and his cowboy hat, and would always say,

"Oh, I'm going to see my girlfriend in Leeds."

I don't really think he had one, but he used to say that.

When Jack passed away,

me and my wife were very sad about the situation.

He'd lived in the house for seven, eight years,

and you really get to know people like that.

It were very upsetting.

If you knew he was going to die, you would ask him hundreds of questions.

But you think they're going to live forever, don't you?

When Jack died, he left an estate worth £15,000, but no will.

His case was picked up by heir hunter Anna Dunn

at DS Researchers in Hull.

I forwarded a marriage for that name in '85.

Anna and her team have been in the genealogy business for ten years...

Hi, I'm Peter from DS Researchers.

..and are one of only a handful of heir hunting companies

based in the North of England.

Being based in Hull,

we're pretty well-placed to deal with the Northern areas of England.

We also cover Scotland.

When Jack's name appeared on the Treasury's list of unclaimed estates,

it showed that he had died in Bradford.

Anna picked up on it straightaway and started to investigate.

On checking the case, we found the deceased had been married,

and he'd had two children.

Jack had married in 1962, but the marriage lasted less than ten years.

In that time, he had two children

who, under normal inheritance laws, would have been his sole heirs.

But then, Anna made a surprising discovery.

I found that his wife had remarried, and I couldn't find the children.

So then I checked the names,

and she had actually changed the children's names

to her next husband's surname.

And on checking, we found that they'd been adopted,

which threw the case out for them.

So even though Anna had found Jack's biological children,

because they had been adopted by their mother's new husband,

they were not eligible to inherit Jack's estate.

Adoption laws are clear.

They go through court.

Once a child has been adopted out, they belong to another family.

Now that his own children had been ruled out,

Anna needed to go further back in Jack's family tree

to look for his heirs.

Jack's birth certificate revealed that his parents were

Arthur Thornton and Sylvena Banks,

and that he had been born in the village of Saltaire, near Bradford.

In the late 19th and early 20th century,

Saltaire was a centre of the Yorkshire wool industry.

It was named after Sir Titus Salt,

a wealthy industrialist who'd been horrified by the appalling conditions

he'd seen in the mills of nearby Bradford,

where workers were exploited

for pitiful wages and crammed into slum accommodation.

In 1853, Sir Titus transplanted

his entire textile manufacturing business from Bradford

to his newly-constructed salt mills on the banks of the River Aire.

His workforce were installed in a new model village, Saltaire,

built to the highest standards and designed to promote

their general health and well-being.

Titus Salt, I class as a paternalistic employer.

He was aiming to better the lives of the workers.

You'll find street upon street of terraced housing.

There was a dining room within the complex.

There was the institute where they could go and exercise their minds.

So all this was far removed from the smoky atmosphere

that you would find in Bradford and in the mills in Bradford.

By the end of the century,

Saltaire was home to 4,500 mill workers.

Amongst them were Jack's paternal grandparents,

Edward Thornton and Ada Houlden.

Over the years, they lived in several houses in the village,

but ended up at number 27 Titus Street,

just a couple of doors down from the house where, many years later,

in 1943, Jack was born.

Having established Jack's immediate family,

Anna now needed to cast her net wider in her search for his heirs.

She began by looking to see if his father, Arthur,

had any brothers or sisters.

We found the grandparents' marriage in 1903,

and that was Edward Thornton, who married Ada Houlden, so from there

we were able to identify one, two, three, four, five, six children.

It turned out that Jack had four paternal uncles and two aunts,

most of whom were born in Saltaire.

It seems that Jack's grandparents, Edward and Ada,

worked at Salts Mill all their lives,

as did at least three of their children,

including Jack's uncle Joseph,

who eventually held the prestigious post of wool sorter.

Wool sorters were considered to be the aristocrats of the industry.

Seven years apprenticeship, very skilled.

The whole production depends on their skill

at finding the different qualities of wool.

