January 30, 2022 • 12 mins
Around three-quarters of a million people in the UK are adopted, but before the law changed in 1975, most adoptees never knew the identity of their birth parents. Margaret was adopted when she was just six months old.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
So today I'm talking to Margaret who was oneof our contributors on the first series of
DNA Family Secrets.
So, for those of you who haven't seen theepisode that Margaret is in, when you came
to us your question was essentially to findout who your mum was, because you'd been adopted
when you were six months old.
(00:21):
So, tell me about your family circumstancesgrowing up.
From a very young age, I mean as far as Ican remember back, my adopted mum told me
I was adopted.
And she told me the circumstances was thatshe couldn't conceive, and they went to the
priest and the priest said, ‘oh there'san adoption society in Southport.’
(00:41):
So, yeah, they went through all the channelsand picked me.
There was not a lot of information about birthmum, other than, we think she came over from
Ireland.
That's as much as I thought about it and tobe honest it was sort of put at the back of
my mind I guess, I'm little, I've been adopted,I'm happy and, you know, everything was lovely
(01:02):
so… but one of the things which was quiteemotional in the filming of this was, I think
it might have been Stacey said, when do youthink about your birth mum?, and it was almost
like, oh I do think about her on my birthday,because it's… as a mum I would have thought
I gave that child up.
(01:22):
At the time, you know, abortion was illegal,birth control was illegal, and we know that
about 2000 women a year, you know, would comeover to Liverpool to give birth and so that's
what you thought might have happened.
What information did you have about your mum,you had a name didn't you?
Yeah, I mean I didn't find stuff out tilllike paperwork till after my mum had died
(01:45):
and then I found my birth certificate withmy name on it.
Mum always said I was Rosemary Flynn, butactually I'm Rose Mary Flynn and I was, ‘oh
right okay.’
So, they didn't show this on camera, but wehad a long and really quite emotional chat
(02:06):
about how much this meant to you and how itwas unlikely that your mum would be alive
and that you really just kind of wanted anything.
So just to know her name, and this is thething I really remember, was you were really
just wanted to have a photo.
I remember, so we’re coming…
when you came, what were you hoping…
(02:29):
Again, yeah, I mean to find out information,did she go on to have a good life?
That was really important to know.
So, I was quite hopeful because so many peoplearound the world have got Irish ancestry and
DNA testing's super popular in Ireland, butalso in places in the world where Irish people
have immigrated to, so I was cautiously hopeful.
(02:52):
So, the morning that you were coming to findout what the results were, how was that for
you?
I was super excited, I really was, and TuriI remember when you mapped it all out and
the penny hadn't dropped, there was names,but the penny hadn't dropped.
And then, I don't know whether you remember,I nearly lost it with emotion.
(03:17):
And you just sort of gave me some reinforcement,for me to go in and see Stacey, but the emotion
then, I didn’t know whether I could do thenext bit.
It was hugely emotional because we had gotreally lucky, because we got a first cousin,
we got a number of second cousins and a numberof third cousins and what that allows us to
(03:42):
do is build up these family trees, and thenwhat you start to do is you see where they
intersect with one another, and that allowedus to kind of home in on who your grandparents
were, and they were Margaret and James Flynnand then when we looked at what children they
(04:04):
had, they had two daughters, Bridget and Mary.
So, we knew one of them had to be your mum.
Now Bridget had two children, so they wereSheamus and Maureen and when we contacted
them, they were quite surprised because therealways was this story that their mum's older
(04:28):
sister Mary had given up a child for adoption,but not their own mum Bridget.
So, what we did was we got them to take DNAtests, just to be absolutely sure, because
we wanted to give you the right answer andit turned out then that you had two half siblings.
(04:49):
So, what happens when you go in and see Stacey.
I think the first thing is Stacey gives methe picture, and I looked, and I could see,
you know, the facial expression and thinking,‘oh that's wonderful,’ and then at some
stage, just then, the penny did drop, andI said to Stacey, ‘one question, is she
still alive?’
(05:11):
And then, yeah, and she was, the bombshell,yeah, absolute bombshell.
All you wish for and then it is, I mean, wow.
And then, I think Stacey gave me the letter.
(05:31):
My brother and sister they'd sat togetherand how did it start; I mean I've got it here…
So, this was dated Monday the 12th of October2020 and it says dear Margaret, I hope this
letter finds you safe and well.
Seamus and I (Maureen) are overjoyed to discoverwe have a sister.
(05:55):
The news came as a huge surprise, but a verynice one.
We are sad that our mother kept you a secretall these years.
Our mother Bridget was born on the 17th ofFebruary 1928.
