Marion Reeder, Bournemouth - about 1931. ARC TBC?

[Starchild]

My father is trying to trace his natural birth-mother. It is proving to be an unusual story and we are really struggling now. He has emailed the FBI and USCIS with absolutely no success other than to receive a generic reply which is, to be honest, worthless and insensitive.

The lady in question is one Marion Reeder. My father was born in Knowle Road, Bornemouth on 29th November 1945. We can find no trace of Marion Reeder in this country, it may be because she illegitimately gave birth to him at the age of 14/15 years but it would seem unusual that there is no record of her birth. Her name is listed on his birth-certificate, however. He ended up at an adoption centre (or similar) in Surrey in 1946 before being adopted and living in Ilford in 1947. I have had sight of the adoption letters etc but these give nothing further away. I include an excerpt from his original email:


I hope you may be able to help. I am searching for my birth-mother to whom I was born illegitimately here in the UK in 1945 and adopted in 1947. Searches through all the normal channels based on UK residence have proved negative as no trace of her or my adoption records (despite the adoption being conducted through the courts) can be found. As her birth record does not appear anywhere I had hoped to trace her through adoption records and to this end have conducted searches through five county councils, three county courts, the National health Service and numerous charitable organisations who were operating at the time.

I had all but given up (even a professional genealogist could find nothing) when Ancestry advertised their worldwide immigration records were available for free viewing for a short period. As the story I had grown up with was that my father was an unknown American serviceman I thought I would put my mother's name in on the off chance. Imagine my amazement when the records showed an eighteen year old woman of her name was found to be a stowaway on the S.S. Santa Maria which landed her at Charleston, S.C. on the 19th February 1949. She was then shipped on to New York where she landed on the 21st February and was required to present herself to your immigration people for "BSI". Although I cannot discover her port of departure,( I strongly believe it to be Southampton, England) this seems to be such an incredible coincidence that I cannot believe it was anybody else but her.

Unfortunately, despite this piece of (I hope) good luck the trail has immediately gone cold again. I can find no trace of her return to this country as she may have been deported, nor can I find a record of her naturalisation. Again, unfortunately as I do not know how your legal system would have applied to her back then had she been allowed to stay and perhaps meet up with this unknown serviceman.

Clearly, although quite elderly, she could well still be alive and I should be grateful if you could advise me regarding procedures to try to trace her or discover what happened to her back in 1949. I note from your web-site that there are forms of application for certain records but do not know if these apply to foreigners.

As you can see, this is no ordinary case. I would like him to find his birth-mother, he is now 67 years-old and she would be 82(ish). Currently, this search has been running for around 3 years...

Has anybody out there ANY idea where we could go from here? I've no idea really who to contact in the USA who may be able to help or if there is any way of finding out more information about Marion Reeder in this country.

Thanks for taking the time to read this

[linell]

Hi Starchild, sorry but we cannot discuss living people on here, Identity Fraud etc. Try 192.com.

Linell.

[peterd]

sent you a PM ( personal message)

[Starchild]

Thanks, but we can't confirm she is still alive either. It would be nice to believe she is but time passes and who knows? It was worth a try!