mother
‘I loved you and didn’t want to let you go’: Mother’s heartbreaking message from beyond the grave to son she was forced to give up for adoption – as family find him after 30-year search
‘I loved you and didn’t want to let you go’: Mother’s heartbreaking message from beyond the grave to son she was forced to give up for adoption – as family find him after 30-year search
- Jayne meets her brother in this week’s episode of Long Lost Family
- READ MORE: Scottish woman’s heartbreak as she tracks down her birth mother after 50 years – only to find out she doesn’t want to meet
By ALANAH KHOSLA, FEMAIL REPORTER
Published: 11:03, 2 October 2025 | Updated: 17:54, 2 October 2025
A woman whose older brother was put up for adoption has revealed her joy at finally meeting him after a 30-year search – fulfilling their mother’s dying wish.
Jayne Hadlow, 60, from Essex, met her brother Andrew for the first time this year.
The pair’s mother Kathleen was unmarried when she had Andrew at the age of 21, and to her heartbreak, her strict Catholic parents put her son – who she’d named Jeffrey – up for adoption behind her back.
In 1994, at the age of 53, Kathleen sadly died of cancer, and her final wish was for Jayne to find her firstborn and tell him that he was loved.
‘I still know that it hurt Mum to the depths of her soul to let him go,’ Jayne told tonight’s episode of ITV‘s Long Lost Family.
‘She carried it with her for the rest of her life.’
‘One of the final things she spoke about was Jeffery, and she said, “Jayne, when I’m gone, can you please find him for me; can you please tell him what happened, and tell him that I loved him and that I didn’t want to let him go”. She held my hand and she said, “Please, please make sure that you do it”.’
Growing up, Jayne and her two younger brothers, Stephen and Jamie, were unaware of Andrew’s existence.
But when she was 19, Jayne’s life changed forever when her mother told her the truth.
Jayne explained, ‘Mum was 21 when she had Jeffery. He was born two years before me. She went home one day and he wasn’t there. My grandparents had the baby adopted. I can’t imagine the pain of that. She carried that every single day.’
Jayne Hadlow (pictured), 60, who lives in Essex, told ITV’s Long Lost Family of her 30-year search to find her long lost brother
Jayne met her brother Andrew for the first on this week’s episode of ITV’s Long Lost Family (pictured together)
Kathleen was always the life and soul of the party, but there was one day each year when her mood and behaviour completely changed.
Their late father would always take Jayne and her siblings out on bonfire night, but Kathleen always refused to come.
The children would see her the next day and see that she was upset, her face swollen from crying.
Jayne explained, ‘Bonfire night every year my father would take us out. We were just super excited to see the fireworks with dad, it was great.’
Despite the festive fun, they would always question why their mother wouldn’t come. ‘She wasn’t her usual bright self.
‘We’d come back and mum would be in the bedroom and we wouldn’t really see her until the next day. We could always tell she’d been upset and crying.
It wasn’t until Jayne was 19 that she discovered the reason behind her mother’s sadness.
‘She just said to me one day, ‘I need to tell you something, you’ve got a brother; his name is Jeffery, and I had him adopted, well, I didn’t have him adopted, he was adopted.’
Jayne’s mother Kathleen (pictured) gave birth to Andrew when she was 21 before her parents gave him up for adoption behind her back
‘Jeffery was born on the 6 November, 1962. Bonfire night was the night that would bring all those memories back. Now I understand why she was so upset at that time of year.’
Piecing together her family’s past, she visited her mother’s home in Liverpool, where she was raised.
She said, ‘My grandparents were not happy at all at mum being pregnant and not being married. They were very strict Catholics. They sent her away to the Isle of Wight. They were basically trying to hide it.’
Kathleen spent the duration of her pregnancy miles away from family and friends, and when it was time to have her baby, she returned to Liverpool.’
‘After she had Jeffery, I think the pressure from her parents probably got on her every single day.’
‘I think she fought it as hard as she could, she wasn’t going to let him go. But she came home one day and the baby wasn’t there, he was gone.’
Jayne added, ‘It hurt mum to the depths of her soul to let him go. She carried it with her for the rest of her life.’
Kathleen sadly died at the age of 53, and one of the last things she spoke about was her long-lost son.
With the help of ITV’s Long Lost Family team, including co-host Davina McCall (pictured), Jayne was able to meet Andrew for the first time
Co-host Nicky Campbell (pictured) delivered the news to Andrew that his biological sister Jayne was searching for him
Before Jayne went to the Long Lost Family team, she had exhausted all search options and hit a dead end.
However, thankfully, the team discovered that Jeffrey was adopted by a couple who lived in the Lake District and that his name was changed to Andrew.
The show’s team of specialist intermediaries found that he is now living in Bristol, and wrote to him to reveal that he has a younger sister who is desperate to find him.
Host Nicky Campbell travelled to Bristol to meet Andrew, who welcomed the news that his birth family was searching for him.
Discussing his life with his adoptive family, Andrew told Nicky, ‘I had a great upbringing, a great childhood, I felt a part of that family, they made me feel like a part of it. That’s why I never went looking, it was that loyalty.’
However, after hearing the news of Jayne’s search, Andrew was visibly taken aback and agreed to meet his birth siblings.
Meanwhile, co-host Davina McCall went to visit Jayne to share the news that her elder brother had been found, who was ecstatic, and after seeing an image, marvelled over Andrew’s physical similarities to her mother.
She said at the time, ‘Oh wow, I can see mum. Oh, I can’t believe I’m actually seeing him! And I never had a big brother. Oh, how amazing.’