Gerald Smith has been a wool sorter since he left school at 15.

He's now one of only two still working in Bradford.

It entails getting a fleece of raw wool from the sheep

and sorting it into different grades.

I suppose you could have five or six different sorts on one fleece.

The rougher it is, it goes for carpets,

the finer it is, it goes for making suiting and clothes.

75% of Bradford was reliant on the wool trade,

and it all started off with wool sorters and went down the line,

right through the mill, until it came out as cloth.

Salts Mill, where so many of Jack's relatives

spent their entire working lives, closed down in 1986.

And Saltaire has since been preserved as a World Heritage Site.

Jack's father, Arthur, didn't follow the family into the wool trade -

he was a gunner in the Royal Artillery

and then, like his son after him, went to work as a bricklayer.

When Jack was ten, they moved away from Saltaire.

It seems they slowly fell out of touch

with the rest of the Thornton family.

Anna had found every single one of Jack's father's siblings,

but it was very unlikely that any of them

would still be around to inherit.

I checked to see whether any of those were still alive,

and having found deaths for all of them,

we knew there were no uncles and aunts.

The search was now on to find their children.

After some painstaking research,

Anna eventually came up with the goods.

Jack's father's sister, Annie, we found the marriage on that one.

She was married to Mr Watson.

We found three births to that marriage.

It looks like Anna had finally made a crucial breakthrough.

But little did she know the investigation would go on to reveal

some names with a very different sound to them.

Was she onto the right family after all?

We had names like Cicero, Sylvena,

and I thought, "Could they be Italian?"

The search for Jack Thornton's heirs

was about to lead to some very unexpected places.

Heir hunters solve thousands of cases a year

and millions of pounds are paid out to the rightful heirs.

But not every case can be cracked.

The Treasury has a list of over 2,000 estates

that have baffled heir hunters and remain unsolved.

Could you be the heir they've been searching for?

Could you be in line for a windfall worth hundreds, thousands,

or even millions of pounds?

Estates stay on the list for up to 30 years,

and today we're focusing on three names.

Are they relatives of yours?

Marjorie Ettlinger died in Hammersmith, London, in 1997.

Ettlinger is a very rare name in the UK and may indicate German ancestry.

Did you know her? Are you related?

William Ronald Victor Tod died in Plymouth in 2008.

Although Todd is a common name, this spelling, with one D,

is quite unusual.

Does his name ring a bell with anyone? Did you work alongside him?

Vera Stingmore died in Molesey in 1997.

Stingmore is a very rare name, indeed.

There are only a handful in the whole of the UK.

Were you a friend or neighbour of Vera's?

Can you help solve her case?

If no heirs of hers are found, her money will go to the Government.

If the names Marjorie Ettlinger, William Tod or Vera Stingmore mean anything to you,

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

Back on the case of Jack Thornton, the reclusive bricklayer

who had died, aged 61, in Bradford, Yorkshire.

Anna Dunn at DS Researchers had established all Jack's paternal uncles and aunts were dead.

So the search for his cousins was well and truly on.

Anna began her investigation with Annie Thornton, one of Jack's paternal aunts.

She discovered she had married a Heba Watson in 1938

and that Jack's mother, Sylvena, had been a bridesmaid at their wedding.

Annie and Heba had gone on to have three children, two daughters and a son, Ian.

If Anna could only find these children, then she would have her first heirs.

It didn't take long for Anna to find a phone number for Ian Watson,

who was still living in the Saltaire area.

The news of his cousin's death was quite a shock to him.

It came as a surprise, because we hadn't heard from him for over 20 years.

Ian remembered back all those years to when he and Jack were both growing up in Saltaire.

Jack was an only child and I think he was a bit of a loner.

One of his main interests was horse riding. He used to go to a local stables.

On one occasion, he brought the horse to our house to show us.

And he rode the horse all the way through the town and then all the way back to the stables again.

When Jack's family moved away from Saltaire, the two boys kept in touch for a little while,

meeting up in Bradford to go and watch Jack's favourite cowboy films.

