UK UK - Mary Flanagan, 16, Newham, East London, 31 Dec 1959

[MelmothTheLost]

If she was pregnant, perhaps she went off to a mother and baby home to have the baby, as was common for unwed mothers at the time. Then perhaps she didn't want to return home. Or perhaps she decided to keep the baby, but knew she wouldn't be welcome home with the baby in tow so she went off to start a new life with her child.

At that time it was virtually unthinkable for an unmarried mother to keep her baby. The state was a lot more paternalistic then and made decisions that would not be countenanced now. For example, when my mother was in hospital having me, there was a woman on the ward who'd just had her 10th baby and her belly was hanging almost to her knees. The doctors refused to discharge her until she had been sterilised.

The reality is that since she would have been estranged from her family, Mary would effectively have been forced to hand over her baby and then discharged. She probably wouldn't even have been allowed to name the baby or register the birth as it was normal for healthy babies to be handed over to childless couples within days and for the adoptive parents to register the child as theirs with their surname and choice of first name(s) from the start. It wasn't until the late 1960s that the idea of unmarried mothers routinely being able to keep their babies gained any sort of traction.

Or could she have died in childbirth? Although they would surely have contacted the family to inform them of her death - or would they?

If she died in childbirth in some official facililty such as a hospital or place for unmarried mothers, her death would have been registered in the usual way. There are no deaths of a Mary Flanagan in 1960 which could possibly be her.

If she had died in that way, there's a good chance the authorities would have offered to place the baby with her family. It was not unknown for an unmarried teenager's baby to be brought up in the family as a child of the grandmother if that was credible.

In addition, its worth noting that abortion was not legal at the time. If Mary was pregnant and marriage was not on the cards for whatever reason, perhaps she sought a backstreet abortion and died in the process? Then the person doing the abortion had to get rid of Mary's body, so that he did not get prosecuted for carrying out illegal abortions.

I think that's unlikely. Firstly because Mary was Catholic and even today the abortion rate amongst Catholic women is pretty low. Secondly because it sounds as though her life was sheltered and controlled by her father so it's unlikely she'd have known where to turn to get an illegal abortion. It's the sort of thing that would only have been discussed between very close and trusted friends.

 

[Cherry]

check Northern Ireland.

 

[Jennifer17]

At that time it was virtually unthinkable for an unmarried mother to keep her baby. The state was a lot more paternalistic then and made decisions that would not be countenanced now. For example, when my mother was in hospital having me, there was a woman on the ward who'd just had her 10th baby and her belly was hanging almost to her knees. The doctors refused to discharge her until she had been sterilised.

The reality is that since she would have been estranged from her family, Mary would effectively have been forced to hand over her baby and then discharged. She probably wouldn't even have been allowed to name the baby or register the birth as it was normal for healthy babies to be handed over to childless couples within days and for the adoptive parents to register the child as theirs with their surname and choice of first name(s) from the start. It wasn't until the late 1960s that the idea of unmarried mothers routinely being able to keep their babies gained any sort of traction.



If she died in childbirth in some official facililty such as a hospital or place for unmarried mothers, her death would have been registered in the usual way. There are no deaths of a Mary Flanagan in 1960 which could possibly be her.

If she had died in that way, there's a good chance the authorities would have offered to place the baby with her family. It was not unknown for an unmarried teenager's baby to be brought up in the family as a child of the grandmother if that was credible.



I think that's unlikely. Firstly because Mary was Catholic and even today the abortion rate amongst Catholic women is pretty low. Secondly because it sounds as though her life was sheltered and controlled by her father so it's unlikely she'd have known where to turn to get an illegal abortion. It's the sort of thing that would only have been discussed between very close and trusted friends.

No, no, no. The admitted Catholic abortions may be low, but more abortions went on in Catholic families than others. Pregnancies out of wedlock were so shameful, many, many Catholic families arranged backyard abortions or sent them to England for a month's holiday.

 

[MelmothTheLost]

No, no, no. The admitted Catholic abortions may be low, but more abortions went on in Catholic families than others. Pregnancies out of wedlock were so shameful, many, many Catholic families arranged backyard abortions or sent them to England for a month's holiday.

Do you have a source for widespread abortions in Catholic families at this time?

Out of wedlock pregnancies were shameful for almost any woman and family at this time. The usual response was to send the girl out of the area on a pretext of some sort to have her baby which was left for adoption before the girl returned to her family. Illegal abortions did happen, of course they did, but they weren't the only option to cover up an illegitimate pregnancy.

