Video tape sparks search for mystery couple

Brian Allsopp has uncovered a previously unknown piece of footage of the man and woman and their new-born baby among his video tapes.

The 30 minutes of footage show the unidentified couple celebrating their first weeks with their daughter.

Mr Allsopp said: “I have not got an idea how I came to possess the footage.

“It shows the first three months of a baby’s life and starts about ten days after she was born.

“It’s obviously an important time in their lives and it would be nice to re-unite her parents with the film.

“The couple may have had copies made, in which case this footage is not important, but it might be the only copy.”

Mr Allsopp, 76, has managed to deduce some clues about the couple’s identity from looking at the footage.

The VHS-C video was made in August, 1991, and covers a two-month period. The baby’s name is Samantha and and her mother’s name is Sally. The name of the father is not mentioned in the conversations.

Another girl in the video is referred to as Belle and what appear to be the grandparents of the baby are in the final sequence.

Two short outdoor locations have also been identified by Mr Allsopp.

One is near Worthing Pier and the other is the pier in the Devon resort of Teignmouth.

Mr Allsopp has been filming his family’s occasions since the 1960s.

It was while he was transferring that library of tapes into a digital format to be shared among his family that he came across the unknown footage.

To add to the mystery, the format on which it was shot is different from that he used in those years.

The film could have been in a batch of E180 tapes he was given by the relatives of a late friend from Middleton.

But he has no other ideas of how it came into his possession.

Anyone with information can contact Mr Allsopp on [email protected]