In her late teens, early 20s, she worked inEngland as a cook, in Stonyhurst College,
Lancashire.
(06:15):
Her summer holidays were spent working ina restaurant in Morecambe.
Our mother was a very bubbly outgoing personand loved her bright colours.
She read a lot, enjoyed cooking, arts andcrafts, doing crosswords and liked the game
of bingo.
She married Patrick in 1956 and settled backin Ireland.
(06:36):
They both ran the family farm until dad passedaway in December 2004.
Patrick was a tall kind gentleman; they werevery happy.
Our mother now is in her 93rd year and in2015 she was diagnosed with vascular dementia
and needs full-time care.
(06:58):
We are glad to hear you had a happy childhoodand made a good life for yourself.
We are all looking forward to meeting youand welcoming you into our family, love Maureen
and Sheamus.
It sounds like you both went off and had anice life and then were able to come back
and find each other again?
Yes, the other thing was that they were goingin to see mum without the COVID restrictions.
(07:21):
So, they were sending pictures back of mymum, you know, they were lovely, and she looked
bubbly and really well cared for, you know,you could tell, and they'd say, ‘she's on
good form today and really chatty’ and Ithought, oh I can't wait to go over and experience
that.
Yes, so how do you start a conversation withyour half-siblings?
(07:45):
There was no awkwardness, no, it was…. and,you know, it's like trying to get a word in.
And my brother Sheamus he's the greatest storyteller,one after the other of them growing up and
what it was like with mum and she was almosta champion sheep shearer and this is by hand
(08:08):
with the old big scissors and oh, she'd bepicking up the sheep and doing this and she
taught Maureen now to do the same, and Maureenwas a champion sheep shearer and there was
hundreds of stories.
Sheamus should write a book.
So, you've been to see your mum.
Oh, that lead up to going over to Ireland,I mean I'm feeling it now.
(08:31):
I've never felt such emotion, waves of emotion.
Thinking I'm just going to lose it, soon asI see my brother and sister.
I'm just going be a wreck.
I was looking out for them, looking out forthem, looking out for them, and then I said,
‘oh there they are,’ and it was just likewe've always been brother and sister, yeah.
(08:58):
That evening we chatted for about two hoursand then of course Maureen had arranged for
the visit to mum and yeah it was a beautifulroom and there she was in the chair looking
beautiful, but fast asleep.
We got a chair either side and Maureen said,‘mum, mum, Rose Mary's here, Rose Mary's here.
(09:22):
So, I went to hold her hand, she gripped myhand for an hour and Maureen said, ‘I've
never known her to do that,’ it was white,she gripped it, but she still had her eyes
closed and god, Maureen was saying, ‘mumRose Mary's here, Rose Mary's here.
She kept on saying it over and over and Ithink after about an hour the eyes fluttered
(09:47):
and I said, ‘Oh she's waking up a littlebit.’
So, I said to my sister, I said, ‘will yousing a song with her?’
So, there's Maureen singing to her and thenI could see her joining in, oh it was just
priceless.
Never thought I'd be there listening to mymother sing.
(10:09):
Did you get the feeling that she knew whoyou were?
I do, I think on some level, I mean that grippingof my hand, because Maureen said she's never
done that with her, but she just held on.
What really comes across is just how muchyou've just been kind of enveloped into the
family, just really taken into the family.
(10:32):
From the time we were there we were takenfrom that house, this house, tea here.
Every single member of the family, they werejust wonderful, absolutely wonderful, and
one of the lovely things was, one of Bridget'sgrandson's, lovely lad, and he said, to me,
(10:53):
she walks like nanny, and I thought, thatis the most loveliest thing you could have
said.
It sounds like you’ve had some really wonderfulmoments over the last year, but I know it
must have been really bittersweet becauseyour mum was in the later stages of dementia
(11:14):
and I know that really sadly she passed away,didn’t she?
Up to September Maureen was saying, ‘ohmum's in fine form, she's fine.’
Then October Maureen sent me a picture andI thought, ‘oh.’
And then she said, ‘they've got mum in bedwith a white cover, they've got a candle burning
(11:38):
and flowers.’
So, it looked like they were sort of preparing,and the priest had been in a couple of times
and that sort of thing, and I thought, ‘ah.’
And, oh Turi, I woke up at 4:30 on the dayshe died, and I thought, ‘she's gone,’
and then I got a text to say, she's gone at4:30.
(12:01):
Yeah, they were at the bedside and yeah.
So, she passed away peacefully, god blessher.
And having met you.
Yeah, and that's the thing, I don't feel….
she's past but, God, how lucky I have beento have met her and I kissed her and heard
(12:28):
her sing and yeah, I'm blessed.
