This archive report was first published on 6 June 2020.
June 6, 2020
Two siblings, David and Helen, have been reunited after a remarkable DNA investigation revealed they were found abandoned in red tartan bags in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, respectively, in the 1960s.
David was found in a stranger's parked car in Belfast in 1962, while Helen was discovered in a telephone box in Dundalk in 1968. Both were adopted by loving step-parents and brought up in different faiths, with David being raised as a Protestant and Helen as a Catholic.
As they grew older, both siblings sought desperately to discover their origins, but their research yielded no results until a lorry driver responded to a public appeal by Helen, revealing that she had been wrapped in a red tartan bag when found.
Independent Television, makers of the programme Long Lost Family, learned about the two tartan bags and persuaded David and Helen to provide DNA samples for investigation. The result confirmed that they were brother and sister.
The siblings' father, a Protestant, was married with 14 children, while their mother, a Catholic from County Kerry in Ireland, remained unmarried. Both parents are now deceased, with the father passing away in 1993 and the mother in 2017.
David and Helen's story highlights the stigma of illegitimacy and the religious divide that sealed their fates. However, they have finally found some answers, even if mysteries remain and some wounds cannot be healed.
As Helen said,
