King's Lynn man reunites Australian family with suitcase full of memories found at Denver car boot sale

A suitcase packed with more than 1,000 photos, poignant letters and memorabilia is on its way from West Norfolk to be reunited with its family in Australia.

Memories will be rekindled thanks to some detective work by family historian, Simon Howard who managed to unearth and track down family members who are still alive and living down under.

They could have been lost forever if Simon had not gone to a car boot sale at Denver and got talking to a woman who had bought the suitcase full of photos and memorabilia at an auction at Downham.

“It was so interesting that I bought it from her,”said Simon, who lives at West Lynn.

“The case had L. Eagelton stamped on the top. After looking through the photos and postcards I discovered the family consisted of the father Walter Eagelton b1896, mother Leontine Eagleton b1901 in Egypt and their four children, Lily, Blanche, Walter and Claudine.

“The family lived in Otford, Kent and hundreds of pictures are of the area, plus the most amazing studio portraits from Egypt dating from 1898 onwards.”

Simon discovered the case had belonged to the daughter Blanche who had lived in Downham and died in a residential home in Swaffham in December 2021.

He said: “I soon found out the only child to have children was Lily but she moved to Australia in 1959.

"After writing a post on my business page, I shared the post in an Australian Facebook group and amazingly found Walter and Leontine's granddaughter.

"She was absolutely shocked. Even more amazing is the fact her mother is still alive, aged 98.”

Having unpacked the suitcase, Simon is now packing it up again and is sending the case off to Australia – after scanning all of the paperwork in case it gets damaged in transit.

As well as photos, the collection included a little letter from Leontine's granddaughter in Australia in 1959 - the one who found Simon on Facebook.

Simon's detective work has reunited a number of families with heirlooms over the years.

Simon is a family historian whose Facebook business, Find My Family, traces and records family histories and backgrounds.