It started with a shopper browsing in a Belgium flea market - and ended 15 years later when the 103-year-old son of a World War One soldier was reunited with a treasured family heirloom.
Christine Griffiths, from Swansea , had been visiting the market in Ostend in the mid-nineties when she saw a silver snuff box inscribed "P H Jenkins, Orchard Street, Swansea".
Earlier this year it was identified as a gift given to soldier Phillip Henry Jenkins as he was leaving to fight in World War One.
Through social media, the item has been reunited with the son of its owner, who despite being 103 immediately recognised it as belonging to his father.
Petain Verdun Jenkins - Mr Jenkins’ son is named after the French general who led the French army to victory in the nine-month-long Battle of Verdun.
His daughter Marie Jones, who formerly lived in Killay but now lives in Hampshire, said: “Dad is 103 and doesn’t say much at all, and he has difficulties with his memory, so I wasn’t sure if he would grasp what it was.
"But when we put it in his hands he just said ‘dad’. It was a very moving moment”.
Soldier Phillip Jenkins’ granddaughter Marie Jones said: “My cousin called me earlier this year to say she had something to tell me.
“She said a woman had been on holiday in Ostend when she saw the snuff box in a flea market.
“I remember when I was little my dad told me his father took snuff, and it turned out the woman on holiday had discovered his snuff box.
“It was a chance in a million. This woman was from Swansea and had recognised the address on the snuff box.
“My father’s oldest brother William had a son who had moved to Belgium, and it must have ended up there through that side of the family.”
Having been discovered, the snuff box was shared on social media and another Swansea woman, Wendy Thomas, spotted it and was able to trace the likely Jenkins’ family from whom it had originally come, through examination of census records, which suggested the family had moved to Gelli Street in Port Tennant .
An appeal was then made via Swansea Eastside Historical Society’s Facebook page , where another of Phillip Jenkins’ granddaughters spotted it.
Joy Davies, cousin of Marie Jones, said: “I saw the snuff box posted on the historical society’s Facebook page, which asked if anyone knew Mr Jenkins.
“It caught my eye, and I got in touch to say I thought it was my grandfather's. Christine Griffiths was kind enough to say she would give it back to the family.
“I came down to Swansea over the summer and met up with her, and we were then able to return it to my uncle. It’s a lovely story of how it made its way back to the family”.