Margaret thank you so much for chatting tome today, it has been such a treat to see
you again and catch up.
Thank you Turi.
So today I'm talking to Margaret who was oneof our contributors on the first series of
DNA Family Secrets.
So, for those of you who haven't seen theepisode that Margaret is in, when you came
to us your question was essentially to findout who your mum was, because you'd been adopted
when you were six months old.
(00:21):
So, tell me about your family circumstancesgrowing up.
From a very young age, I mean as far as Ican remember back, my adopted mum told me
I was adopted.
And she told me the circumstances was thatshe couldn't conceive, and they went to the
priest and the priest said, ‘oh there'san adoption society in Southport.’
(00:41):
So, yeah, they went through all the channelsand picked me.
There was not a lot of information about birthmum, other than, we think she came over from
Ireland.
That's as much as I thought about it and tobe honest it was sort of put at the back of
my mind I guess, I'm little, I've been adopted,I'm happy and, you know, everything was lovely
(01:02):
so… but one of the things which was quiteemotional in the filming of this was, I think
it might have been Stacey said, when do youthink about your birth mum?, and it was almost
like, oh I do think about her on my birthday,because it's… as a mum I would have thought
I gave that child up.
(01:22):
At the time, you know, abortion was illegal,birth control was illegal, and we know that
about 2000 women a year, you know, would comeover to Liverpool to give birth and so that's
what you thought might have happened.
What information did you have about your mum,you had a name didn't you?
Yeah, I mean I didn't find stuff out tilllike paperwork till after my mum had died
(01:45):
and then I found my birth certificate withmy name on it.
Mum always said I was Rosemary Flynn, butactually I'm Rose Mary Flynn and I was, ‘oh
right okay.’
So, they didn't show this on camera, but wehad a long and really quite emotional chat
(02:06):
about how much this meant to you and how itwas unlikely that your mum would be alive
and that you really just kind of wanted anything.
So just to know her name, and this is thething I really remember, was you were really
just wanted to have a photo.
I remember, so we’re coming…
when you came, what were you hoping…
(02:29):
Again, yeah, I mean to find out information,did she go on to have a good life?
That was really important to know.
So, I was quite hopeful because so many peoplearound the world have got Irish ancestry and
DNA testing's super popular in Ireland, butalso in places in the world where Irish people
have immigrated to, so I was cautiously hopeful.
(02:52):
So, the morning that you were coming to findout what the results were, how was that for
you?
I was super excited, I really was, and TuriI remember when you mapped it all out and
the penny hadn't dropped, there was names,but the penny hadn't dropped.
And then, I don't know whether you remember,I nearly lost it with emotion.
(03:17):
And you just sort of gave me some reinforcement,for me to go in and see Stacey, but the emotion
then, I didn’t know whether I could do thenext bit.
It was hugely emotional because we had gotreally lucky, because we got a first cousin,
we got a number of second cousins and a numberof third cousins and what that allows us to
(03:42):
do is build up these family trees, and thenwhat you start to do is you see where they
intersect with one another, and that allowedus to kind of home in on who your grandparents
were, and they were Margaret and James Flynnand then when we looked at what children they
(04:04):
had, they had two daughters, Bridget and Mary.
So, we knew one of them had to be your mum.
Now Bridget had two children, so they wereSheamus and Maureen and when we contacted
them, they were quite surprised because therealways was this story that their mum's older
(04:28):
sister Mary had given up a child for adoption,but not their own mum Bridget.
So, what we did was we got them to take DNAtests, just to be absolutely sure, because
we wanted to give you the right answer andit turned out then that you had two half siblings.
(04:49):
So, what happens when you go in and see Stacey.
I think the first thing is Stacey gives methe picture, and I looked, and I could see,
you know, the facial expression and thinking,‘oh that's wonderful,’ and then at some
stage, just then, the penny did drop, andI said to Stacey, ‘one question, is she
still alive?’
(05:11):
And then, yeah, and she was, the bombshell,yeah, absolute bombshell.
All you wish for and then it is, I mean, wow.
And then, I think Stacey gave me the letter.
(05:31):
My brother and sister they'd sat togetherand how did it start; I mean I've got it here…
So, this was dated Monday the 12th of October2020 and it says dear Margaret, I hope this
letter finds you safe and well.
Seamus and I (Maureen) are overjoyed to discoverwe have a sister.
(05:55):
The news came as a huge surprise, but a verynice one.
We are sad that our mother kept you a secretall these years.
Our mother Bridget was born on the 17th ofFebruary 1928.
In her late teens, early 20s, she worked inEngland as a cook, in Stonyhurst College,
Lancashire.