 

[shadowdancer]

Do you have a source for widespread abortions in Catholic families at this time?

Out of wedlock pregnancies were shameful for almost any woman and family at this time. The usual response was to send the girl out of the area on a pretext of some sort to have her baby which was left for adoption before the girl returned to her family. Illegal abortions did happen, of course they did, but they weren't the only option to cover up an illegitimate pregnancy.

No religion allows abortion, but there have been backstreet abortions (of various kinds) since at least Victorian times, and probably before that too. I was recently told by a staunchly religious (not Catholic) 92 year old relative that 2 of her sisters had abortions when they were young and unwed.

There are many things that religious leaders and society said were forbidden, but its extremely naïve to think that they didn't happen. The only difference was the fact that nobody talked about it.

Even today there are organisations which help women to have abortions in countries where abortion is against the law, sending abortion pills through the post.

Women will always, and have always done what they have to do to end a pregnancy if they truly believe that having this baby is unthinkable for them, no matter what society or religious leaders tell them.

 

[shadowdancer]

No, no, no. The admitted Catholic abortions may be low, but more abortions went on in Catholic families than others. Pregnancies out of wedlock were so shameful, many, many Catholic families arranged backyard abortions or sent them to England for a month's holiday.

Exactly. The more religious the people, the higher the rate of backstreet abortions.

Its very easy to say "Oh, she didn't need to have an abortion, she can just secretly have the baby in a mother and baby home!"

Unfortunately the reality is nothing like as simple as that. They would definitely have to tell their parents about it, which would have terrified many of these girls, whereas an abortion can be performed earlier in the pregnancy before they grow a bump, so its easier to hide that from parents if the girl doesn't want her parents knowing.

Its all the months you lose from your life whilst you are away at the mother and baby home too. You have to give up your job. What if your family needs the money you bring in from your job, as was the case in many families back then? This of course being before social safety nets such as child benefit.

Also, its so incredibly heartbreaking to carry and birth a child, knowing that you won't be able to keep it. Not to mention the pain and danger to health involved in childbirth. No epidurals back then!

Then there is the fear that someone will work out that she has actually gone away to have a baby, and the shame that would be caused by it getting out.

Also, there was the way that women were treated in some of these homes (especially the religious ones where the women were punished for their sin of sex outside marriage). Yes, these things were not talked about openly, but nobody was under the illusion that these mother and baby homes were happy, clappy places.

Women had no end of reasons to want an abortion if they were pregnant outside of marriage.

 

[MelmothTheLost]

Unfortunately the reality is nothing like as simple as that. They would definitely have to tell their parents about it, which would have terrified many of these girls, whereas an abortion can be performed earlier in the pregnancy before they grow a bump, so its easier to hide that from parents if the girl doesn't want her parents knowing.

The problem I have with this idea is how a 16 year old like Mary would have known where to access an abortion and how she'd have paid for it. She almost certainly left school at 14 and then worked at two part time jobs, both of them pretty menial so wouldn't have had much in savings after paying her parents for her keep.

If you had money and the right contacts you could usually find one of the many doctors, nurses or midwives who carried out abortions on the QT. These were the safe options since there was medical training behind the procedure.

Otherwise you were stuck with the stereotypical back street abortionist - untrained and wielding a coat hanger or some sort of solution which was introduced to the uterus. If Mary did go for an abortion, this is most likely what would have been available to her. Clearly the risk of death or serious injury was much higher and I would imagine most of these practitioners had the odd fatality of two. But then there would have been the problem of getting rid of the body.

Thats assuming that she arranged an abortion herself and that her parents were not involved. After all, they did spend the rest of their lives wondering what had happened to her. If they arranged for her to go to a non-medically trained abortionist and she died during the procedure and her body was disposed of, then I can see that they would probably not have known what happened to her. From their point of view she would have gone to someone recommended but then vanished. They would have had a good idea of what happened but couldn't do anything about it, such as going to the police, nor know where her body was. However their reported behaviour afterwards does not suggest to me that they were involved in whatever happened.

Stephanie Gentile has previously said that she is confident Mary did not end up in the Thames so we would be looking elsewhere for her body. At this time post-war London still had a lot of wasteland and bombed out buildings where a body could be disposed of, but these have all been cleared and redeveloped since then without her body coming to light. So where is it?

