A Gilwern couple left devastated after a deliberate fire ripped through their historic Georgian property have put up a £50,000 reward in hope of uncovering new information.

 Helen Marks, and partner Mitchell Field, returned from a family event to find the home they had spent years restoring, destroyed by a graffiti-daubing arsonist last September. 

It is hoped the substantial sum will garner fresh leads for an investigation into the blaze which incinerated the three-storey property and rendered the couple homeless at the time.

Ms Marks said their concern was to solve a mystery which has left the couple dumbfounded as to why their 400-year-old property was targeted. ??“We are really quite ordinary, nice people. So, you think if this happened to us, it can happen to anybody.”

“It’s the potential for this to happen again. To someone else, or us. We are told that someone who sets a fire once may do it again in another situation.??“Someone could have been hurt. It’s easy for me to say ‘we can rebuild, but you can never replace a person. Even a beloved pet. That would be heartbreaking.” said Ms Marks. 

Twenty firefighters battled from the early hours of September 20 last year trying to douse the flames. All but the outer structure was incinerated.

Painters were due to put the finishing touches just three days after the fire gutted the property. The couple had invested hundreds of thousands of pounds over almost eight years in renovations.

The inferno consumed the entire building, leaving a charred shell so damaged, the area had to be cordoned off. The intense heat of the blaze even turned a two-hundred-year-old solid marble fireplace to dust.

All three emergency services scrambled to the scene at 3:35am to find the house - with classic Georgian double bow-fronted facade - engulfed in flames.

Chillingly, police forensic teams determined the culprit had broken into the property, just outside Gilwern, twice. ?

?On the Friday evening, or early hours of Saturday morning, someone graffiti-ed the outside, broke in and started a fire in the sitting room. This burnt half a sofa and petered out. ?

?“When the police told us they had broken in twice it was upsetting and bewildering. The police and forensics told us that on the Saturday night, they returned with an accelerant. I believe that was put in the two front rooms downstairs.” said Ms Marks. 

 The arsonist left windows open to stoke flames, shredding three floors, de-roofing the property, and decimating all of the couple’s worldly possessions.

 The couple, due to attend family wedding party in London, raced back to their home after a frantic 4.30am call from neighbours. Ms Marks said they came up with an excuse to avoid spoiling the event with their traumatic news. 

Amid the blaze and chaos, neighbours and emergency services desperate to get hold of Ms Marks, whose car was parked outside her burning home. They feared she could be in the smouldering ruins.

 “Any phone ringing in the middle of the night means something isn’t right. We could see it was Olive and John, our neighbours. At that moment we both knew something was badly wrong.”

“Mitchell phoned back immediately. The first thing John said was ‘is Helen with you?’. It was a different conversation from then on. I was okay.”

“They said there was a fire at the house. Literally we were out of the hotel and flying down the motorway in minutes,” said Ms Marks. 

The shattering reality of the situation dawned as they approached a roadblock outside the Corn Exchange pub, about a mile from their home. The whole area was cut-off as fire crews tried in vain to douse the fire. 

“As we saw the roadblock, we knew we had to brace ourselves for something very bad.” 

“Then when we saw the house it was surreal, hard to take in the enormity of it. You couldn’t see a thing inside. Just black and grey billowing smoke.” 

“The only roof left above our bedroom was glowing bright red before it too collapsed. We couldn’t get close. It was too dangerous.”

As horrific scenes unfolded, Helen and Mitchell were cared for by neighbours John and Olive, who did all they could to comfort the couple. ??“As we walked away from our burning home, Olive and John walked up and gave us a big hug and took us into their home.

“There was no power in the area, so John got the barbecue out and boiled up some water to make a cup of tea.

“They said they had sorted out a room for us at their home, and cleared space in the wardrobe.

“We had nothing to put in it. We had a case for the weekend away, so, we had just a little more than the clothes we stood up in,” said Ms Marks.

The couple hope that a substantial reward of £50,000 would go someway to providing closure for the matter. 

“We just thought that if someone might remember something, maybe it would prompt new information to come out,” said Ms Marks.

“Certainly, the person who did this has changed our lives. We don’t want this, or even something worse, to happen to someone else.”

Despite the shattering turn of events, the couple are ready to start the rebuild next year. The extensive work should take another two years. 

As the building stands encased in scaffolding, charred remnants leave an indelible reminder of a devastating event.

Despite the shattering experience, the couple are determined to finish their home.

“A lot of people have said to us: ‘why are you staying?’. It was hard to begin with. There’s always that question of ‘why did someone do this?’ Although it does get easier as time passes,” she said.

“Like most bad things that happen to you in life: you learn to accommodate it.

“We are lucky, we have each other and a house to rebuild. Our view is always to keep busy and look to the future, but there remains this constant unknown, as to who and why this happened.”

• Anyone with information regarding this incident should call police on 101.