Babies of single mothers sold in Spain - could it have happened here?

[languagelounger]

In Spain there's a court case going on which has revealed that it was common practice in Spain until the 1970s to tell single mothers giving birth in Roman Catholic run hospitals/homes for unmarried mothers, that their children had died, and then give the baby to a couple, and pass it off as their natural child. The report I saw mentioned 300,000 cases, which is staggering.

This set me wondering whether this had also happened in England. I would be very interested to hear from anyone who might know whether the Spanish/Irish practice of telling single women giving birth that their child had died, and then giving or selling the child to someone else, without any official records or legal adoption, may have gone on in England also? (In the case in the news in Spain, the children were actually being sold to childless couples).

[Alan Medic]

This is an old story and relates to the Franco regime. Where did you get the idea it was an Irish practice too?

[El Pibe]

"This is an old story and relates to the Franco regime"

Actually this practice continued well into the 90s, it wasn't the franco regime as much as it was the institutions of church and the state (by which i mean beauracratic institutions), often this distinction was blurred, hence why seperation is a good thing!!!!.

There was a documentary about it not too long ago.

The precedent was set after the civil war where some children were taken from families of political prisoners and gifted to party members. The practice was widened to all sorts of 'undesirables and babies changed hands for cash, payments for which could last many many years.

The practice referred to in the OP was not actually state policy, but was done by a slough of Catholic medical institutions and medical individuals. It was done with the usual judgmental self-righteousness of the fanatic, so a baby born out of wedlock may be taken from a 'prostitute' etc safe in the knowledge that you are doing a good thing, not an evil thing after all, for reasons of salvation. God it makes me want to puke when I think about it.

Typical targets were single mums, socialists, women with jobs and immigrants.

That it went on so long smacks of collusion from both the Church authorities almost certainly and those in the civil service undoubtedly, and at best a blind eye from successive governments.

I found watching it particularly chilling as one of the examples in the documentary was in a case in a hospital in Madrid where I was born, in the same year I was born in.

My grandfather spent some time as a political prisoner of the Franco regime and my father could best be described as an outspoken critic. I'm pretty sure if it wasn't for the British citizenship of my parents (my father left in the 50s and became a naturalised brit before returning in the late sixties) that that could easily have been me on the screen.

300,000 is very much a finger in the air, due to the intrinsically fraudulent and criminal nature of the practice records which were routinely doctored (ho ho), faked or destroyed, so we'll never know. My gut is that that is probably rather high, but the people have a right to feel utterly betrayed by those who were supposed to be serving the people.

COUld it have happened in Britain, never say never, I can certainly believe that a religious or political fanatic may one day have been found to have secretly sterilised women or somesuch, but routinely and institutionally presenting a dead baby in a fridge then faking certificates and passing children on, all as State policy, absolutely not.

I don't think the church was in a postion to do so and I don't believe it's something the sate would have done.

Britain did however do some pretty unconscionable things http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/bindoon-boys-town-the-sad-truth-behind-britains-lost-children-1782544.html

[El Pibe]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15335899 for the stuff about spain.

AM, I guess stuff like the sheer extent of the findings of the commission into child abuse in Ireland, might give rise to people conflating the two.

Certainly the levels of influence of the church both on the government and in deeply entrenching a socially conservative society were very similar in both countries, as was the instituional power of church in education, social provision and health care where the privileged position was open to and often abused.

[Otta]

Of course this used to happen in Britain. Don't think they told mothers that babies had died, but many babies were taken from their mothers for no good reason.

[Alan Medic]

I understood Pibe that at the heart of the exercise was the wish to provide children to pro Franco couples, thus ensuring he had a political majority in the future. At least that was how it started out. Maybe I got that wrong.

[dulwichgirl2]

Dear god. I had a neighbour who had five brothers and sisters shipped to Australia. He was deeply troubled though had been too young to leave so stayed with his mother. The halcyon days of the 50s were not as depicted.

[El Pibe]

AM, the Franco thing was a one off after the war. God knows there were enough orphans to have made childless supporters happy.

It was actually an ideological move to try to ensure that active the children of socialist families were removed to ensure they were not brought up with funny ideas. A rather brutally cynical attempt to stave off a future revolution or cycle of violence.

They were either sent to families of supporters or more commonly to further fill the overflowing orphanages (have you ever wondered why Spain makes so many films set in them, it was the experience of many of its subsequent writers and film makers, nasty things civil wars).

Heres some background.

The issue above was a long term rather more insiduous affair where church institutions took it on themselves to do this sort of thing over a period of forty odd years.

Otta, I've heard tell many anecdotal tales over the years, I used to do some voluntary visits to a mental institute and heard from the horses mouth from a couple of the inmates how they were sent there because they were unmarried mothers, had some pretty horrific 'treatments' and ended up institutionalised. But the children though removed were brought up by aunts or 'aunts'. I've yet to hear of instances where they were systematically stolen and sold, but I guess given the horror stories we've heard over the years we'd be a hard bunch to shock.

[languagelounger]

Thanks for the expanded info, Pibe. The news story about the court case in Spain just made me wonder. I only discovered after my mother died, that I'd had a great aunt who was unmarried and died giving birth in a home for unmarried mothers, run by nuns. I was astonished because my great aunt had been completely written out of the family history. Neither my grandfather, or great aunts and great uncles, or my parents' generation, who had also known her, had ever mentioned her. I was told by someone who'd known my family, that the baby had been born healthy, and that the nuns had probably arranged an adoption. I presumed they meant a legal, on the record adoption. I wanted to trace this person, my mother's cousin, but there is no record of the birth at all - no record of a still birth, or a live baby.

[Huguenot]

Was this in the UK languagelounger?

It's certainly intruiging. But since no-one in your family had ever mentioned this, and there is no record of your great aunt or her child, isn't it simply more likely that your neighbour is mistaken?

What starts off as slander or innunedo can often morph through time and community into rumour, myth and then 'fact'.

Rather than a cover-up of staggering proportions isn't it simply more likely that this didn't happen?

[StraferJack]

Huguenot makes a good point, but... that is the argument used against people trying to expose stuff as well

Basically, given the church's track record, I would err on the side of listening to people on this one

[woodrot]

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[languagelounger]

Just to put this back on track, as I would be interested in hearing from anyone who has first hand knowledge of a similar incidence to this:

I had a great aunt who was not married and died in childbirth in an institution run by Roman Catholic nuns at the end of the 1930s in England. I have first hand evidence (from people who knew her) that this happened. However, there is no record of the baby - no record of birth or stillbirth. I'm told the baby lived and was adopted. I wanted to find out if "unofficial" adoptions were arranged in the UK by the Catholic church as has been proven to have taken place in Spain (there is a very high profile court case taking place in Spain relating to such incidences, at the moment).

I'm not making any suggestions about what the motives were. First one would need to find out whether there was such a practice, if it was widespread, and if the Catholic Church kept records of where the babies went - if so then those records should be made public. My mother's cousin would be in their early 70s if still alive, and, it's reasonable to suppose, would never have had any idea of who their family was. This is not about blaming the church officials involved - my relatives apparently just let a baby be adopted that had grandparents and several aunts and uncles.

[Huguenot]

I thought the problem was that you didn't have any evidence? At this stage isn't it still really just a vague memory from someone who would have been very young at the time and who is now very old?

In fact those who could be considered most reliable witnesses (the family) have never mentioned it?

'Official' adoption was only introduced in 1926 - so it is highly possible that an adoption could have taken place without any record having been made, and without any subterfuge.

However, I'm not so sure a death could be as easily overlooked.