Son of Tuam survivor 'over the moon' to secure funds to buy mother's home

By Lynn Rusk, PA

A man who was reunited with his birth mother, a survivor of one of Ireland’s most notorious mother and baby homes, has raised more than €70,000 to buy her home.

Patrick Naughton, 70, from Ealing, west London, was taken from his mother, Christina “Chrissie” Tully, from the Tuam mother and baby home in Co Galway in 1954, just weeks after she gave birth to him aged 24.

Mr Naughton, who moved to the UK with his adoptive parents aged 13, was reunited with Ms Tully, now 93, in 2013.

In a bid to help his birth mother, whom he said “never had anything in her life”, Mr Naughton set up a fundraiser to help her buy her council home, which was valued at €50,000.

Last week Ms Tully’s story was picked up by the New York Times and since then their fundraiser has reached more than €71,000, hitting their target.

“Chrissie is stunned – the penny hasn’t dropped yet,” Mr Naughton said.

“She never believed it would happen in her lifetime.

“I just can’t thank everybody enough. It means the world and the earth to both of us.

“We had a wonderful woman in San Diego who was moved by our story and she donated $50,000 (€44,800). I’m just over the moon.”

Ms Tully, who had given birth to another boy in 1949, when she was 18, via Caesarean section, was told by doctors at the time that he had died.

But she believes her son, whom she named Michael, is still alive.

As many as 68,000 people went through the religious-run mother and baby homes. Women’s babies were forcibly taken from them and adopted.

Up to 9,000 children died in institutions across the country, in appalling conditions.

Mr Naughton said he had set up the fundraiser to buy her home from Galway council in case Michael ever returned like he did.

He said he and his mother have searched “high and low” in recent years for records of her first child, but have been unable to find anything.

He said Ms Tully received a record from a Freedom of Information request that said the baby had been “returned to Tuam home” after he died.

In 2014 it was revealed that hundreds of babies had been “indecently buried” in a sewage tank at the Tuam mother and baby home.

The research by local historian Catherine Corless found that 796 babies and young children had died and been “indecently buried in a defunct sewage system” at the home between 1925 and 1961.

Ms Tully, who said “he could be in that pit in Tuam, but he could also have been adopted”, said she wanted to keep her home for after she had died, in case he came looking for her, like Mr Naughton.

After they hit their fundraising target Mr Naughton said: “We will get a plaque and we will put it up over the door and call it ‘Michael’s home’.”

Mr Naughton, who regularly travels to Ireland to visit his birth mother said: “I am so happy because all of her life she’s never had or owned anything.

“She worked in a priest’s house for 13 years and then she worked in another home for 26 years simply because they were live-in jobs as she had nowhere to go.

“That’s the icing on the cake is that she can spend the last few years of life knowing that she’s an equal.

“Thanks isn’t enough for the people that have done this.

“I just hope and pray to God Michael does come back.”