Assisi Mother & Baby Homes

[mullion cove]

Hi,
you should be able to apply for your adoption records and they would say your birth Mother's name.  My friend applied for hers and, after some counselling, which apparently has to happen before they release the records, we were able to trace her Mother through a genealogical social media site
If you would like more advice as to where to search after you hVe been given her name, then I will talk to your further through this site, as to how we went about tracing her.

[nannysmith]

I know my mother's name but not her date of birth  Unfortunately I was not adopted but was long term fostered  Without a date of birth it's impossible to go forward  Was hopping this mother unit  might have records with date of birth

[mullion cove]

Hi,
I guess that you were privately fostered. This does make it difficult but maybe not impossible.  Have you any idea where your Mother lived?  I think it is possible that she was young, maybe 16 - 20 maybe, so an approximate date of birth And where she may have lived could  find an answer. 
My friend's search seemed completely impossible because after we found a person that matched what we thought we knew, she went off to America post war and disappeared.  We kept trying and, without going into a long explanation at this point, we got lucky!
She was still alive, 93 and living in Florida!  After a lot of soul searching, because she felt that it might upset the old lady too much, my friend decided that she had to try to make contact which she did and although her Mother died soon afterwards, they did speak and she was put touch with half brothers and sisters. 
If you would like, you could message me the details you already know and I will see if I can get any further for you.
Sadly you won't be able to get any information from the Assissi Home because it was sold off many years ago and is now exclusive housing. 
My husband grew up in the house next door to the home and remembers the girls going by on their way to the village.  His Mother used to talk to them and give them cups of tea.  He says that he was always frightened to go anywhere near it as a small child because the nuns were so severe,  but did deliver prescriptions from the local Chemist there when he was older (imagine that happening now!).  The property belonged to the Catholic Church so I think that they must have records somewhere.  It might be worth writing to them although they haven't had a good reputation for releasing these records, you might be lucky if you persist.  It is worth a try.

[nannysmith]

thanks for your understanding and offer of help Without her date of birth its useless so will certainly take your advise to contact the catholic church   

[mullion cove]

Ok, I understand that you feel that it would be useless. 

Have you tried using ancestry.com to find her?

Put the name, place where she lived after she was adopted, ( that is very often the area where she was born, especially if she was fostered) and an approximate birth year, you will be given up to a 10 year either way option. You will probably get several options come up.  Next search each name in "other people's trees" and see if anything comes up, these trees are particularly useful.  It takes time and there are lots of dead ends, but I have had success with several different people's trees.  People on these Geneology sites are very helpful.
Good luck, I hope you are successful in the end.

Moderator comment: edited for content. Please do not suggest asking for look-ups from commercial sites. Most commercial sources have strict 'Terms of Use', which forbid publishing their data elsewhere, so asking for such look-ups is also asking people to ignore the 'Terms of Use'.

http://www.rootschat.com/help/posting_guide.php

[Garry Laine]

I was born in Assisi.   I visited there some 20 odd years ago and actually,  thanks to the lady who resides there I was shown around.   Did not take pictures but visited earlier this month and took some (3) pictures.    My mother died without knowing me so unable to ask questions.  But the stories I am reading on this site are horrendous.  What I remember in the garden was a statue of the Virgin Mary in an alcove cut out in the rock. I was born in 1944.

[mullion cove]

My husband, lived as a child,  in a cottage called Cedar Cottage very near to Assissi Home.  He remembers the statue very well.  He was frightened of the nuns.  His Mother used to have some of the girls in for a cup of tea.  It would be nice to think that your Mother was one of them.  Sorry that you weren't able to meet up with your Mother but hope you had a happy childhood.

[Damian Keady]

Hi All - this is my story part 1

I have been reading this thread with some interest, as I was born in May 1963 at Assisi, Hammer Lane, Grayshott. My mothers name was Teresa, she was Irish, Catholic and 26yo when she had me, so if any one remembers her it would be great to hear from you and any memories you have of her. She entered the Home on 19th Feb 1963 and was discharged on 20th June 1963, there is no record on the official register of where I was sent on discharge, however I ended up in foster care immediately after discharge.

