Vic Reeves Uncovers Simeon Lee's Bigamy | Who Do You Think You Are? UK | S1 E10

Vic Reeves digs into the secrets of his grandfather Simeon Lee, revealing a first wife in Hull, three sons, and a second marriage that points to bigamy. In this Who Do You Think You Are? UK journey, Vic Reeves steps out from the comic persona to become Jim, the family sleuth. He begins at home, joking about chickens and a backyard graveyard, then heads to Darlington to quiz his mum Audrey about her elusive father, Simeon. A clue emerges: Simeon once called for “Mary” on his deathbed. With family history researcher Nick Barrett, Jim finds the 1901 census listing Simeon with wife Mary Lee in Hull, plus a 1900 marriage certificate to Mary Jane Payne. Fast forward to 1926 and Simeon marries Lillian Crowe, shaving 11 years off his age and declaring himself a widower. Nick’s searches find no death for Mary and no divorce record, but they do reveal three sons from that first marriage: Stanley Eustace Simeon, Eric Trevers Edmund, and Clarence George. Jim retraces Simeon’s trail along the East Yorkshire coast. In Bempton, he learns the verger’s pay was meagre, fuelling theories of a payoff and a life on the run. At a former family home in Hull, Jim touches the same banister his grandfather would have held in 1905 and contemplates the moment he left three young boys behind. The trail leads further back to Suffolk and Fornham Hall, where an 1884 school log records a near-fatal accident: “run over by horse and cart.” Historian Pamela Horne confirms Simeon’s father remained a butler for Sir William Gilstrap, puncturing family lore that he was an estate agent. In South Yorkshire, dusty ledgers and field notes from Dinnington reveal another ancestor, gamekeeper Edmund Lear, tracking pheasants, woodcock, and rabbits—brought to life by a retired keeper’s tools and tales at Wentworth. The search culminates across the Mersey, where Jim and Audrey meet Susan Ray, Stanley’s daughter and Simeon’s granddaughter. Susan confirms Mary lived into the 1940s and that Simeon left—sealing the family’s conclusion: he was a bigamist. #VicReeves #WDYTYA #FamilyHistory #Bigamy #SimeonLee #Hull #Bempton