Show Posts
1
Northamptonshire / Re: N0RTHAMPTON - Home for illegitimate babies
« on: Friday 23 September 16 01:42 BST (UK) »
I forgot to add something about lady Susan Glover , who ran Elmleigh and who was chairperson of The National Adoption Society at the time . I kept all letters from NAS and clung to information in the letters as part of my identity and family history . the information was special to me as mhy only link to my birth mother , who i never met .
I live in Australia thouogh i was born & raised in the U.K . A British researcher found my mtjer and birth family who didn`t really want to know me but they told me tit bits of information abut my mother and i discovered the NAS letters told one lie after another about my mothers occupation and of her immediate family .
The researcher told me letters often embellished a babys history to make them look like they were from `good stock` . As a mixed race baby it was harder to place me but either way .. the NAS told my adoptive parents that my mother was a student nrse . she wasn`t . They said her brother was a graphic artist . He was a policeman . They wrote that my grandfather was an art teacher but he was a coal miner and so on . Apparently my Indian father was a doctor his family were described as professionals .. It really shows the level of cultural shame surrounding mothers and babies of the era , its amazing .
another member wrote here about her time as an employee at Elmleigh thank you so much for writing about your experience ! It gave me insight into the era and was really incredible to read x
I live in Australia thouogh i was born & raised in the U.K . A British researcher found my mtjer and birth family who didn`t really want to know me but they told me tit bits of information abut my mother and i discovered the NAS letters told one lie after another about my mothers occupation and of her immediate family .
The researcher told me letters often embellished a babys history to make them look like they were from `good stock` . As a mixed race baby it was harder to place me but either way .. the NAS told my adoptive parents that my mother was a student nrse . she wasn`t . They said her brother was a graphic artist . He was a policeman . They wrote that my grandfather was an art teacher but he was a coal miner and so on . Apparently my Indian father was a doctor his family were described as professionals .. It really shows the level of cultural shame surrounding mothers and babies of the era , its amazing .
another member wrote here about her time as an employee at Elmleigh thank you so much for writing about your experience ! It gave me insight into the era and was really incredible to read x