Jayne shares the news with her two brothers, Stephen and Jamie, who are also over the moon at the prospect of meeting Andrew.
At the end of the episode, in an emotional scene, the siblings finally had the reunion that Jayne had hoped for.
‘As soon as I walked into the room, I just knew instantly that he was a part of me. He was part of our family.’
Jayne told her brother about her family’s past, and they bonded over their similarities.
Andrew said, ‘It’s just incredible, the connection is there, and the instant warmth. Let’s get on and fit in what we’ve missed in the past 30 years.’
He added, ‘They couldn’t have made me feel more welcome if they tried. It was fantastic.’
Jayne concluded, ‘I feel like I’ve answered mum’s request, so I know she’ll be looking down, and she’ll be so happy.’
Chat with son
16th April 2005
Finally managed to get into this after a few days of problems. Went into the chat room last night but spent most of the time chatting to Anthony privately as it was hard going trying to keep up with the main conversation. We had a semi-serious chat although he was making me laugh at times. A hasn’t got much of a sense of humour and he doesn’t seem to realize how incredibly funny he is at times. Occasionally I tease Anthony that the midwife dropped him on his head when he was born and knocked his sense of humour out of him which he does see the funny side of now. Got back to personal matters again and he doesn’t know how much I squirm talking about some things. I do take it as a compliment that he can talk about anything. Anthony has been asking if I’m pregnant yet so have got him up to date over what’s happening although he already knows what tests have been done and when the next hospital appointment is.
Been thinking about a lady who emailed me a few days ago who sounds desperate about wanting to find her son who was adopted – he’s now 22 -and asked me for advice. I haven’t a clue where she got my email address but am assuming it was from one of the groups/forums I belong to and am fairly certain she is British as well. Had to be honest that I found Anthony by accident and through which website. Gave her some constructive advice about how to go about searching and who to approach for help on the matter. Hope I get some feedback though. Been worried about Bouncer today as he collapsed once then his back legs went on him again while we were out. Probably to do with his heart murmur but it was still upsetting to see it happens as he seems so happy. Been lucky he has gone on this long really as we have known about his heart murmur for the past 6 years.
*This was quite a normal day for me or as at least as normal as it gets post reunion. Periodically I do get asked to help with searching which I am quite happy to do. It’s quite rewarding when there is a success story and the family member found.
‘Holes’ in My Memory
5th April 2005
A few weeks ago I received copies of the adoption papers which I was pleased about as it filled a hole in my memory. On reading them it was no surprise to realize the reason I had a ‘hole’ in my memory was because I hadn’t given any of the information on them. It was still a bit irritating to read half-truths and lies though, the only absolute truth was descriptions of myself and my ex. The only other bit of truth was about my mum being asthmatic and that she had been in contact with Rubella so I’m partially deaf and a hardly noticeable speech defect. The only thing that really disappointed me was that I thought there would be copies of the consent to surrender form and nobody told me that they wouldn’t be included even though I had mentioned not remembering signing the papers so wanted to see copies.
When I saw my counsellor for the last time which was the same day as I got copies of the adoption papers, I mentioned this. All she could mumble was something about the consent to surrender form being at the court that dealt with the adoption. I left it that as she has never been very helpful about explaining my rights so just didn’t know what to say but it has been on my mind since then.
Last week this subject was brought up in another online group I belong to specifically for women who have had a child adopted but haven’t had any more children. Some of the others have said they have copies of the consent to surrender form, so it has got the rest of us thinking about this, so we are going to try and get copies as well. Yesterday I emailed my contact at the Adoption Resource Centre thanking her again for being so helpful before over the other papers then went on to explain what I was after this time.
Now I am feeling a bit frustrated about having to wait for a response but I’m hoping this means she will find out how I get copies of the papers I want. I hate this feeling of having holes in my memory from that time and I can’t ask my parents as it has never been open to debate to discuss Anthony’s adoption. Even now the only person I discuss Anthony with is my dad and then it’s stilted, he only mentions Anthony when they have spoken to each other – I hate that so much. I get more support from my in-laws, and they openly admit they don’t understand what I have been through. At least Chris and Peter were fine about meeting Anthony the last time we saw him, and they often ask after him. One thing that cheered me up is that Rick is having second thoughts about viewing the flat of the lady who wants to do a mutual exchange with us. I want to get back down south but I don’t really want to give up a house for a flat as we do have the dogs and it wouldn’t be fair on the cat even though she is a ‘house’ cat as she still likes sunning herself outside.
*It was painful to receive them, but I have never regretted getting them as I have been able to move on. I do wonder about my parents though … I sometimes think they live in a parallel universe with the things they come out with, and the adoption papers were a classic example of that.
When my son was adopted, paperwork had to be filled out, but I never saw any of it so the first time I saw anything was in 2005. Only the basic information was true, and the rest read as if I wanted my son adopted. I knew the information had come from my mother from the way it was worded including she would have liked to have helped me but couldn’t be due to her health. This came from the same person who was fit enough to look after my niece who was a baby at the time.
‘They just took the baby away’: Family speaks out in church-run homes scandal
‘They just took the baby away’: Family speaks out in church-run homes scandal
- Wednesday 16 October 2024 at 10:27pm
A family has come forward following an ITV News investigation into cruelty and abuse at ex church run mother and baby homes, Social Affairs Correspondent Sarah Corker reports
Further allegations of abuse and neglect at a former church-run mother and baby home in Cumbria have emerged, following an ITV News investigation. Earlier this year we revealed that 45 babies who had died at St Monica’s home – in Kendal were buried in an unmarked grave in the town’s cemetery.
