Lost and Found

The Sunday Sun, 19th January 2003

By Coreena Ford

PAT BASQUILL is proud of the fact that she has helped more than 1600 mothers trace sons and daughters who were adopted as babies.
But the pride is tinged, with personal sadness... her own story has had no such happy ending.

Pat was just 16 when doctors took her baby from her and, when she
finally tracked down her daughter 25 years later, the woman didn't want to know her birth mother.
Despite this, Pat continues to fight for the rights of birth mothers through her successful tracing agency Trackers International. And she's gearing up for thousands more to call on her help now that the agency - a non-profit making business - has launched a website.

"It's fantastic," smiled Pat, now 57 and the mother of three other children.

"When it went online I sat reading through it again and again... hundreds of people have been in touch as a result. We are going to get swamped with calls". Pat's determination to help others is fed by her anger over the way she was treated as an unmarried mother in the 1960s. Heavily pregnant with baby Elaine, the teenager was sent from her home in Ashington, Northumberland, to Elswick Lodge in Newcastle, where unmarried mothers were hidden away during the last stage of pregnancies.

Taken

She turned 16 days before the baby girl was born and was allowed to nurture and bond with her, but only until a suitable married couple could step in to adopt her.

The day Elaine was taken from her is fixed in her memory.

"It was April 9,1962 and I was breast-feeding her when the welfare workers came in to the dormitory where eight of us slept with babies in the cots beside us.
"One put her arm on my shoulder and the other simply took Elaine from me, and she was gone through that nursery door before I could blink.
"I could hear her screams all the way down the corridor and words can't really describe what it felt like... it's like having a limb torn from your body.
"Then I was given half an hour to get out of Elswick Lodge."

MISERY... as a pregnant teenage Pat was sent to Elswick Lodge and had her baby taken away.

At the time Pat wasn't aware she was entitled to benefits and could even have gone to live with temporary foster parents with baby Elaine.
She says that all her attempts to learn more about her rights as an unmarried mother were blocked by the home's welfare workers.
"I was told if I didn't sign the adoption consent form Elaine would be placed in a children's home and grow up an orphan.
"I didn't want that to happen, so I eventually signed the form to protect her. It was not a voluntary signature.

Haunted

"And that's how it was for thousands of women out there... they were forced to sign under coercion and stress. For a great deal of time I felt so guilty and thought I had allowed strangers to take my baby away. I took the blame."
She dedicated the rest of her life to setting up Trackers International and to getting questions answered.

How and why could this have happened? And what happened to the "missing babies"?

Pat is now married to husband Keith and they have set up home in Stockport, Cheshire, with their children Cathy, 29, Vicky, 30 and Brian, 26, as Northumberland brings back too many unhappy memories.
But she never gave up hope of finding Elaine again and in 1987, after
making hundreds of phone calls, her persistence paid off.

A colleague contacted Elaine, who is now called Julia, on her behalf.
"She called me and we had a horror phone call," recalled Pat. "She asked what religion her birth father was and I told her he was Roman Catholic and I could hear a sharp intake of breath.

"She had been told he was Jewish and she had been raised by Episcopalian adoptive parents.

"Tears were running down my face when she said `I feel no emotional involvement with you'. "The worst search I have ever done was my own."

Since setting up in 1979 the six-strong team of researchers at Trackers International have been dedicated to tracing and reuniting all families separated by adoption.

It usually takes between six and seven weeks to find a lost mother or child.

Pat won't reveal how she tracks people down but says she has built up a huge list of contacts at a range of organisations. Her success stories include Pauline Bird, 60, of Wallsend, North Tyneside, whose son Gavin was taken from her while she was admitted to hospital. Pauline and Gavin, now 21, are in contact again thanks to Pat.

Success

And the agency also reunited Ashington mum May Burge, 74, with her daughter Elisha 36 years after social workers ordered her to look the other way as they carried her baby off to start a new life with a new family.

TRIUMPH... Pat Basquill, centre, with North mum May Burge and her "lost" daughter Elisa Straughan, 36 years after Elisa was taken by social workers.

"My case is a bad example because we have had so many successes," said Pat. "I call it a success if we can find any kind of information because it helps remove the blanket of guilt."

Her work includes lobbying the Government about the adoption abuses of the past and her campaign has seen improvements there too.

Last October the Government announced measures to create a multimillion pound tracing system to help mothers.

Inquiry

And an amendment is to be made to the Adoption and Children Bill, giving women the right to contact adopted children.
She added: "I've been pushing for a public inquiry into what went on in these homes for unmarried mothers where consents were not lawfully taken ... I'm sure it will happen soon."

You can contact Pat and her team of advisors on www.uktrackers.co.uk, or call Trackers International hotline on 0161-483 7324
coreena.ford@ncjmedia.co.uk

Sadness drives woman's search for adopted kids

FOR Pat Basquill, reuniting adopted children with their birth mothers is a labour of love.

BUT, as COREENA FORD reports, she found out her work does not always lead to a happy ending.

KEEPING MUM... success story Pauline Bird.

"A welfare worker put her arm on me and a second took Elaine, she was gone through that nursery door before I could blink"

CAMPAIGN... Pat and devoted husband Keith.

Copyright © Patricia Basquill, 2002 - 2008