It’s a wonderful moment when you find Paul Simon’s Greatest Hits in a charity shop in Chepstow.

Who can resist a CD with 19 digitally remastered hits from one of the greatest songwriters of our generation?

Except this CD turned out to be something quite different, something unique, as Beacon reader Gill Bevan found out to her surprise.

Instead of listening to ‘Mother and Child Reunion’, she heard the exploits of a Monmouth man who served with Bomber Command in the Second World War and was interviewed in 2015 when his memories of his wartime service were preserved for posterity. The Beacon reported in 2015 how war veteran, Ken Brown MBE of St James’ Square had been awarded France’s highest official decoration for his role in the D-Day landings.

He was a technician attached to Bomber Command from 1943 with 635 Squadron as ground crew, responsible for making the planes that had been shot up during sorties, airworthy again.

The pathfinder squadron of Lancaster bombers he served with were tasked with destroying the railway lines and disrupting the German war machine behind the D Day beaches in June 1944.

He was also interviewed in 2015 for Lincoln Bomber Command, who recorded his memories of serving during the war and those memoirs were used for an interactive talk at their museum.

Surprised at her find, Gill contacted International Bomber Command to ask them for contact details for Mr Brown so she could return it.

They replied that he had died in August of this year and they had no contact details of next-of-kin.

They assured her the recording was a copy and they had the original.

Searching for Ken Brown, Monmouth only turned up our 2015 article on his exploits during and after the war.

So concerned that his family could not find the recording, she contacted the Beacon to see if we could track down a living relative: “If it was my father, I would be sad if I couldn’t find a recording of him, especially not knowing I had given it away in a Paul Simon cd box,” said Gill.

We contacted Mr Brown’s son Andy who was intrigued to know whether Gill was upset or surprised with her purchase. “We had lots of CDs in dad’s flat which he wanted to go to a charity to support the hospice, but we didn’t realise his recording was there. The interview was used to create an interactive ‘walk through’ for school pupils at Lincoln Bomber Command and if you go there, you can hear dad’s voice explaining everything as you go through the museum,” he said.

“My brother Peter and I are both so grateful that she took the time to make sure we had this recording in the family records.

“Isn’t it pleasant when people take so much trouble to be kind to someone they don’t know?” he added.

We called Gill to confirm she was delighted to let her ‘find’ go back to its rightful owner: “I’m even buying a copy of Ken’s book ‘A Stitch in Time’ as a reminder of all this.” Her find cost her 50p but bought her a lot of memories!