St Monica’s was one of hundreds of homes for unmarried mothers across England.
Between 1949 and the mid-1970s, an estimated 200,000 women were sent away to homes run by churches and the state where they were pressured and coerced in to give up their babies for adoption. Other infants died through poor care.
Since our first report aired in July, the family of one of those children has come forward and told ITV News that their mother was lied to about the fate of her baby daughter, Faith, and was never told where she was buried.
Norah Everard was in her 80s, and dying from cancer, when she told her family for the first time about the trauma she’d endured decades earlier as a teenager in 1941.
Pregnant and unmarried, she was sent away to St Monica’s, which was run by the Diocese of Carlisle, to have her baby.
Norah’s son Bob Chubb recounted the details that his late mother shared with him and his wife Carole about the “cruel” home.
“We were all round the table one Christmas, and she said ‘I’ve got something important to tell you both. Bob you weren’t my first born’, and then she told me about being raped as a young school girl, going to St Monica’s in Kendal to have the baby, and the baby was stillborn, called Faith,” Bob told ITV News.
Burial records seen by ITV News suggest that Norah was lied to, they show that Faith wasn’t stillborn and that she had lived for 12 hours and was later buried in an unmarked grave at Parkside Cemetery in Kendal – one of the 45 babies who were buried in secrecy.
If you’d like to share your story please get in touch with Sarah on the following email: Investigations@itv.com
“I don’t think she was told the truth. I think some terrible things went on,” Mr Chubb said. Carole Chubb, Bob’s wife, said: “It really really disgusts me. They just took the baby away and said the baby’s dead and that’s it. Did they even given her any milk? Would she have survived? “Norah told me it was cruel place, they made the women scrub floors when they were heavily pregnant and they were refused pain relief in labour as a punishment.”
Bob and Carole share their family’s story and concerns about how babies were treated
Concerns have been raised by other families about the poor care of sick and premature babies at the home in the decades after the war, while official documents from the archives paint a disturbing picture of neglect, cruelty and suffering inside St Monica’s. Bob revealed that he too was born prematurely at the same home in the late 1940s, and feels ‘lucky’ that he survived.
The acting Bishop of Carlisle Rt Rev Rob Saner-Haigh described what had happened to Norah and her daughter as ‘wrong’ and said he was ‘really sorry’ for the way women and children had been treated.
The acting Bishop of Carlisle Rt Rev Rob Saner-Haigh answers questions from ITV News
Since allegations of abuse first emerged, 20 people with a connection to St Monica’s have contacted the Diocese requesting access to their family records. “The Church of England should do all it can to support people who have lived with the trauma. We need to listen and give them a choice in decision making so they can tell us what they need and as an organisation we show them the love and dignity that they weren’t shown before,” he said.
The family of another baby, Stephen Holt, who died aged 3 months old at the home in 1964, are now campaigning for a permanent memorial to the 45 babies.
It was years later when baby Stephen’s mother Judith Hindley first told her husband, also called Stephen, of the abuse she endured at the ‘draconian’ home in the late 1960s. “Judith was 17 at the time and told me how she was forced to clean floors and kitchens while heavily pregnant. They were being punished,” he said. “Her son Stephen was born with disabilities and needed to go to hospital, but he was cruelly denied proper medical care and died 11 weeks later.” She never recovered from that trauma and in 2006, Judith took her own life close to the cemetery where her baby is buried.
Stephen Hindley explains what happened to his wife Judith at St Monica’s and why he is campaigning for a memorial
Cumbria Police has confirmed it is still investigating allegations of historic abuse at St Monica’s and said it “would welcome any new information which would assist officers…following concerns raised in relation to these premises”. Westmorland and Furness District Council which owns the cemetery where the graves are located said: “We are currently exploring options and reaching out to others who may wish to be involved or consulted on the possibility of marking the unmarked graves at Parkside Road cemetery, Kendal relating to the former St Monica’s Maternity home.”
Department for Education spokesperson said: “We have the deepest sympathy with all of those who are affected, the practice was abhorrent and should never have taken place.
“While we will not be able to quickly make every change we would like, we will look at whether there is any more we could do to support those affected.”
Mother and baby homes: NI-born survivor ‘abandoned again’
Mother and baby homes: NI-born survivor ‘abandoned again’
Published 18 March
By Eimear Flanagan BBC News NI
A woman from Dublin, born into a mother and baby home in Northern Ireland, has said she feels “abandoned again” because she is excluded from a new compensation scheme. Sinead Buckley was born in 1972 to an unmarried woman from the Republic of Ireland. At that time her mother, Eileen, was living in Marianvale in Newry. A midwife in Dublin, Eileen came north because of the fear and stigma associated with being a single mother. Marianvale was one of a network of institutions across the island of Ireland which housed unmarried women and their babies at a time when pregnancy outside marriage was viewed as scandalous. After the birth in Newry’s Daisy Hill Hospital, an adoption agency in the Republic arranged for Eileen’s baby to be adopted by a family in Dublin. Ms Buckley grew up and still lives in Dublin, but never got to meet her birth mother. Eileen died during a Covid lockdown which meant she endured the heartbreak of watching her mother’s funeral over the internet. This week, the Republic of Ireland will open an €800m (£684m) redress scheme, external for survivors of its own mother and baby homes. Ms Buckley is one of thousands of Irish adoptees who will not qualify, despite her decades-long battle with the Irish state to access her birth identity and family medical history. “I grew up with a sense of rejection and abandonment and I feel like I’ve just been completely abandoned again,” she told BBC News NI.
