Tonie and Valmai Holt are the authors of ‘in Search of the Better ‘Ole’. They had an article in the Stand To!  journal of the Western Front Association April 1992.

They state that the real Old Bill has now been found and verified recently seventy seven years after he was created. They say that they not only know his name, rank and number but they have a picture of him in the trench.

‘In Search of the Better ‘Ole’  is a Biography of Captain Bruce Bairnsfather , In their new edition  updated in 2001, they mention the real Old Bill, Thomas Henry Rafferty!