Anyone Know How to Trace and Adoption from 1937?

leahn

Hi,

my grandmother was adopted in 1937, she has always wanted to find out who her birth parents were but she never really pushed the issue. She did approach the nuns who handled the adoption but they told her no and she never went any further with. My mother and I want to see if we can find anything out.

My question is this. Does anyone know whether the law in 1937 still applies to my grandmother regarding finding her parents? Also what is this law? Is she permitted to find them or are the records blocked. Presumably they are dead at this stage or if not then at least in their late eighties, early nineties so we do not expect to meet them.

If any one could give me some advice on this or point me in the direction of someone who could help it would be greatly appreciated.

little nell

your best bet is to first go to joyce house in dublin where you will get your grandmothers birth cert.this will give you her mothers name and address,you are at nothing with the adoption board as they will not be any help to you.so try to get the birth cert first then i will tell you the next step.ok

leahn

We already have a copy of her birth cert, got it in Cork as that's where we are. Not sure where to go from here.

little nell

ok so look for a marriage cert for her mother ,if she did get married then you have a better chance of finding her as if she moved from the area of the address on the birth cert no one would know her by her maiden name.hope this is of some help

The_Conductor

Unfortunately, adoption was not on a legal footing in Ireland, prior to the 1954 act- so there not an awful lot that can be done from a legalistic viewpoint. Adoptions did regularly occur even prior to 1954- but they tended to be informal arrangements normally between nuns who run homes and catholics of good standing who would approach their parish priest with their conundrum, normally if they were unable to have children of their own (curiously in a lot of cases they may subseqently have had children of their own following adopting).

You already have a copy of your mothers birthcert- this should have her mothers name on it. If you visit the reading rooms in Roscommon (or Joyce House in Dublin when they return the books there), you can make a presumption that her mother (that is your maternal grandmother) was most probably between the age of 18 and 25 (this is an assumption that you may have to revisit) and from there work on the books of births for 1922-29 (you're actually lucky- a lot of the books immediately prior to this time frame were destroyed in the Custom House fire). The book are in alphabetical order- so it shouldn't take too long. Its entirely possible that you may have several possible matches- particularly if its a common name (and you should also be aware that people may not be known by their first name- or may be known by a variant of their first name). At this point it would probably be a good idea to try to confirm that you have the right person- if the nun who your mum was originally talking to is human at all- she should at very least agree to do this (then again she might not- but cross that bridge when you come to it).

Once you have your maternal grandmother's name confirmed definitely- you can then attack the marriage certs (as you'll now have a date of birth for your grandmother, you can be pretty sure you're looking at the right records). There is no guarantee that she married, but then again- perhaps the ever helpful (I hope) nun might be able to shed a little light on this.

Once you have her marriage cert- its very straight forward to build up a family tree- and even to find current information (historical electoral registers are amazing sources of information and are normally available on microfiche in all county libraries (its only the current register that is at the Garda Baracks)).

If any of us can give you tips as you're going along feel free to ask.

Best wishes,

Shane