https://www.dublinlive.ie/news/dublin-news/mother-baby-homes-rte-investigates-19952699RTE Investigates: Dublin woman's battle to find birth mother after finding out she was illegally adopted
Some powerful people were involved in the cover-ups, including the son of a President of Ireland, Professor Eamon de Valera Jnr, who worked at Holles Street National Maternity Hospital
By Ailbhe Daly
07:00, 3 MAR 2021
Threatening letters, fake documents and insensitive meetings are just some of the shocking discoveries from a probe into
Ireland’s illegal adoptions. In January, the Mother and Baby Homes report was finally published and detailed the harsh treatment of unmarried women and their children at 18 institutions across the country. The 4,000-page document details the failings of the State in relation to the homes but does little to discuss the 126 illegally-adopted babies. Dublin woman Susan Kiernan learned as a child she was adopted and, after spending years attempting to hunt down her birth mother, she received a letter from Tusla in 2018. She was told she was one of the babies who were illegally adopted and, while she managed to sneak copies of some of her paperwork during the meeting, she was later provided with redacted records when she went through official channels. Among the documents seen in the RTE Investigates programme was a demand for £85, the fee St Patrick’s Guild charged pregnant women to care for their babies until adopted the equivalent of more than €3,200 in today’s money. But when Susan’s birth mum didn’t pay her fee, the Sisters of Charity went in pursuit and, two months on, they threatened to send the child back to her. The documents show that a year on Susan’s birth mother was still struggling to pay the nuns and they began phoning Arnotts, where she worked as a shop assistant. They said: “If you do not send, my collector will call to see you. She would prefer not to have to do this as it might be embarrassing for you and we want to safeguard your reputation. We have not failed you; you have failed us”.
But these were nothing more than idle threats because Susan could not have been returned due to the fact she had been placed with her adoptive parents at just four days old. And some powerful people were involved in the cover-ups, including the son of a President of Ireland, Professor Eamon de Valera Jnr, who worked at Holles Street National Maternity Hospital. He arranged antenatal appointments for a woman who was not pregnant to facilitate an illegal adoption. This was almost a decade after the Adoption Act 1952 came into force. Brenda and Brian Lynch were two of four children illegally adopted into the one house over five-and-a-half years The adoptions were facilitated by Mr de Valera Jnr and they were concealed as fake pregnancies. Brian’s mum went to St Brendan’s Nursing Home, Dublin, on her pretend due date but she emerged with him, the child of an unmarried mother. Fearing her children would face the stigma of adoption, their adoptive mother never told them the truth. Brenda said: “No one is above the law, who does this person think that he is? That he can just decide that, ‘Oh yeah here is a baby, we will take her from her and give her to a good family, middle class’. It is incredible.”
Tusla said it has “identified a small number of cases where meetings have taken place in venues that would fall outside our own guidance and best practice.” It intends to engage with these people again and “apologise directly to them”.
