When a farmer's daughter seemingly vanished without a trace, it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that her assets and any claim to them would be lost. But with TPR on the case, UK assets in excess of £70,000 were recovered some 60 years after her disappearance.

France, 1946: The war was over, but the country was still in a state of flux. Records were scarce but it was the census for this year where the farmer's daughter first appeared in the agricultural region of Ile-de-France. Now we also knew her husband's name and armed with this information we were able to trace the marriage to a small fishing and agricultural town in Suffolk, England in 1908.

One thing leads to another and soon a French death notice had been located for her husband in 1948. The notice made it plain that she had predeceased him, but there were no official records to this effect. In fact, after that census entry of 1946, there was nothing. To make matters worse, there was no evidence of any children either in the UK or in France. Who would inherit her estate and more to the point, without any official documentation to prove her death, how could we prove the claim to the UK authorities?

Following her husband's family line, extensive research was undertaken until a great niece was found in New South Wales, Australia. In the absence of a death certificate, leave to swear death was granted by the Probate Division of the High Court of Justice in England, and finally two generations on, the family received the benefit of the lost assets.

Whatever became of the farmer's daughter? There is the suggestion from one French genealogist that she may have been deported during the German occupation of France, but in truth, that may always remain a mystery.

Previous Article

Upon hearing that TPR has located assets in their names, some clients ask, "Well, all right, but why do I need your help in recovering them? Can't I just fill out a form or two on my own?"

The answ...
TPR Network is only one of Richard Davies' brainstorms. Richard cheekily characterises at least a portion of his work-day as "sitting in Starbucks and coming up with ideas". Far from being an idle dre...