(06:15):
Her summer holidays were spent working ina restaurant in Morecambe.
Our mother was a very bubbly outgoing personand loved her bright colours.
She read a lot, enjoyed cooking, arts andcrafts, doing crosswords and liked the game
of bingo.
She married Patrick in 1956 and settled backin Ireland.
(06:36):
They both ran the family farm until dad passedaway in December 2004.
Patrick was a tall kind gentleman; they werevery happy.
Our mother now is in her 93rd year and in2015 she was diagnosed with vascular dementia
and needs full-time care.
(06:58):
We are glad to hear you had a happy childhoodand made a good life for yourself.
We are all looking forward to meeting youand welcoming you into our family, love Maureen
and Sheamus.
It sounds like you both went off and had anice life and then were able to come back
and find each other again?
Yes, the other thing was that they were goingin to see mum without the COVID restrictions.
(07:21):
So, they were sending pictures back of mymum, you know, they were lovely, and she looked
bubbly and really well cared for, you know,you could tell, and they'd say, ‘she's on
good form today and really chatty’ and Ithought, oh I can't wait to go over and experience
that.
Yes, so how do you start a conversation withyour half-siblings?
(07:45):
There was no awkwardness, no, it was…. and,you know, it's like trying to get a word in.
And my brother Sheamus he's the greatest storyteller,one after the other of them growing up and
what it was like with mum and she was almosta champion sheep shearer and this is by hand
(08:08):
with the old big scissors and oh, she'd bepicking up the sheep and doing this and she
taught Maureen now to do the same, and Maureenwas a champion sheep shearer and there was
hundreds of stories.
Sheamus should write a book.
So, you've been to see your mum.
Oh, that lead up to going over to Ireland,I mean I'm feeling it now.
(08:31):
I've never felt such emotion, waves of emotion.
Thinking I'm just going to lose it, soon asI see my brother and sister.
I'm just going be a wreck.
I was looking out for them, looking out forthem, looking out for them, and then I said,
‘oh there they are,’ and it was just likewe've always been brother and sister, yeah.
(08:58):
That evening we chatted for about two hoursand then of course Maureen had arranged for
the visit to mum and yeah it was a beautifulroom and there she was in the chair looking
beautiful, but fast asleep.
We got a chair either side and Maureen said,‘mum, mum, Rose Mary's here, Rose Mary's here.
(09:22):
So, I went to hold her hand, she gripped myhand for an hour and Maureen said, ‘I've
never known her to do that,’ it was white,she gripped it, but she still had her eyes
closed and god, Maureen was saying, ‘mumRose Mary's here, Rose Mary's here.
She kept on saying it over and over and Ithink after about an hour the eyes fluttered
(09:47):
and I said, ‘Oh she's waking up a littlebit.’
So, I said to my sister, I said, ‘will yousing a song with her?’
So, there's Maureen singing to her and thenI could see her joining in, oh it was just
priceless.
Never thought I'd be there listening to mymother sing.
(10:09):
Did you get the feeling that she knew whoyou were?
I do, I think on some level, I mean that grippingof my hand, because Maureen said she's never
done that with her, but she just held on.
What really comes across is just how muchyou've just been kind of enveloped into the
family, just really taken into the family.
(10:32):
From the time we were there we were takenfrom that house, this house, tea here.
Every single member of the family, they werejust wonderful, absolutely wonderful, and
one of the lovely things was, one of Bridget'sgrandson's, lovely lad, and he said, to me,
(10:53):
she walks like nanny, and I thought, thatis the most loveliest thing you could have
said.
It sounds like you’ve had some really wonderfulmoments over the last year, but I know it
must have been really bittersweet becauseyour mum was in the later stages of dementia
(11:14):
and I know that really sadly she passed away,didn’t she?
Up to September Maureen was saying, ‘ohmum's in fine form, she's fine.’
Then October Maureen sent me a picture andI thought, ‘oh.’
And then she said, ‘they've got mum in bedwith a white cover, they've got a candle burning
(11:38):
and flowers.’
So, it looked like they were sort of preparing,and the priest had been in a couple of times
and that sort of thing, and I thought, ‘ah.’
And, oh Turi, I woke up at 4:30 on the dayshe died, and I thought, ‘she's gone,’
and then I got a text to say, she's gone at4:30.
(12:01):
Yeah, they were at the bedside and yeah.
So, she passed away peacefully, god blessher.
And having met you.
Yeah, and that's the thing, I don't feel….
she's past but, God, how lucky I have beento have met her and I kissed her and heard
(12:28):
her sing and yeah, I'm blessed.
Margaret thank you so much for chatting tome today, it has been such a treat to see
you again and catch up.
Thank you Turi.
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