But in the end, they lost contact.

The fact Jack died alone and without anybody else in the family knowing about him is quite sad.

We had no contact addresses.

So without the chance meeting, there was no way we'd have been able to get in touch with him.

It wasn't long before Anna had traced all the paternal heirs to Jack's estate.

But her work was only half done.

There was still the whole maternal side yet to investigate.

Anna managed to track Jack's mother Sylvena Bank's birth certificate.

This showed her parents were a Tom Banks and a Lavinia Campbell.

By referring to the 1911 census, Anna discovered they had nine children,

including Sylvena, but that wasn't all she noticed.

We had names like Cicero, Sylvena, Mona May,

and various sort of unusual names.

And I thought, "Could they be Italian?"

But then again, being a little bit different, I thought this might help with the search.

As Anna predicted, there weren't many Cicero Banks born in Bradford at the turn of the last century.

So it didn't take long to track him down.

We looked first for the marriage of Cicero Senior and found his wife,

and then looked for the children for that marriage and found yet another Cicero.

Cicero Junior had married Olive in 1932 and they'd had five children,

all of whom would be beneficiaries of Gordon's estate.

The youngest of these children was Julie Banks,

who was amazed to hear she was in line to inherit

from a first cousin once removed that she'd never heard of.

I didn't know anything about Jack Thornton.

I didn't know he existed.

And I felt a little bit disappointed by that.

But Julie was able to shed some light on how her father

and grandfather came by their exotic name.

Cicero Senior was born in 1905,

and the winner of the Derby that year

was a magnificent chestnut thoroughbred called Cicero.

When you're a young teenager, having a dad who's named after a horse is slightly embarrassing.

If anybody asked, I'd say, "Oh, my dad, he's from Italian stock - that's why his name's Cicero!"

In the end, Julie embraced the story behind her father's unusual name,

especially when she heard how he had come by it.

It seems that was all down to her great grandmother, Lavinia Banks.

Great Grandma - definitely a gambler.

Loved the horses and liked to put the odd penny or two on a race,

which I think is brilliant and I hope she won lots of money.

But Julie certainly didn't inherit a fortune from her long-lost cousin.

Jack's £15,000 estate was divided equally between all his aunts and uncles

and then divided again as it passed down each branch of the family.

So by the time it got to Julie, she only received £25.

But for Julie, it wasn't really about the money.

The whole process has been about finding out more about my family.

So I've learned who he was through this process.

Which you can be thankful for - you can thank the process for that.

Jack may never have met his cousin Julie,

but the shy boy who loved cowboy films and had a passion for horses would have been pleased

to know how she was planning on spending her inheritance.

-Hi, can I have £10 each-way on that one, please?

-Ten each-way, number 11, thank you.

-Thank you, my love.

-Thank you.

-Cheers.

Julie and her mother, Olive, have come on a trip to Epsom racecourse...

-If this wins, I'll get £75.

-Will you?

..the same racetrack where Cicero the Derby winner,

who her father was named after, had his famous victory in 1905.

On that day, he raced his way into the history books

and became a part of the Banks' family history as well.

If only the great champion had been running today!

I think we lost.

I've spent the inheritance!

That was brilliant!

Heir hunters Fraser & Fraser have been investigating the case of Gordon Clarke,

who died, aged 65, in Birmingham, leaving an estimated £40,000 estate, but no will.

Gordon was a Brummie born and bred and worked his entire life in a pen factory

in Birmingham's famous jewellery quarter.

The pen-making trade was established here in the 19th century

and at one point, 75% of all pens in the world were produced in this one square kilometre district.

Gordon came to the factory in 1960, aged 16, and worked his way up to become a pen designer.

Dennis Freeman was a friend of Gordon's since they were young apprentices together.

Due to a congenital condition, Dennis has been deaf since he was a teenager.

He wouldn't make friends easily.