“I used to be proud to be Irish, I’m not anymore. I’m not Irish what I am?”
Ireland’s Department of Children said that Marianvale was outside the Republic’s jurisdiction, adding there were “processes ongoing in Northern Ireland to respond to these legacy issues”.
But as a Dubliner, born to parents from the Republic, Ms Buckley said she cannot understand why she is excluded from the Irish redress scheme “because I was born a few miles over the border and adopted back here”.
Who qualifies for compensation?
Under the rules, mothers who spent even one night in an eligible institution in the Republic will receive compensation. Payments start at €5,000 (£4,275) and rise incrementally based on length of stay, external. But former child residents only qualify if they spent six months or more in homes. Marianvale is not on the list of eligible institutions, but even if it was, Ms Buckley would still not be entitled to compensation because it appears she was resident for less than six months. “I wish someone would explain the six-month thing to me because we’ve suffered through life,” she said.
“There’s absolutely no humanity in this decision.”
She added she paid Irish taxes all her life and now the Irish state “isn’t recognising me”. “For me it’s not about the money, it’s about the principle,” she said. “I want to be vindicated.”
‘Where do I belong?’
Adoption records show her mother was engaged to a Tipperary man when she became pregnant, but Eileen’s family opposed her relationship. When she entered Marianvale, her fiancé was not even told he was about to become a father. The adoption was arranged by Cunamh, formerly known as the Catholic Protection and Rescue Society of Ireland. “If the adoption was arranged from counties in the south and agencies in the south run by convents and nuns in the south and women from the south were in there and the children were adopted back into the south it’s just a loophole to get out of paying anybody money,” Ms Buckley said.
Border babies
Her cross-border journey was not unique. A recent report into Northern Ireland’s mother and baby homes, external calculated that more than 550 babies were moved to the Republic between 1930 and 1990. “Here in the north, the campaigners have been calling for their public inquiry and redress for more than a decade,” said solicitor Claire McKeegan, who acts on behalf of survivors of institutional abuse in Northern Ireland.
In 2021, Stormont’s leaders agreed to hold a public inquiry into mother and baby homes, Magdalene laundries and workhouses north of the border. But two and a half years on, that inquiry is still to be legally established. “Obviously with the collapse of Stormont, the legislation hasn’t happened for them and many survivors and victims are no longer with us,” Ms McKeegan said.
The solicitor is due to meet First Minister Michelle O’Neill about the issue next month and said the message from survivors will be: “It must be done and it must be done now.”
For Ms Buckley though, it was the Republic’s secretive adoption system which she had to fight all her life. As a teenager she suffered serious health issues and baffled doctors ran lots of tests because they could not access her family medical records. “My mother told me that at one stage they thought it was leukaemia and that the doctors had been trying to ring the adoption agency just to try and get some history. They were like: ‘This girl is really sick, we need to know.’ And they were just met with closed doors.”
Aged 43, Ms Buckley was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS), a condition she later found out runs in her birth family. She believes she missed out on earlier diagnosis and treatment due to her lack of rights to birth information when she was a teenager. A new Irish law came into force in 2022 which gave all adoptees rights to access their original birth certificate and family medical history, but adoptees complain of long delays with the new system. How many survivors get compensation?
It has been estimated there are about 58,200 people still alive who spent time in the Republic’s mother and baby homes and county homes (institutions which succeeded workhouses). The Department of Children confirmed its redress scheme will “provide financial payments to an estimated 34,000 people”.
But that means just over 40% of survivors some 24,000 people cannot apply because of the six-month rule. Awarding payments and medical benefits to all surviving residents would have doubled the cost of the scheme. “The exclusions are vast and it really is extremely unfair,” said Dr Maeve O’Rourke.
The human rights lecturer recently helped design the framework for investigating homes in Northern Ireland. Dr O’Rourke argued the Republic’s 2015-2021 mother and baby homes investigation, external was too narrowly focused and has resulted in a restricted redress scheme. She said there should have been a wider investigation into adoption across all of society, including the role of adoption agencies, maternity hospitals, “forced family separations” and illegal birth registrations. “Unfortunately, and perhaps to limit its ultimate financial liability, the Irish government insisted that it would be limited to mother and baby institutions and a sample of county homes,” she added.
Ms Buckley took part in a 2021 public consultation, external in which survivors and interested parties gave views on the design of the redress scheme. Most survivors stressed loss of the mother/child bond was the most important factor that required redress, not the time spent in homes. Ms Buckley shared her own experience during the consultation but was shocked when she realised Marianvale residents would not be part of the settlement. “I couldn’t stop crying. We bared our souls at that thing, you know? We told them how this has affected us mentally,” she said.
“For saving a few quid, we’re just collateral damage.”
Bessborough mother and baby home should have been bought by the State, Tánaiste says
Bessborough mother and baby home should have been bought by the State, Tánaiste says
ireland
20/09/2024 | 14:48 PM
Olivia Kelleher
Tánaiste Micheál Martin has indicated that he has always been of the view that the State should have purchased Bessborough, the former mother and baby home in Cork, for conversion into a memorial or amenity site.
This week a decision made by Cork City Council to refuse planning permission for a proposed 92 unit residential development at Bessborough in Blackrock in the city was upheld by An Bord Pleanála.
The planning authority backed the decision of the local authority because of the historical landscape and potential human remains at the grounds.
