MISSING . . . and FOUND!
THE DAILY MAIL offers readers a unique opportunity to re-establish contact with long-lost relatives and friends. Each week, MONICA PORTER features the story of someone trying to find a missing loved one, as well as a tale of people reunited. This column is produced in conjunction with the voluntary tracing service, Searching For A Memory, run by Gill and John Whitley. Jane Stackhouse, nee Sheridan, is looking for her longlost school friend elizabeth ann Carr.
‘I lost contact with elizabeth i n the early Seventies and have been trying over the years to learn her whereabouts, but without success,’ says Jane.
‘If I remember corr ectly, elizabeth was the only child of Lesley and Doris Carr, and was born in the Liverpool area in May 1946.
‘I met her when the family moved to Dore, near Sheffield, and she started at Dore Church of england school when she was seven.
‘We both went on to High Storrs Grammar School for Girls and travelled there on the bus every day, no matter what the weather. We would walk a mile in deep snow well over the top of our wellies to catch the bus when it was unable to get to the village.
‘Our time together in Dore was great f un. We were members of the 125th 1st Dore Guides and this photo was taken in 1957. We are both in the back row: elizabeth is on the left and I am on the right. That year we attended the Baden powell Centenary Camp at Bretton park.
‘elizabeth went on to study at Leeds University in 1964. We lost contact in the early Seventies. She was married by then (her surname was Braithwaite) and living in Hayes, Middlesex.
‘I would be so thrilled if you could help me with my quest by putting this appeal in the Missing . . . Found column because the Daily Mail is the paper I read every day.’ In aprIL, we ran an item from alfred Sargeant, who told us: ‘My picture shows me (in uniform) on the far left, together with pete Smith, Mike Tearle and roy Godden, my fellow national Servicemen, on July 11, 1956, the day we were demobbed after two years in the raF.
‘We had been stationed at raF Warting in Sussex. I have maintained contact with Mike and roy, but pete Smith, centre front, appears to have fallen off the planet.
‘ Several of us have held reunions over the years, but none of us could find pete. Maybe you can succeed where we amateurs have failed.
‘With pete, I served on the r adar i nstallations near pevensey on the Sussex coast from September 1954 until our demob in July 1956.
‘pete was ever the quiet one and when we parted company on that July afternoon I never saw him again.
‘a dozen of us have kept in touch and held two reunions: one in 1985, when we were all about 50, and then in 2006, when we were around 70.
‘ Despite several i ntense s earches, i ncluding t he Salvation army and air Ministry, pete seems to have disappeared. I do hope you can find him.’
Well, no wonder pete appeared to have fallen off the planet. alfred remembered his surname incorrectly! The old pal he was searching for is actually called pete Owen.
Luckily, he recognised himself from the write-up and picture and got in touch. The pair have chatted on the phone and plan to meet soon to arrange a reunion with old comrades later in the year.