Long Lost Family: Man who was left on a doorstep in 1960 reunites with woman who found him

This is the emotional moment when a man who was left on a stranger’s doorstep on a cold Christmas night in 1960 was reunited with the older woman who discovered him.

Harvey Shackell, now 63, was found as a newborn in a cardboard box covered in brown paper outside a house in Hayes, Middlesex, where Mr and Mrs Wood lived.

Harvey appears tonight on Long Lost Family: Born Without Trace to try and find his biological relatives. Harvey finally has a chance to thank the woman, Vera Wood, who “saved his life” after discovering him on her doorstep and getting him out of the cold.

The duo are reunited, with Vera, now 88, explaining how she tried to keep Harvey as a baby and even searched for him after he was taken by the police and later adopted by another family.

‘I always thought, where was I found. You really saved my life. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be here right now,” an emotional Harvey says to Vera.

Vera remembers the moment she discovered Harvey as a newborn and said, “I pulled this sheet of paper away, and there you are at the bottom of this cardboard box, and under the sheet of brown paper was a thick blue lady’s cardigan, you’re standing there below.

‘No hat, no mittens, nothing on your feet. I lifted the box and brought you in, called the police and within minutes the police showed up.”

“So I really had been there all night,” Harvey wonders, before Vera confirms, “You’d been there all night.”

“I would have loved to try to keep you, but it wasn’t possible,” the older woman admits, before adding, “I’ve been looking for you, wondering where you are, who has you?” How did you grow up?’

Harvey was quick to reassure Vera that he was “very lucky” and explained that he was taken in by a “nice family.”

He adds, “That family loved me so much, they decided to adopt me, so I’ve been with one family all this time.”

She gives him a photo taken at the time and tells him, “If anything happens to me now, I can go to my grave happy, because I saw you.”

Vera and her husband apparently had nothing to do with the case, but expressed interest in adopting Harvey according to reports from the time in the Daily Herald and The Mirror.

Harvey Shackell, now 63, was found as a newborn in a cardboard box covered in brown paper outside a house in Hayes, Middlesex, where Mr and Mrs Wood lived (pictured)

Harvey was taken to Hillingdon Hospital before being raised and then adopted by the Shackell family.

He had a good adoption and is married with two stepsons, but has no blood relatives. Over the years he has thought about his biological family, but only recently took action when he launched an appeal in the national newspaper.

With no leads from this, Harvey returns to the only link he knows, the threshold where he was found. “If I hadn’t been admitted, I would have froze to death,” he says. But Vera no longer lives at that address.

Miraculously, the Long Lost Family team discovered that Harvey wasn’t the only one watching; Vera appeared on ITV’s Surprise Surprise in 1988 to ask for information on the whereabouts of the baby left on her doorstep.

Meanwhile, the search team discovers through DNA that Harvey has two older full siblings.

Both his biological parents are deceased and one sister does not want to be identified, but Harvey’s sister Cherry is very happy to have been found.

Harvey (pictured) appears tonight on Long Lost Family: Born Without Trace to try to find his biological relatives and finally has a chance to thank the woman, Vera Wood, who “saved his life” after having him on her doorstep discovered and brought in from the cold

Cherry and Harvey meet for the first time. Cherry can tell Harvey that his birth mother had no say in his abandonment and thought he was taken to a safe place.

The siblings are amazed at their physical resemblance and the comfort the encounter brings them both.

Shockingly, it is also discovered that Cherry and Harvey’s father had multiple relationships with different women and had a total of nineteen children.

Some went to children’s homes before being adopted. Harvey video calls several of his half-siblings and celebrates getting back together despite their divorce.

Harvey looks forward to the future with the large family he could only have hoped for.