A hunt is on to find the relatives of a Brent woman’s ashes dumped in a Norfolk skip.

Gwendoline Harding’s cremated remains were found by skip business Gamble Plant and Fakenham Skips in Norfolk last Tuesday.

Alex Dunmore, general manager of the company said he initially thought the ashes were a Halloween prank, but on finding a name in the urn, started investigating with the help of family history website ancestry.com.

He said: “We have managed to work out she lived in Brent before she died in 1996. She was cremated at West Herts Crematorium on the 19th March 1996 aged 84. I believe she was just short of her 85th birthday as we think her birthday was 4th April but now have reached a dead-end, so to speak.”

The urn had come from the Guestwick area of Norfolk by builders working on a property.

Two previous owners of property were contacted but knew nothing about her.

“Christmas is coming up which is a time of family. We are doing everything we can to reunite her with the people she belongs to. When we’ve exhausted every avenue, then we’ll scatter them back in the crematorium.

“I’m hoping someone will know something about her, a young couple who lived next door perhaps.

“I got in touch with Brent Council who said they’d pass it on to their archives department but I’ve heard nothing.”

Do you know Gwendoline Harding or her family? Get in touch with us at times.series@archant.co.uk.