OUT OF PLACE
Having completed the 52 Ancestors challenge in 2021, I have already written several stories of Ancestors who were found in some unexpected places within their own stories.
Examples include:
How and why did my 2x Great Grandparents go to live in Chile in the 1840's?
What was my Grandfather doing in Sierra Leone just before the war?
When I saw this weeks theme I wondered who to write about. Yes, there are some ancestors who would fit the criteria, but I wasn't motivated, at this time, to write about them. Then at 3 o'clock in the morning (I agree there is no hope,) I had a lightbulb moment and thought about some of the interesting stories that my generation of descendants have, my second cousins, so the family relationship charts identify.
I am fortunate in finding many interesting stories within my wider ancestors, but I note that amongst my paternal 2nd cousins there are also stories that are interesting and not necessarily run of the mill. Initially my working title was to be:- HONG KONG FOUNDLINGS', £10 POMS and OTHER STORIES. However during the process of research for this blog post, I found myself diverted and becoming increasingly interested in the background story of the initial subject related to my second cousin, who herself was one of the children bought over from Hong Kong in the 1960's
As this lady is still alive, I cannot name her, nor can I tell her full story as that is her's to tell, but I can relate the background information. Why? you may ask and my reply is that I have written many stories about my ancestors, and if the internet still exists in the distant future, future family historians may be interested to learn of this 1 in 100 child, who came to the UK in the 1960's.
A HONG KONG FOUNDLING
Between 1960 and 1963 The International Social Services UK, Hong Kong Project, 100 children, mainly girls, were found homes in the UK with adoptive parents. Many of these children were found abandoned in areas of Hong Kong. At this time there were many refugees escaping from China, not only struggling with the social and economic impact of Chairman Mao's Great Leap Forward, between 1958 and 1962. This coincided with a famine in China from 1959-1962, leading to many seeking refuge in Hong Kong.
But immigration of refugees from China was not new in Hong Kong, post war to the early 1950's there was a huge influx and increase in population from 600.000 to over 2 million by 1951, when border controls were then put in place. However there was a lack of space, accommodation, jobs and hope for these refugees. So the second wave of refugees later in the decade, compounded these issues.
Whilst it may be asserted that these abandoned babies may have been the children of the latter wave of refugees, life was equally hard for those who had already made Hong Kong their home.
1960's Hong Kongwww.gwulo.com
1963 Kowloonwww.gwulo.com Mike Cussons
In the early 1960's these young children were flown into Heathrow Airport, to meet their newly chosen parents, who had answered a newspaper advertisment. Following a study by the British Association for Adoption and Fostering, interviewing 72 of these children identifying the long term effects of their adoptions in the UK. An article in The Guardian in 2013, one of these children noted that:-
"Most of the parents were largely middle-class white people with very good intentions and a lot of them very religious. The intentions were great, but the anecdotal recollections show there were quite a few who just didn't know it was like to be Chinese."
It was into one such family that my cousin found herself, although her story does differ from these young children as due to medical problems, she was older and later in joining her family than most of her fellow adoptees.
In 2018, the BBC series, Call the Midwife addressed the story of the Hong Kong children within their Christmas special with the story of the fictional, May Tang. Watching the programme, I immediately thought of my cousin and her story. An observation that she asserts many of her friends made similar links when the episode was aired.
An article in the Radio Times at the time, published the feelings of one of these girls, Sue Jardine.
Similarly, my cousin also talks of the difficulties she has experienced with her personal and cultural identity. When I sought her permission to reference her story she also asserted that she is/was a foundling not an orphan. She was abandoned, her mother was likely to have been alive at that time. Whilst my mother was adopted as a baby, she has the name of her mother on her adoption and birth certificate, my cousin does not. What must it be like to have no idea about your heritage? I have mentioned in previous blog posts how I have only uncovered my wider paternal family in recent years, but at least I had a starting place.
Of course, my cousin is not alone, historically there have been many abandoned children, the Foundling hospital in London opening as long ago as 1739. Whilst even today there are periodically reports in the media of children being abandoned, although now the focus is much more related in finding and supporting the mother.
Having reviewed the background articles of these Hong Kong families, I then thought of the Romanian orphans in the 1990's, in the fact that the majority of them had been abandoned rather than orphaned. Thirty years later studies have been undertaken on how these Romanian children have fared. Sadly many have Mental Health Problems and similar to the Hong Kong children those adopted by UK couples have cited cultural identity issues. This has then led me to wonder about those babies born to Eastern European surrogate mothers, will there be underlying issues for these children too?
This is a very simplistic look at the complexities of this subject, it has left me questioning so many events in the world. For that, I am grateful to my cousin, in highlighting it through her own story.
I believe that
similar projects to that described in the UK related to the Hong Kong
foundlings were also undertaken in Canada, New Zealand and the USA.
As for the £10 Poms and other stories... they may appear at a later date.
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