Speaking in Cork, Mr Martin said that options should be explored in relation to the use of the site.
“I was always of a view that the local authority with the State should have purchased that site and have a proper memorialisation but also see if we could do things on a planned basis. It is a beautiful area. It can potentially be a very strong amenity area for the area as well, but that was always my view on it.
“I felt at the time that maybe the local authority should have got involved earlier and pre-empted what happened and bought it because there are medical facilities, or HSE facilities on the site,” he said.
“There are a variety of facilities on the site, and it is a natural area and a green area as well, and we need to look at that as well.”
Meanwhile, Bessborough became notorious for the cruelty and neglect of mothers and their babies.
Of the more than 900 babies who died at Bessborough or in Cork hospitals having been transferred from the mother and baby home over the course of seven decades, less than 70 have known burial sites.
Survivors of the home have broadly welcomed the decision by An Bord Pleanála to deny planning for building on the site.
Carmel, whose mother gave birth to a boy who died in Bessborough, told Red FM News of her delight at the decision by the planning authority.
“I’m delighted it is being refused. All the grounds potentially have burials in them. It is not just one particular area.
There hasn’t been an investigation to establish whether there is a mass grave or where the children are but what we do know is that there is witnesses that have witnessed burials take place.”
Bessborough survivor: ‘The shame belongs with them’
Bessborough survivor: ‘The shame belongs with them’
Sun, 30 May, 2021 – 06:35
Maresa Fagan
Survivors of mother and baby homes and other State institutions have been let down and only an international investigation can shed light on the “human rights violations” of the past, according to Bessborough survivor Terri Harrison. The 66-year-old Dublin campaigner is one of 13 women from Ireland and the North who have requested that the International Criminal Court (ICC) investigate the ‘violent legacy’ of mother and baby homes, Bessborough survivor: ‘The shame belongs with them’e laundries, and industrial schools. The recent ICC request made by Belfast-based legal firm KRW Law is seeking a preliminary examination into whether the institutional abuse exposed in recent reports and inquiries amounted to “crimes against humanity”. Earlier this year, the Mother and Baby Home Commission of Investigation found that around 56,000 unmarried mothers and 57,000 children passed through 18 State-funded and church-run institutions examined and that around 9,000 babies and children died. The legacy of the institutions, which operated for more than seven decades, has left deep scars across society, from the mothers whose babies were taken away to the children who were adopted or who died and were buried in pits. The commission findings were met with widespread criticism from survivors and have led to several legal challenges against the State. For Terri, the final report was a “whitewash” as it failed to acknowledge or atone for the abduction and forced disappearances of thousands of young girls and women pregnant out of wedlock, their “stolen” babies, or for the children who died. “There wasn’t a whisper of humanity in the report,” Terri says, adding that it failed to address the issue of neglect and starvation or the 922 unaccounted for babies in the Bessborough facility in Cork.
‘Pregnant from Ireland’
Terri is one of more than 2,500 PFIs Irish women or girls who were officially recorded as ‘pregnant from Ireland’ and brought back from the UK to a mother and baby home. It was 1973 when the Crusade and Rescue Society, an English-based Catholic charity, “abducted” the expectant 18-year-old from London and a nun and priest escorted her by car to the airport and onwards to the Bessborough mother and baby home in Cork. It was a day forever etched in Terri’s mind. “I will never forget the door and the click of the door when it closed. I was just left there in the hallway. I have never felt as alone in my life as I did in that moment,” she says.
“When I stood in that hallway I lost me. I was given a house number and house name and was shown to a bed and locker. I just sat there and cried and cried and said to myself ‘this is the bowels of hell’.”
While Terri managed to escape from Bessborough and return to Dublin, she was tracked down and sent to St Patrick’s mother and baby home on the Navan Rd, where she gave birth to a baby boy, Niall, who was later “taken” for adoption. There was a cry, a primal scream, that you would hear regularly when a mother discovered that their baby was gone. “It was wrenching, like a cry from an animal,” she says.
Forty-eight years on, the pain and sense of loss remains, but Terri continues to hold out hope that she may someday reconnect with Niall, who she describes as her “shadow child”. “No matter where we were or what we were doing I always pictured him at the age he should be. I visualised him everywhere and at Christmas time there was always a present under the tree for him,” she says.
Terri is only too aware that her experience is not unique and last year got involved in setting up a support group, Society of Survivors, to enable women to share their experiences.
Carrying the secrets
Some women, she says, still carry the loss, silence, shame, and secrets today: “I know women in their eighties to this day who have not told anyone, including their husbands or families.”
Survivors, she explains, have endured ‘living bereavement’ even though there was no loss of life. “No death occurred but each stage of your life presents a new bereavement that amplifies all those years of loss. The loss of freedom and liberty, the loss of motherhood, the loss of the right to breastfeed your own child, it just goes on and on and it never stops until you die.”
Women and girls, some as young as 12, were “dehumanised” in the institutions, which could not be called a home, Terri says: “We weren’t residents. We were interned. We were incarcerated. We were recorded by our offence. I was down as my first offence. The only difference is we didn’t get a court of law or a trial to find us guilty of anything.”
An independent international investigation, she believes, is the only way to uncover the true scale of the “human rights violations” and “inhumane” treatment that occurred. “There is a huge correlation between us and those who were incarcerated in war camps. You were 100% at the mercy of your captives. You could do nothing without their approval,” she says.