Assisi was one of the larger "so called" M&B homes in the UK at the time with places for 36 mothers and 20 babies. At the time it was in the county of Hampshire, which causes some confusion today, as due to boundary changes it is now in the county of Surrey. The order of Nuns running Assisi was the Franciscan Sisters of Divine Motherhood? they are known today as the Franciscan Missionary of Divine Motherhood. They have a website http://fmdminternational.co.uk/ not that it is of any help regarding past history.

I went along to Assisi, which was originally a large rambling convent building, when I was 20yo (1983) to try and find out some information about my BM, as back then all I knew was her name from my Birth Certificate and my place of birth (Assisi). However I was told the property had been sold a few years earlier to a developer and had by then been converted / divided up into 5 luxury homes. I was however signposted by a resident there to a Catholic church up the road called St Josephs. At St Josephs they said they could not assist me, but gave me the details of a local convent not far from Assisi and advised I try there. So I drove there and spoke to the Mother Superior regarding my quest. She informed me that “we often have people like yourself” approaching them for info and said all the records from Assisi were held by the Diocese of Guildford. I was told to call her the next day and was assured they would definitely be able to give me some information. However when I called I was told “we have no record of your existence”, and that was that, no further explanation or anything else was offered.

However 23 years later I tried again to find out some information, this was because I now had a son of 13yo who was asking me questions about our paternal and maternal family history, of which I knew next to nothing and still don’t. However I did at the time after some digging manage to get a photo copy of my Birth Record from the original register of Assisi from the Catholic Children’s Society, funny that, as I was told previously no records of me existed! I also found out through that record I was baptised by the Parish Priest of St Josephs on the day of discharge from Assisi which was 20th June 1963. Again I find it funny that they said back in 1983 they could not help as it was this church that had baptised me! One other nugget of information on that extract from the Birth Register was it had a name for my father, who was an Iraqi Army Officer, unfortunately this piece of information has never lead to any other leads in tracing him or anything else about him.

I do know that I was never formally adopted, and sense that I was given away to my so called foster parents. This may have been instigated by a Miss XXXXXX who appears to be some sort of private welfare officer who was involved with my maternal mothers confinement.

Unfortunately my foster mother (FM) would never give me any information on how she came about me, and also went to great lengths to avoid having to explain anything to Social Services on the very rare and I mean rare occasions that they visited the foster home and so eventually Social Services became very suspicious, but back in those days they do not appear to have had any powers to do anything about it..

I assume my FM has passed on now, as when I was placed with her in 1963 she was already 51 years old, she privately fostered other children, mainly for 2 or 3 years duration whilst the parents were in the UK training as Nurses or Midwives, they then in the main went back to their country of origin with their parents.

I had a very Dickensian and quite a brutal upbringing in the foster home and it came as a great relief to eventually go into the care of the local authority when I was 13yo. Despite a long list of social workers who were assigned my case, not one of them managed to find out my history, how I ended up in the foster home or anything about my BM. I managed to obtain my council care records in 2007 which bears this out.

My experience in the foster home was the main reason I chose after I was taken into care to have limited contact with my foster mother, my main reason for maintaining any contact was purely in the hope that she would one day give me the information on my birth mother and father and how I had ended up in her care, however that was not to be and I finally broke all contact with her after my own son was born in the early 90's.

To be continued as not enough space in text box

[Damian Keady]

My story part 2 -  continuation of previous post

I find it strange that in this day and age that their is still so little known about these organisations that operated as M&B homes and think it is time (well overdue) that there is full disclosure by them, as I am sure they collected more information (records) than just the scant details entered on a register of births. For instance they were in many cases paid to provide this so called service and many operated the homes on a commercial basis so must have kept other records. For instance, in my case who is the Welfare worker Miss XXXXX mentioned on the register and what was her role, especially in my ending up as I did in the foster home and to which the authorities themselves had no knowledge?

I have all but given up now on finding out more information, as I am aware that my BM got married (not to my father) around 1969 and had other children, I even tracked down a marriage certificate for her, however I feel (if she is alive) that she does not want to be found and have put it down to her experience of having me in the circumstances she did.

What is sad about all this is I may have maternal relatives still alive that don't know I exist, as well as half brothers and sisters from my birth mothers subsequent marriage. If not for me it would be good to be able to have some information to pass onto my son, as a family unit it is just me and him on my side of the family, although he has an extended family and half brothers on his mums side.

I wish you all the best in your own personal searches and hope that you find what you are seeking,

Best Wishes
Damian