Notes A birth registration was found for Mary L M O'Brien: Mother's Maiden Surname: Baker; Date of Registration: Jan Feb Mar 1946; Registration district: Rochford; Registration county: Essex; Volume Number: 4a; Page Number: 1274.
In 1959, Mary O'Brien, 13 (along with brother, Patrick O'Brien, 15 and sister, Myrtle O'Brien, 12), arrived at Sydney, Australia, in a group of Fairbridge children from Knockholt, Kent, England, en route to Fairbridge Farm School, Molong, Australia.
In an interview with the Sunday Times Online (July 27, 2007), Mary O'Brien broke her silence telling of the sexual abuse she received at the hands of her after-school carer.
"Mary O?Brien cannot forget being driven through London?s East End, where she had lived, towards Tilbury docks, one dreary, wet and miserable April afternoon. She was 13.
That year, 1959, she left England for the Fairbridge Farm School at Molong, New South Wales, with her brother Paddy and sister Myrtle, aboard the SS Strathaird, a grand old P&O liner. When she boarded the ship, in her linen hat and gingham frock, she stepped into a sumptuous world of wealth and luxury.
'It was a child?s dream,' she said. Within six weeks the children sat in a rattling old train heading towards the Fairbridge Farm School in rural Australia. Mary recalls arriving at the station: ?We were herded into a truck and driven out to the farm. And the honeymoon was over??
Within a year at Molong, Mary was moved out of her cottage into Gloucester House, where visitors to the farm stayed. It was also the home of the aftercare officer, Mr William Phillips, and his family. Mary served as the ?domestic? and shared a bedroom with Phillips?s daughter.
'I was expected to clean up for them, serve them and their visitors. It was the most degrading part of my life. [H]e [Mr Phillips] sexually abused me. I?d then be expected to serve him breakfast next morning. I didn?t mention it because I thought it was just happening to me. I had no idea whether other children were having problems.'
Her grades at Orange High School, which Fairbridge allowed her to attend because she showed talent, slipped; her self-esteem fell; and she played truant. But within two years she was allowed to rejoin her mother, who emigrated to Australia to be reunited with her three children, and lived in a flat in an outer suburb of Sydney.
'I felt sorry for those who never had that,? Mary recalls, ?to walk out of Fairbridge and have their mums to go to. My mum was poor and she was sick. But she was my mum. And she took me away from there. And that was everything.'"
Contributors Created : 2009-03-06 10:59:06 / From original database Last Updated : 2009-03-06 11:25:08 /
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