Eileen's sweet memories of Billy Blue

A history project has been asking for the public's help in finding out more about the photo showing a mystery Great War soldier and his family , knowing only that it was taken in Welshpool during the conflict.

But after we published it Miss Gordon came forward to say she recognised him.

"The soldier is William Jones," she said.

"I'm pretty sure of it. I have lived in Welshpool all my life.

"Although I had never seen this picture and was not born when it was taken, I knew him as an older man, and I have a picture of him that looks almost the same.

"He was commonly called Billy Blue, although I don't know where the 'blue' came from. The little girl in the centre of the picture kept a coffee shop in Hall Street in Welshpool. She was his daughter Myfanwy Jones. She never married.

"They lived at 11 Hall Street. I don't know the others.

"During the Second World War I was working at the local Co-op drapery department and Mr Jones came back to pack little bags of sugar. He must have been helping out there when all the men were away in the services. He used to ask me to help him. I was helping him weigh them up. That's how I first knew Billy Blue. I would be about 15 or something like that.

"He was a very nice person, but I can't remember an awful lot back then.

"I have a picture taken just after the war when we went on a staff outing and he came to see us off. He has his spaniel dog on a lead. When I saw the picture in the paper I thought I knew the face, and when I compared it with mine, it's almost identical, even when he was an old man.

"That's when I fathomed it out, together with remembering the daughter in the shop.

"She had a grinding machine which was a bit unusual and ground the coffee, and used to tell people not to have a lot, so that it would keep fresh."

Miss Gordon has no idea of what Billy Blue would have done as a soldier in the Great War.

"His daughter was at the shop for quite a time, but I can't remember when they died or anything like that."

She says the photo of the family was taken by the contemporary Welshpool photographer Fred Anderson.

"His descendants keep the antiques shop here."

Miss Gordon's information will help fill in blanks about the picture for The Army Children of the First World War project, set up as part of the commemorations of the centenary of the conflict.

Its aim is to collect, preserve and share information about British army children and their history.

The only information it had was that it was a postcard bearing the photographic studio's name "Anderson, Welshpool" in the lower right corner, and that the soldier was wearing what looked like a Royal Welsh Fusiliers cap badge.