But gradually he started to come out of himself

and the more I got to know him, the more I got used to him

and he got used to me and we started to socialise.

He will always be remembered for the work he did here.

We find it very difficult to cope without him.

He didn't really have a family as such.

The factory was his family, really.

Back in the office, and the case of Gordon Clarke is proving so complicated

that it's pushing case manager Grimble to the limit.

HE SIGHS

The two surnames involved, Clarke and Davis, are amongst the most common in the UK.

So they've had to use all their ingenuity in the search for heirs.

Their main hope is to find Gordon's aunt, Elizabeth Clarke's death certificate.

If she had children, then one of them should appear on it as the informant.

Paul is scanning the records in Birmingham Register Office, but so far, he's drawn a blank.

In the office, the team are trying a different tack.

They're searching the online databases for Elizabeth's children and they strike gold.

Anthony Davis was born in 1941 in Birmingham.

If they can find him, then he will be their first heir.

But like everything on this case, it's not that simple.

We haven't picked him up alive, we haven't picked him up dead.

He probably is alive somewhere, but we just can't figure him out yet.

Now the team in the office have found a possible son for Elizabeth,

Paul turns his attention to Gordon's uncles, looking for any trace of marriages or children.

Oh, hang on, hang on. Hot off the press, hang on a second.

Paul is on the phone to Grimble

when registrar John comes in with some good news.

We've got a marriage in 1923.

-This is...?

-Frank Clarke.

Oh, right, spot on.

They've found a record for Frank Clarke's marriage

to an Elizabeth Stella Raven.

Finally, it looks like the heir hunters will have a relatively unusual surname to work with.

OK, Clarke to Raven - that's not that bad, is it?

And there's more good news.

Grimble has finally managed to track down the elusive death certificate

for Gordon's aunt, Elizabeth Clarke,

which they hope will list her son Anthony Davis as the informant.

The only problem is, it's in Lichfield,

half an hour north of Birmingham,

and it's already late in the day.

You haven't got time to get over to Lichfield now, have you?

No, we might need you to do that first thing in the morning.

Paul heads home for the night but in the office,

they're still making headway.

The team have found two children

from the marriage of Gordon's uncle, Frank Clarke,

and his wife, Elizabeth Raven.

A girl, Elizabeth May, and a boy, Frank Thomas.

-Oh, right!

-But before they can celebrate,

Grimble uncovers another incredible twist

in this most torturous of heir hunts.

It seems that Frank was adopted out of the family

and so is no longer eligible to inherit.

Worse still, there's absolutely no sign of Elizabeth.

I don't know, perhaps Mum remarried

and took the son with her, so what's happened to Elizabeth?

I don't know, so it looks as though it's going to be a bit of a problem.

Poor Grimble. Nothing is going his way

and as the sun sets on the first day of this investigation,

it's safe to say that the case of Gordon Clarke is still wide open.

It's early the next morning and Paul Matthews is on the road

to Lichfield to pick up Elizabeth Davis' death certificate.

Paul's confident that it will lead them to her son, Anthony.

We're picking up the death from Lichfield

and hopefully the informant will be the son

and will give us an indication as to where he might be.

At the very least, we will know where he was in 1995.

Morning, Paul Matthews from Fraser & Fraser.

Nice to see you.

-Nice to see you. Any chance of that death, please?

-Yes, certainly.

It's been a dodgy case where we can't find anything at the moment.

-Yes, we'll have a look for that for you.

-Cheers, thank you.

It's not long before the registrar comes back

with a copy of the certificate.

-Here's your certificate.

-Oh, fantastic.

Do you want to check and make sure it's the right one?

That's great, thank you very much.

Yeah, that's a bit of a surprise, but there you go.

A surprise might be a bit of an understatement.

It turns out the informant isn't Anthony Davis

but someone listed as a stepson, Frank Thomas Davis -

the same first names as the child adopted out of brother Frank's family.