Any attempts to attribute what happened to the social norms of the time was a “cop-out”, Terri says, adding that it amounted to human trafficking, involving several sectors of the State and society, and that women and young girls were denied access to information and their rights, such as the right to see their child under the 1952 Adoption Act. “Who gave anybody the right to lock me away and take my child? Nobody will answer that,” she says.
The long-time campaigner, who has penned a play, No More Secrets, No More Lies, based on her own experiences, says the Government needs to acknowledge what happened and support survivors. An enhanced medical card, she says, does not compare to the Health Amendment Act (HAA) card provided to victims of the contaminated blood products scandal, which is what survivors are looking for as a “gesture of kindness”. Any shame around these institutions today, Terri adds, lies firmly with the State and Government, and not survivors. “We are just a pain in their side or a toothache they want to get rid of. They don’t know what to do with us because we’re an embarrassment; we’re bringing embarrassment to the whole culture of this country,” Terri says.
“But I’ll keep saying this until I die; I like the word shame now because I know exactly where it belongs; the shame belongs with them.”
Society of Survivors support line: 085 8069925/26
‘I knew there was something missing from my life’: The incredible story of three siblings who met for the first time in their sixties after being given away for adoption to three different families
‘I knew there was something missing from my life’: The incredible story of three siblings who met for the first time in their sixties after being given away for adoption to three different families
Episode six of Long Lost Family airs on ITV1 and ITVX tonight at 9pm
By Emma Pryer
Published: 16:55, 25 August 2024 | Updated: 08:44, 26 August 2024
When Mary Arbuthnot opened a letter from her dying father, Richard, more than 20 years ago, she had no idea it would change the course of her life. The sealed, brown envelope with ‘Mary’ on the front contained some paperwork and a note, reading: ‘Alright Queen. If you want to find out any info, here are the numbers. Love always, Mum and Dad.’
One of the phone numbers her father had provided was for a Liverpool adoption agency a call to them began what turned out to be a long quest to find her birth family. The agency’s records revealed that Mary’s birth mother was an unmarried Irish woman called Rita O’Reilly, who had been living in London but for some reason travelled to Liverpool for Mary’s birth in 1965 and that Rita had also given birth to two other children, a girl born in 1960 and a boy born in 1962. Mary, from West Derby, a suburb of Liverpool, was stunned. ‘I’d known since I was seven that I was adopted as a ten week-old baby, but I’d had such a great childhood with my brother, who was also adopted, that I never thought any more of it.’
So happy was she, that she had often yearned for other siblings. Now she was left overwhelmed by the news she actually had two she’d never met. Named Bridget and George, they were born in London. And, like her, they had been adopted, each to a different family. Unusually, they shared the same father, an Irishman called Jim Melody. ‘I was so shocked. It was a strange feeling because I’ve had a happy life, but there was always this thing that something was missing,’ says Mary, 58.
Meeting her brother and sister, she felt, would make her life complete. That same year, 2002, she spoke to a counsellor at the Nugent Adoption agency, who was able to give her some more information about her birth parents and siblings. It threw up a mix of emotions. Mary had always imagined her birth mother as a vulnerable teenager, forced by poverty or family disapproval to give up her baby. ‘Back in the Sixties, it would have been hard under those circumstances,’ says Mary, 58.
Instead, she discovered that her mother was 34 when she had given birth to her and had already given two babies away. ‘That didn’t sit well with me. I’m not angry at all, I just can’t fathom how any woman can give a whole family away. She was offered help by the Church but still chose to give us away.’
For the first time, Mary began to have doubts about trying to find her brother and sister: would they even want to be found?
‘Did they know about me and, if so, why hadn’t they come searching?’ she says. ‘Part of me thought that if I started looking and they didn’t want to be involved, I’d be sorry.’
For the time being, Mary busy with her career as a hairdresser and her role as a mother to Stephanie, now 38, and Richard, now 30 put the search out of her mind. Then, three years later, her father died. That loss seemed to trigger an even more powerful longing for the siblings she had never met. She found herself glued to the heartbreaking stories of adoption and reunion on ITV’s Long Lost Family, the programme that reunites relatives separated by adoption. In 2022, after yet another tear-jerking episode and a full 20 years since her father had given her the letter Mary finally decided to take a chance. She filled out an application to the show and then, as life got busy, almost forgot about it. Five months later, she received an unexpected phone call. ‘It was one of the Long Lost Family team who wanted to ask some more questions. I nearly dropped the phone!’ she says.
Because she had her siblings’ dates of birth, the team was able to make a quick breakthrough. They found her brother George and sister Bridget who was now called Andrea. Not only were they both alive and well, but were living just 40 miles apart from one another, 240 miles south of Mary. In an upcoming episode of the series, co-host Davina McCall breaks the news to Mary at her home in Liverpool. ‘It was just unbelievable,’ Mary recalls. ‘It was a life-changing moment, that’s the only way I can explain it. I started shaking because even though I’d known about them, it was another thing to actually be told “we’ve found them”.’
George and Andrea, meanwhile, were dealing with their own sense of shock after each receiving a letter from Long Lost Family explaining they had a sister who was trying to trace them. Andrea Tovey, 64, a former civil servant from Gillingham in Kent, initially thought the letter was a scam. ‘I was a bit suspicious. It was just such a shock to get a letter saying my sister was wanting to find me when I never knew I had one,’ the mum of two admits.
