A WOMAN is appealing for help to trace her long lost relatives who hail from the Shildon area.

Belinda Clare, of Cambridgeshire, is hoping for help to construct her family tree and she is keen to know if she still has any family in the North-East.

Mrs Clare’s great grandparents Arthur and Agnes Reay lived near to East Thickley, close to Shildon, and their daughter was Queenie Reay.

Queenie Reay was initially married to Ernest Winsall but when he died she married again to Frank Dunk, in 1944.

Shortly after this Mrs Dunk, who died in 1993, and her husband moved down to Cambridgeshire where she worked in an optician’s making glasses.

She was aged between 22 and 25-years-old when she left the area and she was 74 when she died.

Mrs Reay had two brothers, Ernest and John, plus four sisters Margaret , Collette, Violeta and Florence, who all took their mother, Agnes', maiden name of Morland.

Links with any remaining North-East family members have been broken over the years.

Mrs Clare said: “I’m trying to find out if I have any family in Shildon and I would love to know more about that side of the family.

“I’m putting together a family tree and I know that I had family in Shildon and it would be nice to get in touch with any of them who are still there.”

Anyone who can help Mrs Clare trace her relatives should email belindabee42@icloud.com