Portsmouth collector reunites family with long-lost war medals
Medals won by two brothers in World War 1 have been returned to their family thanks to a Portsmouth collector.
Gordon Cross acquired the awards in a batch he bought several years ago.
Recently, he decided to try to trace the family of the recipients, Frank and Albert Caines.
Before long he found a Facebook appeal posted by Welsh air hostess Lisa Smith, who was seeking the medals given to her great uncles more than 100 years ago.
Gordon invited her to the World War 1 Remembrance Centre in Portsmouth, where he is a volunteer, to collect the awards she had been seeking for so long.
Lisa, who travelled from her home in Pontypool for the presentation, said: ‘What an amazing surprise to have Gordon contact me and say that he had the medals.
‘It’s lovely that they are coming back into the family. It's where they belong. It’s quite emotional to have them back, to think that I've got the medals that they had over 100 years ago’
Frank and Albert, together with their brother Arthur, all signed up to fight in the war. Arthur and Albert joined the Royal Field Artillery and Frank enlisted in the Monmouthshire Regiment.
Arthur went through the war but Albert was wounded just before Christmas, 1914 and was invalided out of service and Frank, who was 19, was killed in action in March 1915.
All three were awarded the Mons Star, the Great War Medal and the Victory Medal.
Lisa added: ‘I've done quite a bit of research on them and have been to Belgium to visit Frank’s grave. I've always wondered where the medals had gone.’
Gordon said: ‘I bought the medals off of a chap on Facebook – they came with another group of medals which belonged to his family. Those went to a friend of mine, and Frank's and Albert's medals I put aside and they sat there for three years. Recently I considered selling them in a shop where I've got a cabinet but I thought I'd do further research first to see if I could find any living relatives.
‘Lo and behold, because Lisa had done some real great research, her link came up first on a Google search. And here we are. The medals have gone back to where they should be. It’s terrific.’
Buoyed by managing to find her great-uncles’ medals, Lisa is now redoubling her efforts to track down the three service awards given to her grandad.
Arthur Caines, who, like his brothers, came from Blaenavon in south Wales, was living in Doncaster at the time of his death in 1976. The family believe the medals might have been sold privately around that time, or perhaps in 2007 or shortly afterwards.
Lisa hopes that anyone who can help her in her quest will email her at [email protected]