It was even more of an ‘unbelievable, wonderful shock’ to be told that she also had a brother. Today, as the three of them speak, there is an undeniable ease and warmth between them. They fall into a casual, comfortable patter as if they’ve known each other for decades, not months. With similar laid-back demeanours and endearingly gentle laughs, only Mary’s soft Liverpudlian accent gives away the fact the trio didn’t grow up together.nnAs Mary jokingly cuts across from George as he proudly claims responsibility for the reunion he had been looking for his two sisters for more than four years and was just days away from finding them himself before Long Lost Family got in touch you can see they have already developed that unmistakable knack for jovial sibling bickering. They chuckle about the obvious physical similarities: ‘We are all very pale,’ laughs Mary, ‘and if you look at the shape of our eyes and mouths I think it’s the same’.
Unlike Mary, both George and Andrea were raised as only children. Born in Highgate, London, and raised in Gillingham, Andrea had always known she was adopted. Like Mary, she had a blissfully happy childhood, brought up principally by her father, Leonard, after her adoptive mother Betty died of cancer when she was just six. Andrea had pulled her birth records as a young adult, but as she was the first child to be born to Rita O’Reilly, there was no mention of a younger brother or sister. Life was busy and fulfilling and she decided not to chase after her parents in case they weren’t interested in meeting. Born in Hackney and raised in Loughton, Essex, George Buttwell, 62, had also known he was adopted as long as he could remember. Like his sisters, he had a happy childhood, leaving him with little urgency to uncover his past. In 1998, his wife, Lesley, saw a programme about accessing adoption records, which piqued steel fixer George’s interest. He applied for his adoption paperwork and original birth certificate, which provided brief details about his birth parents. But it was really only years later in 2019 that his search got going. George’s youngest daughter, Lindsey, 34, bought him a DNA test as a gift. The results opened a new chapter, throwing up relatives he never knew he had in Ireland and London. He began to discover more about his past than he had ever imagined. George’s DNA test linked him to a second cousin in Ireland and through him and another member of his extended family, he heard he had two sisters for the first time. ‘Knowing that, I became determined to find them,’ says the father of three.
He then decided to explore a hunch that his sisters might have been born at the same Catholic nursing home in London as him. St Margaret’s no longer existed, but he was told he might be able to find out more about his sisters through the Catholic Children’s Society in Westminster. Its records contained the full names and dates of birth for his sisters. His local council adoption service agreed to contact his sisters on his behalf and was just doing some final legal checks when the letter arrived from Long Lost Family. ‘I’d been looking for four years by that stage. I told [the adoption service] to call off the search. It was amazing news but perhaps not as much of a surprise as it was to Andrea, who didn’t know about either of us.’
Last November, the three siblings finally came face-to-face in a Liverpool hotel in emotional scenes which will be broadcast tonight. As Davina explains as they wait to meet: ‘It is very rare for Long Lost Family to find and bring together three full siblings all of whom until today have been complete strangers to one another.’
Andrea was first in the room; her heart in her mouth. ‘It actually felt like quite a while before they came in and I started getting emotional before,’ she recalls. ‘It was something I’d never believed could happen after all this time but it was so nice. We held hands as we talked and we just seemed to get on straight away.’
George agrees. ‘It did feel like we were all family. You could feel that straight away that we’ve got this thing in common, no matter how far we’ve drifted.’
Now, though, the sibling bond appears to be growing stronger with every passing month. They have an official family WhatsApp Group called O’Reilly Melody after the surnames of their birth parents. In January, less than two months after the show, they came together again at George’s Essex home, where a picture of the three of them now takes pride of place in the living room. A second reunion followed in June, with a pub lunch in London and another trip to George’s house to share notes on their histories and meet extended family. Just this week, George’s daughter Sarah, 38, flew in from Spain and Andrea was there to meet her. Small things mean a lot: for Mary, it’s been a thrill to send birthday and Christmas cards to her brother and sister for the very first time. The growing bond feels so natural that Mary has even taken to cutting Andrea’s hair. ‘Every time I’ve seen her she’s blow-dried my hair and last time she actually cut it. I’ve never looked so glamorous,’ smiles Andrea.
But for all the joy of getting to know one another (Andrea even jokes she shares the same love for the TV detective, Columbo, as George) there is sadness for the missed years they could have had together. ‘I know that my parents would have adopted the other two if they’d have known and we could have all been together, as we should have been,’ says Mary.
The siblings have discovered that Jim Melody passed away around 20 years ago and Rita O’Reilly around ten years later. As they were unmarried, Jim was buried in Ireland and Rita in Finchley, North London. From what they have gathered from relatives, the siblings understand that Rita and Jim lived together on and off for 40 years, but the real nature of their relationship remains a mystery: the pair have taken to the grave many unanswered questions for Mary, Andrea and George. ‘For the time they were living in, for their background, it would have made a lot of sense to get married, so why didn’t they?, George, who has visited his mother’s grave, has often wondered. Why did their mother have them adopted, and to different families?
And why, when Rita and Jim appeared to travel from Dublin to London together, did Rita keep leaving their London address and flitting to different areas?
For now at least, the unresolved questions are overshadowed by the joy of finding one another. ‘I’ve got ideas of what I’d like to do if I get to the point of retiring, but this has given me this extra positive feeling. It’s this happy unknown future now and there’s already this genuine love there with us,’ says Andrea.
‘It’s a feeling you can’t really describe because it’s something I’ve never experienced before,’ says Mary. ‘It was like I’d already known them forever.’
Episode six of Long Lost Family airs on ITV1 and ITVX on August 25th, at 9pm
Mother and baby home survivors’ stories published: ‘I was told I was going’
Mother and baby home survivors’ stories published: ‘I was told I was going’
27 September 2022
“I became pregnant and when my mother found out I was taken immediately to a doctor and within a very short period of time I found myself in a Good Shepherd mother-and-baby home.”
