I found someone's wedding photos in our loft!

[Woopdoggysycamosiy]

Can the power of Mumsnet help me? DH and I were clearing out the loft and amongst the long forgotten junk there was a bag of beautiful wedding photos, along with a copy of the couple's invitations, some larger mounted prints and an order of service. They were married in St Paul's Cathedral! What to do? How to get them back to their rightful owners (hope they're still together!! Way too invested now)?

@Woopdoggysycamosiy don’t bin them!! Something similar actually happened to our family recently, only the people who had bought the house knew us (coincidentally). They had been at the back of a huge loft and accidentally left behind - they had been given up as lost for 25 years. It’s been lovely seeing all these old photos again.

Yeh they might have thought they lost it… who knows 🤷🏻‍♀️

I'll definitely not bin them! I've lost plenty of stuff in my time and it's not because they weren't precious (anyone seen a gold heart locket on a chain with a picture of my grandparents inside while we're at it? In a French language school in the Dordogne? About 15 years ago?) 😓Here's a tiny bit of the invitation which wouldn't identify them:

I know you have googled but given you have their names from the invitation try Linkedin specifically. The couple will most likely be in their mid 50's early 60's by now and possibly still working or just retired. You might get a direct hit or recognise from their profile pic and you can contact them directly on there without a public fuss. A lot easier than trawling through dubious facebook profiles!

There was a random box of wedding photos in the house of an elderly lady I was POA for. When her house was cleared it turned out they were a distant relatives, the marriage had lasted 5 minutes but as the photos had cost a small fortune they had been dumped on her as the mother of the bride couldn’t bare to throw them out…Think we chucked them in the skip!

Oooh,so someone with an OBE.

Do you have a Facebook group for the wider village/town? We live rurally but stuff like this pops up fairly often on the nearby town’s Facebook group. Someone found a trunk from WWII in sale filled with a soldier’s things, and was able to post on the group and track down his family. Someone will know who they are, but you’ll have to include enough identifying information, which I can’t imagine people would mind if they got their photos back.

Would you be able to look up the wedding on ancestory.com to find the certificate . They give it a bit more info and might be linked to someone's family tree

What about looking in the voters roll? They might be on there.

Possibly, or someone whose parent has one, maybe.

Try Ancestry.com or similar to see a copy of the marriage certificate - you have the names, date and location of the wedding. The certificate will have their addresses when they married, hopefully someone was still living at home.

A cousin married there. They don't have an OBE so it's not a given.

Pay for 192.com credits to search their names.

Is there not a surname on the invitations? I wouldn’t have thought it would be hard to trace “John or Jane Smith OBE”.

This is what their website says about eligibility to get married in St Paul's:

As St Paul’s is not a parish church, there are conditions on who can be married here and all weddings require the granting of a Special Licence of the Archbishop of Canterbury.
We are able to marry members of:

• the Order of the British Empire, and their children
• the Order of St Michael and St George, and their children
• the Imperial Society of Knights Bachelor, and their children
• the Cathedral Community (staff and volunteers, including Cathedral School, subject to length of service), and their children.

We are also able to marry those who hold a British Empire Medal, and their children.

Why not stick a photo of the happy couple on here someone might recognise it

If they wanted them surely they wouldn’t have left them in the loft and then done nothing to try and reclaim them? I’d guess they’re long divorced and neither really wanted these; they won’t be precious memories if the marriage was toxic/ abusive and you tracking them down could actually be upsetting if this is a marriage they don’t want to remember, assuming your house was once theirs if they’d wanted them they would know the address and how to request them back. You’re over invested imagining a fairytale reunion, but the reality is marriages can be messy and divorce even more so, these might be completely unwanted. If you can’t bear to throw them away just keep them aside in case either side of the couple ever return looking for them, but it’s not your place to go looking for them and foisting something they might not want back onto them. These memories might be very painful or triggering for all you know.

I know, it does seem strange that they didn't try to get them back. Could be for any number of reasons though and I can't bring myself to chuck them as that's the only alternative - I'm not keeping them! Thanks everyone, I'll try a few of these things and get back to you!

They could be blissfully married and not realised they are missing. Most people don't look at their wedding albums all the time. I think you have to try and get them back to them.

I can do a check on findmypast.co.uk (they're likely on the electoral register, or I may be able to find childrens details) - just pm if you'd like me to do this.

Obviously free of charge and I promise not to share their info with anyone else.

Try putting it on lost box on Facebook. Someone may recognise the wedding date if you put wedding album found, marriage dated XXX. Any legitimate claimant might have a copy of the wedding certificate as proof.

Intriguing - I'm guesstimating between 54-64 years of age now

If you wanted you could pay £12:50 to get certified marriage certificate and that would show where they lived at tine if marriage as well as occupations which could help in search to find them

If you are trying to find them to get the photos back to them or their family, why wouldn't you just post their names and date of marriage?

That's how they will be found.

Have you tried tineye or Google lens of their faces?