Bride's delight as dress is discovered after almost three decades

Hungerford man tracks down couple after finding wedding treasure trove

A LOST wedding box and treasure trove of memories has been discovered in a Hungerford attic.

And thanks to some detective work by its finder, plus an old wedding report in the Newbury Weekly News, the romantic hoard has been reunited with a jubilant bride and her husband.

Rod Smith of Hungerford-based Humane Pest Control Solutions was called by estate agents to a vacant property in Hamblin Meadow to deal with an infestation problem.

He was intrigued to find, buried in a corner, a box containing a wedding dress, bridesmaids dresses, cards and other memorabilia.

Mr Smith, aged 38, said: “I knew it would be important to the bride and groom so I started trying to find them.

“Thanks to the newspaper report and then social media I managed to track them down.”

Rosemary Bishop, as she was then, married fiancé Tom Cox in Tadley Common Methodist Church on May 14, 1988.

Hungerford Rotarian Robin Llewellyn was the official photographer.

The happy couple moved from Kingsclere to Lambourn in 1993 and then lived in Hamblin Meadow from 1996.

They subsequently moved to Taunton in Somerset and Mrs Cox said: “I remember carefully packing up my wedding dress, headdress and all the cards and letters we received when we married, together with everything else to do with organising the wedding.

“At first, it travelled with us as we moved – we were devastated when we realised it was missing.”

She added: “Imagine how we felt when we heard from Rod. I can’t tell you how excited and emotional we both felt.

“Rod is such a delightful man. I told him I couldn’t believe he had discovered the box and then taken the trouble, not just to retrieve it, but to clean it up, find inside the original story from the Newbury Weekly News about our wedding and use this to find us. It was like a fairytale!”

The happy couple drove to Hungerford to meet Rod, his partner and daughter and to collect their treasure.

MrsCox, now aged 60, said: “We ended up in tears. Everything was as perfect as the day I had packed it away.”

Mr Smith said: “I knew how important this would be to someone and I’m just happy I managed to find Rosemary and Tom and reunite them with their wedding memories.”