This is part of one woman’s personal testimony about her experience of mother-and-baby homes in Northern Ireland. Her account has been published along with a number of others, running to hundreds of pages and made available on the Quote oral history website run by Queen’s University Belfast, external (QUB).
Those who experienced life in workhouses and Magdalene laundries have told their stories and the transcripts also include evidence from children born in the homes. The testimonies have been anonymised but have been published with the full permission of those who gave them. One woman, referred to as LC, was sent to a Good Shepherd mother-and-baby home when she became pregnant, aged 17. “I was just told I was going and that was it,” she added.
“I was put in a car with the local parish priest and my mother and off I went.”
LC’s baby was adopted against her wishes but later in life she was able to reunite with her adopted child. A mother referred to as HS also entered a Good Shepherd home when she was pregnant, aged 19. She said that she was made to feel “isolated and sinful” there. DH, meanwhile, was born in a mother-and-baby home and then adopted. The impact that it’s had on me as a person has been significant,” he said.
DH had begun a process on reuniting with his birth mother when he was in his 30s.
Stigma of pregnancy outside marriage
Mother-and-baby institutions housed women and girls who became pregnant outside marriage. There was stigma attached to pregnancy outside of marriage and women and girls were admitted by families, doctors, priests and state agencies. The laundries were Catholic-run workhouses that operated across the island of Ireland. About a third of women admitted to the homes were aged under 19 and most were aged from 20 to 29. The youngest was 12 and the oldest 44. A number were the victims of sexual crime, including rape and incest. Numbers of entrants peaked in the late 1960s and early 1970s, before a rapid reduction in the 1980s. The oral evidence had informed a major Stormont report into mother-and-baby homes and Magdalene laundries in Northern Ireland, which was published in January 2021. It found that 10,500 women went through mother-and-baby homes in Northern Ireland and 3,000 were admitted into Magdalene laundries. The report detailed often harsh conditions and abuse suffered by some of those admitted to eight mother-and-baby homes, a number of former workhouses and four Magdalene laundries in Northern Ireland. Some women said they had been detained against their will, were used as unpaid labour and had to give up babies for adoption. The experts from QUB and Ulster University who carried out the research for the 2021 report had said they intended to make some of the transcripts of evidence “available for consultation by members of the public”. That has now been done with full transcripts of testimonies from 24 individuals about their experiences.
‘Traumatic and upsetting’
Thirteen of the testimonies are from “birth mothers” women who gave birth while living in the institutions. Five are testimonies from the children of birth mothers, one from another relative and five from “other observers” of the institutions. The “other observers” include an elderly retired priest, a woman whose father worked in a Good Shepherd convent, a retired midwife, a woman who had lived in one of the Sacred Heart homes and a woman who knew a number of residents of one of the homes. Details have been removed from the transcripts that would identify any of those who agreed that their experiences could be published. An introduction to the transcripts said that a “range of contrasting and complex testimonies” had been collected. “They ranged from testimonies that were highly critical of the mother and baby institutions and Magdalene laundries through to very different narratives from individuals who worked within them,” it said.
“Readers will no doubt be aware that the testimony they will encounter is often traumatic and upsetting. The transcripts reveal many birth mothers were pressured to give up a child for adoption. Several relate testimony about various forms of mistreatment. The latter included a range of details, spanning regimental institutional regimes that imposed cleaning chores on heavily pregnant women through to, in a very small number of cases, more serious allegations of sexual abuse.”
The interviews were carried out by Prof Sean O’Connell of QUB and Dr Olivia Dee. Prof O’Connell told BBC News NI that he wanted to pay tribute to the courage of all of those who had been involved in the process and came forward to give oral evidence. Following the publication of the research report in January 2021, a Truth Recovery Design Panel which had been established by the Stormont Executive subsequently recommended that a public inquiry be held into the institutions in Northern Ireland. The PSNI has also launched an investigation into allegations of physical and sexual abuse in the institutions.
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Listen here to BBC News NI’s podcast ‘Assume Nothing: The Last Request’ about a man who was born in a mother-and-baby home and his last wish to track down his birth mother
Reflecting
I had very good intentions of getting my story written here but life has a habit of getting in the way. Different projects/hobbies have started up again such as writing knitting and having pets who are life savers.
My first 18 years on this planet were very average and I was very good girl not getting into trouble apart from the usual of maybe getting home late, fighting with my sister and so on. This changed after getting into a relationship then splitting up around my 19th birthday. It devastated me at the time as the lad believed a lie told by his cousin and refused to listen to the truth.
Eventually I knew I was pregnant but didn’t tell the father as I was angry and hurting. I kept quiet long enough not to be pressured into having an abortion although certain people who can’t defend themselves now would have disputed that. My mother was furious, my father didn’t say much, and she was determined my baby would be adopted. I refused to agree to that and wouldn’t discuss it. My baby needed me not strangers, I already loved my unborn baby.
I still have moments when memories creep up on me suddenly that I force myself not to cry over. My mother was so cruel yet I couldn’t talk to anybody as I didn’t think they would believe me. Fear of my mother finding out scared me too much to talk to anybody as she would make me suffer emotionally and verbally behind closed doors. I loved her but we just seemed to bring out the worst of each other yet in public it was the opposite. It’s sad as we did have so much in common such as reading the same types of book, knitting, music, films, television and so on. I lived for the happy times when we were all happy.