AN Ilkley woman has spoken of her relief after her missing husband was found safe and well.

Sylvia Todd, whose husband, David, disappeared without trace in February, said she can now look forward to a peaceful festive period

Mrs Todd, said: "I was initially shocked when I heard he was safe, because you do not always know what to think. Then I was relieved."

Mr Todd, postmaster of Leeds Road Post Office, sparked a nationwide police hunt when he disappeared on February 11.

Mrs Todd told how her 51-year-old husband had gone downstairs to open the shop as usual but then disappeared.

She had found the shop still locked up and her husband vanished hours later.

Mrs Todd made an emotional appeal through the Ilkley Gazette, at the time of her husband's disappearance, saying: "I will say the same to you as I have said to everyone I have contacted about David. I need him, I miss him and I want him home."

Mr Todd had driven away in his white Ford Orion. Mrs Todd did not wish to reveal the exact whereabouts of her husband or his movements in the past months.

She said only: "He was not abroad, which is where I thought he was. He was in this country."

Mrs Todd spoke of her months of torment, not knowing whether her husband was dead or alive.

She said: "It is so difficult when you do not know the whereabouts of somebody. You just have to keep going as best you can."

Mrs Todd, who has put the post office up for sale, said she and her family were now looking forward to starting life afresh away from the town.

She said: "I just want to put it all behind me and start next year with a new life and move on. I can't stay here. You cannot change the past you can only move forward."

Mrs Todd said the couples two children, aged 19 and 17, were also relieved their ordeal was over.

She said: "Obviously they have been through a lot. They just want to start living life again in a positive way."

Mrs Todd said she would not at this stage be reunited with her husband.

Inspector Paul Clynch, head of Ilkley Police, said: "He was found somewhere in the south of England. It has been ascertained that he is fit and well. The missing from home report has been cancelled.

"As far as I know he had made no attempts to contact his wife and was found through police enquiry."