TBH I'm torn between too many possibles:

1. She ran away with her real boyfriend (which is why I think that Edinburgh lead should be vigorously run down as well as the possibility that they went to Ireland);
2. She ran away on her own and was supported initially by someone in her network of friends or work colleagues before moving on to having her own life (Edinburgh again);
3. She died during an abortion procedure;
4. She was murdered by Tom (eg jealousy on finding she had another boyfriend);
5. She was murdered by someone not in the picture.

 

[Brundell]

Hello,
I appreciate I'm a bit late to this party but I've been following Mary's case vaguely over the years and for some reason fell down a bit of a rabbit hole with it today
I'm under no illusions that I'm going to work this out but just wanted to pick mightier brains than mine so if anyone could help me fill in a few gaps I would be extremely grateful.
1) How long had Mary not been going to work for? Most of what I have read says several weeks but the Evening Standard says two days?
2) Tom McGinty- was he Irish or of Irish descent? By that I mean, for example, my Granny was Scottish, I've been to Scotland twice in my life. As my Mum say "Irish from Ireland or Scottish like we are? "
It seems his mother at least lived locally but his involvement with the family petered out.

I have theories of course, we all do but I'm organising my notes and research to try to make them coherent . My gut instinct is that even if Mary's still on the Earth plane, she's not coming back.
In the interest of full disclosure, someone recently suggested I start a blog about unsolved and missing people and as I feel a certain affinity with Mary (my Mum also grew up in London just a few years later, I see so much in common between them and think there but for the grace of God...) I want to make her my first post. I feel like I'm giving her pride of place that way.
Thanking everyone in advance for any answers you may be able to give me.

 

[Richard]

Mary Flanagan
Missing since December 31, 1959 from Newham, East London, England, United Kingdom
Classification: Missing

Vital Statistics

• • Date Of Birth: June 9, 1943
  • Age at Time of Disappearance: 16 years old
  • Distinguishing Characteristics: Brown wavy hair; hazel eyes. Olive complexion.
  • Height and Weight: 165 cm (5'4")

Circumstances of Disappearance
Flanagan was last seen in Newham, East London, England, United Kingdom on December 31, 1959.

In 1959 Mary was living with her family in Newham, East London. She was working as an assistant for a local firm.

On the day she disappeared, Mary over slept but said she would go to work that afternoon. She left home at lunchtime. This was the last time she was seen.

When Mary’s family contacted her employer, they found out she had not been to work for two weeks, despite leaving the house each morning as normal.

Investigators
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:

Missing People
0500 700 700 (from the UK)
+44 (0)20 8392 4545 (outside the UK)

Agency Case Number: dsid=298

Source Information:
Doe Network
Missing People
NPIA

LINK:

The Doe Network: Case File 1140DFUK

 

[JerseyGirl]

Age at disappearance: 16

Missing Since: December 31, 1959

Missing from: Newham

Reference No: 94-000632

An idea of what Mary would look like now

The heartbreaking faces of 54 London children who are currently missing

 

[alb1on]

Interesting exchanges about abortions. I have no idea whether that is a factor in this case but I do know that it would have been no problem to have procured one in East London at that time. The east end in the 1950s was a tenement slum area where abortion was a fact of life and readily available. Those not familiar with it could get some idea of the culture from the stories of the Krays and their rivals - although, like similar areas in other big cities at the time - the criminality was mostly at a survival level and there were better areas scattered amongst the slums.

 

[Richard]

Bumping this thread up...

 

[alb1on]

A few comments on some detailed points raised in various posts;

1. someone asked why Tom's details are unknown given he was interviewed by the police. Apparently the original files were lost in a flood years ago.
2. it was suggested it was odd that the employer did not call round to enquire. The employer was Tate & Lyle, a huge operation with probably thousands of employees at the time. If it had been a small or medium size employer it may have been surprising, but not with an operation of that size.
3. I wondered why there seemed so little detail from the 2013 reopening. The mother died in 2000 and the father in 2004, so only siblings were available in 2013 and as they were all younger their knowledge may have been limited.
4. Someone asked about the middle name of Mary. As it was initial C I lean to Catherine as her paternal grandmother (who died in 1973 and seems to have been part of the extended household) was Mary Catherine Boyd.
5. Unfortunately one of her sisters, Eileen, died in 2021 reducing available witnesses further.

Not very helpful but it may clear up some detail.