I wonder if this Frank Thomas

somehow ends up as part of Elizabeth May's family.

The simple way to find that out is to go and knock on his door.

-We'll see if we can unravel the mystery.

-Paul gets straight on the phone to Grimble

to report this extraordinary new development.

Frank Clarke had a son called Frank Thomas, didn't he, who was adopted out?

You're bloody right there, you're bloody right there.

I'm right there.

Grimble is justifiably excited.

Frank Thomas may have lost his claim on his cousin's estate

when his parents gave him up for adoption,

but he's turned up again as a fully entitled heir

because he was adopted back into the family by his aunt Elizabeth.

Finally, this case is opening up

and it seems the key to it all is Frank Thomas Davis.

Things can change so quickly.

We come up with one little bit of information

and the potential of it is that this guy may know quite a bit about the family.

It doesn't take them long to find a phone number for Frank

but it's Grimble's job to make the call and he gets straight through.

Was Frank Raymond Davis your father?

He was a stepfather as well? So they were step-parents.

All right.

It's sounding good.

But after a day of disappointments and near misses,

Grimble wants to be 100% sure he's got his man.

Do you know who your natural parents were?

Yeah?

Stella Raven, that's it.

Oh, terrific. We've definitely got the right family. OK, fine.

Bingo - Grimble has got his first heir,

but he's not going to stop there.

There's plenty more that Frank can help him with.

Did your adoptive parents have a son called Anthony?

Yeah, OK, so the baby died shortly after birth?

Did you have a sister, Elizabeth?

It seems that Elizabeth's son, Anthony Davis,

died as a baby, before Frank was adopted.

One by one, Grimble sorts out every branch of the Clarke family tree.

Thank you very much, thank you, bye-bye.

Success!

One minute, despondent and you think it'll take us years and years.

Then we get one little break and it's opened the whole lot.

He may have solved the case but nothing is over

until the heirs have signed an agreement with Frasers,

allowing the company to help them make their claim

on Gordon's estate to the Treasury.

Unless they get that all-important signature,

this whole investigation could still turn out

to be a huge waste of time and resources.

Luckily, Paul Matthews is close by,

so he heads straight round to meet Frank.

Hi, Paul Matthews from Fraser & Fraser. Pleased to meet you.

Frank tells Paul that his birth parents separated when he was young.

His sister stayed with their grandmother

but he was adopted by his aunt Elizabeth when he was 11 years old.

I still kept in touch with my real mother.

She never got married again and she lived alone

and I always kept in touch with her.

Why were you adopted out?

Well, at that time, there were no handouts like today,

no welfare. It was just a bit of maintenance from the husband.

He disappeared, Frank.

She got no maintenance so she couldn't really keep us.

Frank remembers his cousin, Gordon, from when they were both young boys.

He would probably be about seven or eight then, I should think,

when I last saw him.

Oh, and he's gone?

They're all passing me by.

You hang on, there's some money coming!

After listening to what Paul has to say,

Frank decides he's happy for the company to help him with his claim

and duly signs on the dotted line.

Thanks for your time. Nice meeting you, all the very best.

I hope you get a nice few bob anyway. Thank you, bye-bye.

It's time for Paul to get going but there's no doubt,

he's delighted with how things have turned out.

An absolutely lovely couple.

He's an entitled relative. He's signed up with ourselves

so that's a very good end result

so now we've got to try and trace more members of the family.

In the end, the heir hunters found three heirs to Gordon Clarke's estate,

but when the case was submitted to the Treasury,

they discovered that the rumours about its value were unfounded.

There was no £40,000 in cash.

It turned out to be worth just £5,000

which was split between the three of them.

Sadly, Gordon wasn't close to his blood family when he died

but he certainly wasn't alone.

His close circle of neighbours and colleagues

were a testament to his loyalty and youthful spirit.

He will be sorely missed.

He was just an amazing person.

I do think he's gone straight up there and he's looking down on us.

In my mind and heart, he will always live on, he will.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd