The Tragic Tale of the Queen’s Secret Cousins | The Bowes-Lyon Sisters
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- Опубликовано: 20 окт 2022
- Welcome to Forgotten Lives! In today's episode we are looking into the lives of Nerissa and Katherine Bowes-Lyon the first cousins of Queen Elizabeth II. These contemporaries of the late Queen were born with severe mental disabilities and they were soon cast aside by the extended royal family in a controversy which only came to light decades later.
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My mentally handicapped son was born in 1968, and even then it was suggested he be put in a home. I was not having it. I told more than one doctor that he was my son, not an animal to be caged, and there were many of us who felt the same. The 70's is when change started happening because families started keeping them. I am proud to say he lives in his own townhouse, drives a car and works. Yes, he has to be guided and his money handeled for him but he has a happy life. My hubby and I are so happy we didn't put him away to languish inside some building, never to have a life. He was and still is a valued family member. Love him to bits. I do not judge those who can't care for them and have to place them because it can be very hard. It is a lonely road to travel if you have no support.
U were his angel. 😇
Well done!
Hats off to you. Now THAT'S true love !!!!
Well done but “he’s my son not an animal to be cages” sickening comment there though. How do you think THEIR mothers feel? They’re someone’s son/daughter and sister/brother, cousin, grandchild, etc too, it’s just as wrong to kidnap and cage them for profit as it would be for your son, and their relatives feel the way you would have if he was taken and thrown in a cage to be used or gawked at for the captors to profit! And we ARE animals too, and write all the same (except nonhuman animals are more advanced/evolved of course) and it’s basic biology even if some heartless mindless brainwashed people use it as an insult to fuel their false sense of superiority, which sadly seems to apply to you as well. Don’t be a hypocrite. Treat others as well as you’d like to be treated or better.
the same happened to my older sister whose first child was born with severe Down's Syndrome. He was born 3 months after I was, and was raised with the rest of her children. He is 52, still alive and the most loving, sweet man. He is so proud of his job, and an important member of our family, also!
I know that when my brother was born, mum was told to have him seen to by a child psychiatrist. My dad told them that nothing like that is in his family! Years later, I was in High school, one of my teachers warned dad, at a Parent-teacher interview, to keep a close eye on me. I was very nervous and close to a nervous breakdown. Again, my dad said that nothing like that's in his family. But, when I was 17, I did have a nervous breakdown. The social backlash I got, in a small village was hurtful. I couldn't even get a simple job, because of that! It was 1969. My mother was great! As I never wanted to go out, she'd say to me: "Come on, it's a nice day. Come to the shops with me, it'll be quiet!" It was the best thing she ever did! I met one of my friends through this and my future husband. We're not long from our Golden Anniversary!
Bless your Mom 🙏🏿
Much love and hugs. ❤
we... My 2
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My great great uncle was "put away" too(in Australia). He went into an asylum and was never heard from again we don't even know where he was buried. Unfortunately there was such a stigma about it. When his brother (my great grandfather) however had a little girl with down syndrome he fought like hell to keep her, when his wife died she was sent to family member to look after as he had 7 other kids to care for but when he remarried she was brought back. I loved aunty Et we had so much fun together I'm glad he fought for her.
Happened a lot in Australia my great grandfather disappeared as well
@@michellecobb2158 so much stigma ripped families apart
In what period are you taking about? My stepson was institutionalised in Melbourne but we took him out and without any help tried to give him a good life despite being severely intellectual disabled
@@debbieanne7962y great grandfather generation gave birth (1910-1929) to the boys that went off to ww2 and aunty Et was the youngest. His brother would have been between (1890-1910)
Do you have his name and DOB? I'm a genealogist in Australia and could see if I'm able to locate his gravesite (if any)
Even though my body is considered “disabled” I am still thankful to have a sound mind and the ability to advocate on for myself.
Reminded me of Rosemary Kennedy & her father forcing her to have a lobotomy that went wrong & she was placed in an institution.
ETA: Also Queen Elizabeth's father's brother, Prince John was epileptic and lived apart from his family until he died. His father was King at that point, George V. Prince John lived at Wood Farm.
And nothing was wrong with Rosemary except she had a misogynistic father.
@@beastshawnee Rosemary was developmentally disabled.
@@elizabethhopkins7582 No she wasn’t. She only had mental issues after the lobotomy that her father forced her to have. He didn’t like that she was so rebellious and thought it would “tame” the rebellion, making her a good little girl. Instead it did the opposite and turned her into a 2 year old 😿. He then abandoned her in an institution and pretended nothing ever happened and that she no longer existed. The only person to ever really visit her was her brother John. I think one of her sisters did as well. I want to say it was Patricia but I can’t remember.
@@joanngreen8747 they hardly visited her for years they only stated to in the 80s
Inbreeding will do that.
I have kept my 25 year old disabled son at home all these years. Even just 25 years ago Drs encouraged me to put him away and countless drs told me I was a bad parentfor raising him with my healthy children. I cant imagine how much worse it would have been 100 years ago.
You are an amazing, loving parent and I hope you will always feel proud of the decision you made to raise your precious son despite what anyone else thought. Take care.
I think you are an amazing mother. You put your son first. He’s a very lucky lad indeed. Sending best wishes to you both ❤❤
It's getting worse again. Our eldest has level three autism. He has two younger brothers. The hospital seemed to think exposing the younger siblings to the eldest brother would make them autistic. So they reported us to Child Safety and got what they wanted. Our eldest was torn away from us screaming and now has no contact with any of his family members. We have not seen him for the best part of six months. The younger boys are kept together and are very likely autistic. The youngest one was 4 months old when he was ripped from my breast. The hospital decided that something in my breastmilk was turning the children autistic because the nutrient content was poor. So they administered cow's milk products to them after they stole them from us. The middle child, now two years old, has failed to grow for the last 8 months. He's skin and bone. He has failed to erupt all his teeth. This is because he's allergic to cow's milk.
@@reswobiandreaming3644 Autism is not contagious, I'm so sorry that they did this to you. Shame on them! My mother didn't listen to the doctors when my sister was born. She is living with mental retardation and autism. It was hard for my parents to take care of her when she was older in her teens. So Stockley Center helped her a great deal. My mother and me visited her many times and as she got older we found a group home so she could live comfortably in a caring environment and community. Mary is an integral part of our lives. We are a close family now.
God bless you!🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻❤
Thanks for Ur hope. Check about organic coconut products, nigella sativa Seeds and brahmi powder as tea, it helps improve mental disease. Stoping gluten and dairy helps also.
At the time, putting people "away" in institutions was not uncommon. My mother's brother was sent to such a place at 6 years old (early 1940's). My mother remembers visiting just a few times, as the hospital was 40 miles from their home, and no one drove back then. Bus service was infrequent, as well as a very long and tiring ride, and my grandmother couldn't get away for an entire day very often. She says that 40 miles may as well have been a thousand back then. Also, they were told by doctors not to visit often so that her brother could become acclimated to his new life and "forget" about his former life, so it wasn't always cruelty on a family's behalf, but advice from doctors. Doctors were not questioned back then. Ever. You did what they told you.
These days if you don't obey the doctor's orders, they set child protection onto you and organise the grubberment authorised kidnapping of your children. Then they set about estranging you from your children because you are a danger to them. The doctors do this because they do not want to manage complex patients like those with disabilities.
Yep, very little was understood about disability and mental illness by even experts back then. A lot of families weren't equipped to know how to deal with it. In a lot of cases it was thought of as shameful and people with disabilities just weren't seen in public often except lower income areas but people also believed it was the better thing to do. It was also really dependent on where these people were sent how well they were treated or not. It's a lot better now, but we still have a long way to go and it's not talked about enough.
@@frumtheground I'm sorry to say that not much has changed. Just because our understanding of disability has improved doesn't mean that the application of that knowledge is to the benefit of disabled people. The most common cause of death in disabled people is most likely abortion. They have something called the Down's Syndrome test which is actually a chromosomal anomaly test. Any pregnant woman that is subjected to the test and returns a positive result is encouraged to terminate the pregnancy. If she chooses to keep the child but refuses to allow the child to be genetically tested to identify the genetic markers to refine the test, the grubberment has a sophisticated system to perpetrate a campaign of what is controlled family demolition. If they can't get what they want, they steal the children from the parents. Considering that 70% of the ova a woman produces have chromosomal anomalies, how many babies are lost before they are born? No wonder the birth rate is below replacement level in many countries.
@@frumtheground I am sad to say it is worse.
@@reswobiandreaming3644 The most common causes of death among people with Down Syndrome are heart and lung diseases. This is because about 50% of people with Down Syndrome are born with congenital heart defects that lead them to have shorter overall life expectancy than their peers. The number people born with DS has increased by 30% between 1979 and 2003. People aren't forced to have prenatal testing for Down Syndrome or any other chromosomal disorders. The only procedure (CVS) able to determine a definitive prenatal diagnosis of DS is considered risky and invasive which is why it's optional, and only about 2% of pregnancies are tested. Parents don't have their children taken away from them just because a child has DS or any other disability, but because of neglect or abuse. Disabled people are among some of the most vulnerable to any type of abuse at any age. Usually by their caregivers.
Clearly you have very strong feelings about the ethics of prenatal testing and abortion, but you don't need to use falsehoods to support your feelings regarding those issues. Just consider your own statement here: "The most common causes of death in disabled people is most likely abortion." This is fallaciously and factually an incorrect statement. The reason being, that the overwhelming majority of disabilities aren't caused chromosomally, aren't testable prenatal or otherwise, and don't present themselves until children can be observed such as Autism, ADHD, deafness, blindness, chronic illnesses like juvenile arthritis, mental health disorders, paralysis, seizures, traumatic brain injury, etc. You'd have to ignore all of those disabled people to support that claim. A better and more sound position would be to point out the implications of acceptable eugenics and how it broadly influences social attitudes toward the disabled.
Thank you for your very respectful presentation of the Bowes-Lyon sisters’ story. Their treatment by their family was disturbing - I realize this was a reflection of the times. I truly hope the sisters, along with their fellow residents, were treated with human kindness and decency.
@@urheehoo Sadly yes
@Autumn Leaves that generation just wanted to have a better life for their kids
So leaving the mentally disabled, and psychiatrically ill living on the streets of major cities in 2022 is vastly superior to the wealthy institutions of the past?
@@urheehoo No, we don’t know they were treated badly by the institution staff. The fact that they had a funeral for one of the sisters is a huge indicator that they were well cared for. It may not seem like a big deal to you, but this was a time where there was to few nurses to take care of to many patients, and it was socially acceptable to burry patients in a mass grave. The fact that they found the time and resources (care for other patients) to have a respectful funeral does prove a lot. It may take education in Disability History for you to fully understand what I am referring to.
@Autumn Leaves goodness sakes girl, you seem to need some mental help too. Your comment was unnecessary. Nasty of you. Lucky you didn’t live in those times.
My brother was the first child in a family of four. My father became his best friend and they shared a lot of time together hunting, fishing, etc. He became a constant companion on his work duties, they loved being together. To have a handicapped person in your family is a blessing. My brother taught us all how to have more empathy in our lives and I am drawn to working with special needs people because of him. He is a pure-heart and -minded man. He taught us all how to love with COMPASSION FIRST. He was always an inspiration to anyone whoever met him. My brother-in-law was generally a prejudiced guy but also spent a lot of time with my brother going to sports together. It breaks my heart that these women were treated this way by SPIRITUALLY-HANDICAPPED people. RIP ladies.
I met both at The Royal Earlswood Hospital. The only reason we were a "royal" hospital, was those two poor souls.
Sir, is it true about the lack of funding, provision and visitation for them from the Windsor Family?
My brother had a downs syndrome son while he and his wife were young the midwife that delivered him told my sister inlaw it was her fault ! The doctors advised them to just let him go as he wouldn't have a quality of life ! They said no took him home and sadly he passed away aged 40 in 2020. He had a wonderful life music being his best love.
Unbelievable that Nurse !nurse Ratchet
It isn’t shocking that they were kept out of the public eye. It is horrifying that their own parents acted like they ceased to exist. How cruel!
It is what happened back in the day. Sounds cruel now but years ago it was considered acceptable.
Common practice in those days and even in the sixties , it was not just for the rich either , many families had people with disabilities hidden away in asylums
There father was dead years before the girls were sent to an institution and that didn't happen until they became adults. Their widowed mother was reputed to have mental issues herself so it's possible that problems in the immediate family was a contributing factor rather than them being shut away out of callousness
It's all horrible all of it and if you really believe it's better now you are in denial or just young
There were plenty of people that did it...not just the uppercrust..they were ashamed or to poor to look after them...
May the souls of the Bowes-Lyon sisters rest in eternal peace.🌹🌹 Great investigating, presentation and historical information, too.
????
Small note from a speech-language pathologist and disability advocate: it’s important to recognize that people who don’t speak still communicate. It’s extremely unlikely the sisters didn’t learn to communicate. Non-speaking people have many effective ways to communicate, such as gestures, facial expression, making sounds, and many more. Given the time period it’s almost assured they weren’t provided any technology to help them communicate more effectively, but I would hope that their caregivers learned to read their communication. To anyone reading who loves a non-speaking person, there are so many things we can do to help you and your loved one communicate with each other.
In my country, out in the colonies, we would probably teach them sign language, if at all possible. There is so much I / we the public don't know about their specifics.
My late maternal grandmother, and one of her sisters became nurses, they were two out of a family of eight children. Only the two nurses married, four children succumbed to either the 1918 influenza epidemic or PTSD in either ww1, or ww2.
Before my teenage years, in hindsight, I was being groomed by my late grandmother for her 19th century sister whom it would appear likely to outlive siblings whilst in an institution.
Later in life, I became a District Health Board employee.
Incidentally, I have HRH bloodline in this same family 👪
The survival of my late Great aunt, is a testament of the care my relative received all those years ago.❤😊
Thanks for your story.😊
😊😊
Katherine looks remarkedly like Queen Elizabeth11at aged 14 years.
Many people from that era and earlier were locked away in institutions simply because the health profession of those times didn't understand mental health issues like depression, PTSD, grief etc. as well as people which literally sent them insane mostly by the bazar treatments they received. Thankfully there is more understanding and help for people suffering these traumas along with more understanding, help and support for those with disabilities and these people are no longer locked up with the keys thrown away. and forgotten about.
That's just what I thought, she looks so much like the late Queen.
Can definitely tell they're kin folk.
My life experience informs me that there isn't much help or understanding for disabled people. There is only exploitation and abuse.
That’s what I said too. Such a strong resemblance between cousins
Thought the same too.
At the time of Narissa and Catherine's birth, eugenics reigned supreme and disability was a shameful indication of 'tainted blood' What happened to these children was the norm at the time and not considered especially cruel. Today, we are horrified. Congrats on this essay - Very sensitively done
Which is ironic considering how inbred the nobility is..
Yes but you are forgetting the intermarriage of many royals over the centuries. We all know what can happen by marrying one's cousin!
@@classicaldeb This didn't have anything to do with "royals." There was some kind of genetic problem on their mother's side of the family. They had some cousins on that side of the family with problems too who were also institutionalized.
@@SR-iy4ggAt least the royals could have looked after their own family members
My understanding is that they developed fairly normally for years but sometime in their teens, regressed.
It was not unusual for this to happen to disabled people. Back then babies were left to die if they showed severe disability. My mother had a cousin that meningitis as a toddler and was left with some disabilities that I'm unsure about. This would probably be in the mid to late 1930s. She was placed in a home and my aunt was told to forget her. Very normal for back then. The poor girl died when she was 11 from goodness knows what. People were so secretive and so many things swept under the carpet.
One older midwife told me back many years ago that she knew of cases way back when babies that were drowned at birth if they were unwanted. It's a cruel world and not really any better today.
Drowning unwanted babies still happens today for sure. They are still very secretive about how they dispose of disabled kids. The most common cause of death for disabled people today is probably abortion. They just use the Down's Syndrome test to identify any embryos that have chromosomal anomalies and pressure the Mothers to abort. The media runs campaigns on how the disabled are just a burden on society so the pressure is enormous.
That was common practice in any family who could afford it. Rich families had “disappointment rooms” where members with disabilities were kept with servants completely out of the public eye. Families acted as if they didn’t exist. That was normal practice, as a disabled family member was considered an embarrassment. There is nothing unusual in this behavior for the time and social status of the relatives.
It’s still a terrible practice.
Thanks for sharing
Still it doesn't excuse their behaviour. Any human with a conscience will know that burdening their family members because of disabilities is considered abused and unkind.
I hate when people excuse other people's bad actions, because they are either old, born in a bad era, etc. Can we stop giving excuses.
My mum's cousin was put into an asylum after he received brain damage from an infection, possibly meningitis, as a child. As sad as it is it was just the way things were at the time.
Both my parents worked at the Royal Earlswood Hospital after the Second World War. That is where they met . My father was Night Superintendent and my mother a Nurse Sister. I remember going there with my father one day when about 8 yrs old. My mother said the sisters were well cared for as were all the patients.
Thank you. My grandfather was the last of 10 children. My father had never known that one of his much older uncles (most of whom were dead before he was born) existed. My father had really good records, a typed family tree etc. When I researched the tree I found the census records for the missing one (a twin) who was even working so sentient and not disabled) to about 1901 but then put in Durham lunatic asylum where he died after a few years. I think it was out of sight, out of mind in those days. Luckily my father, a psychiatrist/doctor in the 1960s spent a lot of his time making sure disabled people could be cared in the community and at home where that was possible - a massive change. I don't think we can blame people from the old times for doing what was then the thing to do and we should not look at it with the lenses of today. There will be things we think are fine in 2022 which in 50 years will seem disgusting I bet.
No we can't blame people but we should make the "royal families who are genetically harmed by intermarrying ( keep all the land and $$$$$$$ in the family) pick up the tab instead of the British taxpayers. It was 2014 when one of Elizabeths cousins died. She NEVER went to the funeral. Absolutely DISGUSTING!
Your father is a hero.
Well reasoned and unbiased, very well judged comment. In fact your statement applies not only to this subject but also to many others x
There was a UK documentary on them last year . Staff from the institution stated that the girls never had visitors, or birthday or Christmas presents. They also had only the clothes they arrived in and nothing more was provided, so they wore cast offs from previous residents. To me the person in charge should have written to their family, requesting clothes, at the very least. It was a really sad watch.
They should have just been put down.
@bina nocht I know. I get the shame around mental illness back then, but even so.....
@@sarahholland2600 o9
@bina nocht they were nonverbal even, back then they were considered ¡d¡¤t$...
That's so sad... so much wealth within the Royal and Bowes Lyons families... and they couldn't even spend £200 on simple clothing.
Disgusting
Very late 90s I visited a care home in Devon for people with learning disabilities- the owners mentioned a lady living there was funded by the royal household.
I had a childrens novel called Welcome home Jellybean about a family in the late 70s that reconsiders their decision (directed by doctors at the time) to put their Down’s syndrome daughter in an institution years before and bring her home again. Told from the perspective of the son. Its a wonderfully compassionate book.
Yes, I remember that book!
I remember reading that book! Completely forgot about it til I read your comment.
Omg I remember that book too! We also saw the movie too on VHS in 5th-6th grade.
I'll read that , I could do with a good news story ending
There's a movie duel with the same name and the same continent
A few years ago I worked in group homes with residents who had intellectual and other mental health disorders. It was common for some of the residents to never have any family visit. One man's sister only visited him on Thanksgiving, and the year I was there, she cancelled. He sat and cried. Another resident's mother had to be called on her daughter's birthday so the daughter could talk to her own mom. Mom said to me via phone, "Tell her I'm sorry I haven't come to visit lately. I've been so busy." Her mom lived 30 minutes away and visited a few times a year. My impression was that it's very difficult emotionally for these families to see their relatives like this. Shame, pain, sorrow and embarrassment are some of the emotions. It's easier to ignore them.
That’s like my mom who gave up my sister who is special needs. It traumatized me seeing her cry and scream when she was left at her foster family’s. I see her every Sunday and I’ll do it until the day I die. I love her so much she is my everything and one thing that keeps me humbled. I’m so grateful to have such a beautiful soul for a sister and a pathetic excuse for a selfish, mean and abusive mother
I'm physically disabled from birth myself, It's funny you should mention that families feel embarrassment and shame regarding their disabled family members. I got that vibe from my father often growing up though it was never articulated that way. We can absolutely tell when they're feeling ashamed and embarrassed even in instances where we aren't able to voice it. We often blame ourselves unfortunately.
I also worked in a group home for mentally and physically (they were all both) disabled people. The cost of such homes is exorbitant for most middle income families, so the state paid for the care. Families almost never came. The only time one of the resident's family visited, they ended up shortening her life. They were upset that she was being fed with a feeding tube, which only causes someone not to starve to death when they aren't able to eat very well. The residents can (and did) die of other health problems such as strokes and heart attacks. Other than that, the woman was well cared for and seemed to be relatively happy. However the family went to court so they could decree that doctors could not replace her feeding tube next time it wore out! In my opinion, some people are better off not knowing their family.
Reminds me of Prince John, QEII's uncle who was hidden away and died at 13 when it was discovered that he had epilepsy.
Prince John was not hidden exactly. it was better for him.He lived with his nanny who loved him very much and surprisingly Queen. Mary arranged for children of workers on the estate to be his friends and play with him. they were told he was ill so they would be gentle with him. His epilepsy was discovered when he was 4 years old and he was probably autistic. I saw an interview with a very old lady who remembers playing with him. she said her father used to take them in a pony cart to the store to buy sweets. she said her mother would empty a charity box and he enjoyed putting the coins in one by one. so he enjoyed repetition. So he had a happy life mostly and the king and queen did visit.He was taken to visit his grandmother Queen Alexandra(Queen Mary's mother in law) and he liked planting seeds in the garden. before his next visit she had full blooming flowers put in place of the seeds and I thought that was sweet that he never questioned that they grew in a week. He would pick them and press them into letters he sent to his mother and these letters with the flowers were found among queen Marys things years later. so she loved her little boy.
I had a friend that had Cerebral Palsey who's family treated her like she was an embarrassment, her family put her up in a mobile home in the country and forgot about her , a social worker helped her with her disability checks. She knew how to take care of herself and she cooked and cleaned
That is beyond sad. I hope she is happy and free now.
People r cruel n demonic.
My cousin was born with Cerebral Palsey, also. He was always treated like all the rest of us cousins. He graduated from public high school a year early, drove a tour bus at a historical site and got his real estate license. His mom, of course was his biggest cheerleader. Granted things were changing in the 1960s but his parents wouldn't have sent him away for anything.
I have cerebral palsy and struggle with public perceptions of my independence but am glad I was never closed off like this. It's heartbreaking knowing that the visual physical effects of cerebral palsy may not affect intelligence at all and are treated like your friend:(
Awful. Just awful.
This hurts my soul how their family dump them.
Hiding or giving up disabled children was common place when I was young. Very few people kept children with disabilities and lack of awareness meant that downs syndrome children all had 'pudding basin haircuts' which emphasised their difference. I had also heard via my gran born 1904 that newborns were commonly drowned in a bowl at birth, then described as stillbirths by desperate mothers unable to cope or feed another mouth. I don't think anyone can judge what happened all those years ago, horrific as it seems in modern times.
The drowning does not surprise me, I recently read that in Roman times if they did not want a newborn baby, they would just dump it in the countryside & leave it to die - nobody thought that was cruel. I believe threy didn't really consider children to be worth much until they grew biig enough to work at something, even if just watching the cows ! Life was just so much harder in ancient times especially for the poor !
@@veronicaroach3667 The little ones very often weren't given names because child mortality was so high.
Kafka's novel, 'Metamorphosis' , deals with the subject of disability and the way families used to hide away and try to ignore unfortunate members. It's a very difficult topic and you dealt with it very sensitively.
In those days parents were often told to put a child with severe disabilities into an institution. I have worked in homes for adults with learning disabilities. In one home there was a man with Downes Syndrome. He was 63 years old and had been placed in care at the age of 4 years old. His family have never visited him, the carers who have looked after him have been the only family he knows.
I appreciate that they lived so long, clearly the institutions were keeping the residents clean and fed. That’s more than many health facilities these days can provide unfortunately. I hope they weren’t being abused in any unseen ways.
Heartbreaking story, the poor girls. RIP⚘ Thank you for your great work. Always good to be here
Thanks as always, hope you're well :)
@@ForgottenLives
No mention! Thank you FLives, i'll get there. Take care :)
Wow. Katherine lived till 2014! Katherine's face shape when she was young is similar to young queen Elizabeth's face shape.
Nerissa looks ALOT like Queen Elizabeth and princess Anne. And King Charles.
Not surprising. They are Cousins. These Sisters also look like Their Aunt Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon the Queen Mother.
I thought the same thing
When I was a young child, there was a girl in the neighborhood who was mentally challenged. I really liked her and we became friends. I could understand her, other people ridiculed her and didn't even try.
They were very well cared for. They both lived a long time. Putting them into a care situation was the norm at that time. I had a disabled daughter and she was one of the first who went to school rather than being cared for by the health department. My daughter was not abandoned by her family but she was very much abandoned by society in general.
It was not ideal either. The teachers did not have any expertise in severely handicapped students. And there was little or no help for me caring for my daughter at home. I was just left to get on with it with no help, advise or even equipment. I once visited one of the old hospitals and was shown a large storage room and there was all the equipment I so desperately needed still stacked there.
How many of those who think they are horrified by the care they got have ever helped someone with a severely handicapped child. People even used to cross the street to avoid my daughter. I have a saying, 'Where the bloody hell were all you people who criticised the care these ladies received when I needed help?'
When they closed the mental institutions they moved the residents into smaller homes, and many died in a very short time.
You need to see the famous Geraldo Rivera investigation
These women DID NOT HAVE A GOOD LIFE, DID YOU MISS WHEN IT SAYS THEY WERE NEVER TAUGHT HOW TO COMMUNICATE WITH OTHER PEOPLE, 🤦♂️SO THEY LIVED FOR 70 YEARS WITHOUT BEING ABLE TO TALK TO ANYONE THERE ENTIRE LIVES, AND PEOPLE LIKE YOU SAY THE HAD A DECENT LIFE🤨🤔 just because YOU didn’t get help by people who are alive today that were NOT born then doesn’t mean that other people can and should be treated like this, i find it DISGUSTING that people will use the excuse that I didn’t get help so why should other people
Kudos to the nieces and nephew for getting a grave stone placed 🙏🏾❤️
Very sad, but even ordinary working class people hid their mentally ill relatives back then. It’s only in very recent times that it’s stopped being seen as a stigma. I just hope they were treat well because there wasn’t much understanding of mental health issues back then.
It’s not sad to be born with a disability. They have something to give and if treated with love and respect they live happy lives. Love isn’t about what someone can do for you and people with severe disabilities show pure love. It really pisses me off when people think they’re a disappointment
Sadly not an uncommon outcome for people with disabilities during that time. Many families who could afford it would leave the disabled children in special homes or mental hospitals, never visiting them. Having kids with mental and developmental disabilities was really taboo up until about the 1970s. It was also really expensive to have children with disabilities because there usually weren't any social assistance provided (and is still the case is some places).
In the Middle East they’re literally chained to the floor so they can’t leave. Some are even chained up naked in rooms so they cant hurt themselves or others. There’s so many and so little funding they’re barely have enough to feed the patients. Even the doctors admit it’s inhumane but they can’t afford the necessary treatment so the chains are unfortunately a necessity. There’s a documentary about mental hospitals in Yemen and it’s heartbreaking and frightening. The doctors try to do what they can but it’s not much. Mental illness is still extremely taboo in these countries which just compounds the issue. Families will literally abandon their mental ill members at these places. Our animals in the West get better treatment.
In the Middle East they’re literally chained to the floor so they can’t leave. Some are even chained up naked in rooms so they cant hurt themselves or others. There’s so many and so little funding they’re barely have enough to feed the patients. Even the doctors admit it’s inhumane but they can’t afford the necessary treatment so the chains are unfortunately a necessity. There’s a documentary about mental hospitals in Yemen and it’s heartbreaking and frightening. The doctors try to do what they can but it’s not much. Mental illness is still extremely taboo in these countries which just compounds the issue. Families will literally abandon their mental ill members at these places. Our animals in the West get better treatment.
Not 1970s, early 1990s.
@@SirenaSpades Sort of. Placing disabled relatives and children into permanent care homes based mostly on social taboo was very uncommon by the 1990s compared to what it was in the 1960s. The 1970s is when disabled children were first allowed to attend public schools because that's when the first programs were implemented for them. This negated the need for a lot of people to put their children in homes because they could be watched and have therapy during school hours. This was also the decade where broader changes to infrastructure was made to accommodate wheelchairs, blindness, etc. At least as far as the US goes, but I can't speak for the history of the UK so that might be different. In the US those changes were mostly used by lower and middle class people so upper class people probably did still shun their disabled family members. More of these accommodations and rights were expanded on in the 1990s, but generally speaking abandonment of disables children as discussed in the video was largely frowned upon by the 1990s, but saw the biggest and most socially altering changes in the 1970s for the rights of disabled people. People still abandon their disabled kids to this day, but it's very rare that you see it happen with cases that have mild or manageable disorders like Downs syndrome, etc.
HOWEVER, there's still a long way to go as far as treating disabled people with humility. Just considering that Buckley v. Bell still hasn't been overturned says a lot about where US priorities lie, but that's an entire issue in and of itself.
the magdalene laundries in ireland get publicity but is was the same in the uk really - just without the laundry. getting pregnant outside of marriage was considered a sign of moral deficiency/mental retardation and young girls were hidden away in mental hospitals sometimes for life. i can vaguely remember in the early 70's our village used to give an afternoon tea party to long term inmates from the local county hospital and a bus load of 'old' ladies used to turn up in crimplene floral dresses and sip tea, all very civilized. No free council house and state benefits back in their youth.
I think this information must be considered in the context of the times. When I volunteered at Olive Mount Hospital in Liverpool in 1969. I volunteered for 2 years. I was on one of the children's ward. The children who ranged from babies to 14 year olds were placed there from birth because they were considered 'imbeciles or backward.' They received no visitors and couldn't walk, talk and all were in nappies. At that time parents who gave birth to these children were always told to leave their babies in the hospital and forget about them. A few parents refused to leave their babies. Most parents took the advise of the consultants because in those days professionals were always considered to be experts who knew better than them. In our society today we would considered such attitudes outrageous. However virtually all but a very few downs syndrome children and children with other such disabilities were placed in institutions. However I must say the ward I volunteered in were staff by very compassionate and caring people. However as there was no training all these children lived their lives in cots. Very sad but due to the ignorance of professionals this is how children who were considered 'retarded' were treated. As I think back to those to years I now realise why I was so upset every time I helped there. When we know better we do better.
Thankyou. Very respectfully presented. It was such a common practice in the upper classes and was often done when the children were very young so as not to 'taint' the marriage prospects of other so called normal children in future years. I hope they were shown love of some sort of at least cared for in a kind and compassionate manner throughout their long lives - longevity definitely runs in the family 🇦🇺❤️🇬🇧
Thanks for watching!
It’s wild how much Katherine looked like Queen Elizabeth
This story is so heart breaking. My grandparents are buried at Redstone cemetery. When I go there next I will place flowers for the sisters in honour of this channels very kind rendition of their stories and show they have not been forgotten. Xxxx ❤❤❤😢
It's not just doctors and "professionals" who had this mindset. I was born in 1959 and my mother told me how her room mate in the maternity hospital gave birth to a Downs Syndrome baby. When the nurse asked the woman if she'd like to nurse her baby, she angrily refused and told the nurse: "I'm not taking that home with me! I have normal children at home to care for!"
Sounds about right. People were shocked by the Holocaust, but still held terrible beliefs like that and still saw the disabled as less then human. Shows how little we really learn, I guess...
My mother told me to my face she would have left me behind at the hospital if I'd had been a thalidomide child, that was my era.
@@patlong8449 What was your era?
@@frumtheground We don't learn at all. If you are disabled these days, your body is public property and anyone can do anything to you.
@@reswobiandreaming3644
Thalidomide was the early 1960's. 🦭
It's disgraceful that people want to blame the royals for everything. These girls had parents and they made that choice. You are a good respectful young man, I appreciate the excellent content you make. Thank you from Tasmania Australia 🙂🦘🇦🇺👍.
I feel bad for them. All that trouble in casting them aside over something they have no control over.
Thanks to all of you here for sharing your stories of disabled family members. Its very touching and that period was terrorized by the idea of eugenics.
How sad … for a millions of reasons. Thank you so much.
My grandmothers 1st cousin knew of a woman whose daughter had a baby out of wedlock and she stuck a hat pin in its head and buried it in a shoebox at the corner of the house. This was back in the ‘30’s.
How barbaric. Poor kid?
😮🤢🤮
I wonder if either girl were aware of each other’s existence?! I hate how they were discarded like rubbish! My son has special needs, on diagnosis at 21/2 it was assumed that he would be going into a home! Over my dead body!!
My son is 39 lives independently with a little help,we had our ups and downs but all in all I am a very proud mammy, if I’d listened to the “ experts”, unfortunately I wasn’t very good at being “ told” what to do, things weren’t easy, but we’re here to tell the tail!!
I raised my beautiful boy on my own, believe me it’s worth every tantrum and tear!!
Facts imparted with such tact, sensitivity and delicacy, always a great pleasure to see each episode that evinces such consistently high historiography and diplomacy.
Thank you for your kind words!
I first heard about them from The Crown and was curious to learn how truthful that episode was, thank you!
My pleasure!
Hi 👋 I’ve been subscribed for 12-18 months, you’ve an amazing storyteller voice, I feel calm when I listen to your videos.
As of right now your channel also provides a temporary detachment from the real world.
I never thought I’d need to detach myself from the reality but here I’m realizing that I do need to detach myself from the brutal reality (the war) we’re currently in.
With kindness and respect, Grace
Thanks for all the support 😊
@@ForgottenLives Hi 👋 it is my pleasure, my gratitude to have found a space where I can relax and step outside my life, and engage in forgotten lives. It is a beautiful feeling to think that in some way you are helping these people restore their purpose in life, purposes that some may have felt robbed of, and others were hindered by an untimely death, common to all was that as they walked on this earth, there was something standing between them and their ability to live their lives the way they wanted.
With Kindness and respect, Grace
The father (brother to Queen Mother) of these two women died in 1930 when they were very young. Their mother (rumor has it) was known to be weak minded and apparently there were mental issues in her own ancestry. She was left with four daughters to raise. We don't know how much contact was maintained with the Bowes-Lyon relatives of her late husband. The two daughters were institutionalized shortly after the marriage of their elder sister, perhaps their mother had relied on this daughter's support? We have no way of knowing. Whatever the circumstances these girls lived with their family and were not institutionalized until they were young adults.
The Queen Mother was the second youngest of ten children and 14 years younger than her brother. He died a few years after her marriage into the Royal family so it's quite possible there was minimal contact between their two families. Whatever the case it was neither her responsibility nor her right to intervene either legally or morally.
These two unfortunate girls had a huge number of relatives all of whom appear to have 'forgotten' them so let's not lay all the blame with our late Queen's family.
nobody was! i suspect 'the crown' (never watched it and never will as I can't understand how the royal family have allowed themselves to be turned into a soap opera) has manipulated the story into (republicanism) sweet smiling two-facedness.
A sad story, but all too common. Mental illness or retardation was considered deeply shameful, and to be fair, more or less untreatable. Parents were encouraged to institutionalize their children and get on with life-- and the children were said to be "happier among their own kind." If your family was not exceptionally poor, I can guarantee there were relatives you never heard of, institutionalized in your grandparents' or great grandparents' generations.
"Retardation" was much more common due to poor birthing practices, use of birthing forceps, lack of prenatal care causing neural tube defects. In my lifetime we've seen a huge reduction in many of these once common conditions that were poorly understood. Now we have the drug, and alcohol affected babies that once they age out of supports, are either with family, or on the streets.
No, it wasn't shameful! My daughter was multihandicapped, was loved. But no help from anyone those days, unlike today you have so much help if you want any. Kept her home for 3 years, she was 24 hour care with no respite. For her to have a bottle, it took from one feed to the next and still bit left of the amount she needed. The Dr knew I was struggling and eventually he said enough is enough. So he did help me see that trying to do the right thing for her was to go into a home. You have a child like her, you would know what I am talking about. She had cerebral palsy, deaf, blind and heart defects. Had 30 ops on her eyes to no avail. She has never been forgotten.
This happens when parents are so closely related- which they were..
About 40 years ago, I read a very small article in a UK newspaper entitled 'The Monster of Glamis' which intimated that an old retainer of the establishment took the secret of a disabled child to the grave with him.....
All speculation. But one of the legends of Glamis is that there is a secret room, and a secret told to the head of the family when he inherits. It has long been thought to be a monster child secreted away in the castle. All speculation as I said but interesting family history here?
Wow! Katherine looks just like a young Elizabeth.
I just watched this, and my heart cried.
I work in a pharmacy and daily we work with Group and care homes and often these mentaly, physically disabled people come in with their carer's. A few of them cant talk, but they can smile. They hold their arms out when they see us and we give them a hug. Those who are blind, we hold their hand and those deaf, we sign a "hello, how are you?"
We have and cherish paintings, drawings and artworks they lovingly make for us. ❤
Our Webster packer packs their medication weekly, and she loves seeing their smiling faces on their profile sheet.
When one gets sick, we worry, when one passes away, one of us attends their funeral.
Hearts greive and tears are shed.
To us these wonderful people are just as amazing as our non disabled patients.
To us, theyre human, and we love and care for them no less. ❤
Thank you for sharing this is so sad 😞. RIP 😔 😢 🙏 🕊 ☮ to both of them 😢 💔.
That the British people provided these peers with an annual allowance and palaces, makes it even more horrible that their mother pretended they were dead and sent them to an institution.
They had plenty of money to keep the girls at home and in the family. Only a heartless monster would throw away her children like that...monstrous.
When movie stars Roy Rogers and Dale Evans had a Downs Syndrome child, they refused to quietly institutionalize her as was the socially-acceptable action of the time (early 1950s) but publically loved on her within their family. When little Robin died just before her second birthday, the parents grieved greatly. Dale wrote a book about her beloved daughter called ''Angel Unaware'' and donated the proceeds to the National Association for Retarded Children, and she and Roy supported DS research. Well done.
it’s so moving to hear about people you thought were unremarkable as a kid, turn out to be emotional people with real
lives. i was not a fan of Roy Rogers and Dale Evans - just not really interested (although i loved Trigger). So., to hear what wonderful people they were is just lovely. thanks for letting us know. 🌷🌱
That book is one of my favorites. I used to have a copy but it's long since disappeared. I want to replace it. My heart broke when she passed away & I cried for her & the family. I was just a new Mom with my first son.
A similar thing occurred with Prince John, youngest child of King George V and Queen Mary. He had a disability and was kept permanently "out of sight" at Sandringham. At least he was kept within the family, having a full time nurse and attention from his grandmother Queen Alexandra. He died in 1919 while still a teenager. Can't help thinking that the Bowes-Lyon family were particularly hard-hearted!
His illnesses were worsened when allowed to live with his siblings, so unlike these 2 girls he wasn't disowned, he was unable to live a regular life. He had a loving nanny, and saw family as his health allowed. I believe he was hemophiliac and epileptic in an Era where stopping the bleeds caused by running about with brothers were not fixable.
No, it's not about hard-hartedness.
These women could not talk, could not communicate, their pictures make it painfully obvious they could understand little speech (they aren't posing properly) and they lived long lives. Prince John was kind of verbal, could somewhat communicate and died young so this is why he was never placed in an institution.
And the queens uncle said he saw his brother as nothing more then a animal to his mistress in a letter and then took back his comment when she didn’t like what he said.
@@joywebster2678 John wasn't a hemophilia, but his cousin, Tsraevich Alexei of Russia was
@@psychedelicpayroll5412 It was not the Queens father who said that it was her uncle Edward who abducted the crown. You might want to alter your comment to the right name.
Back then all children born with disabilities were placed into institutions and forgotten about, especially well to do families. The doctors told the parents to put them into the institutions and forget about them and have another baby.
I expect you have already covered this, but the late queen's father had a brother, John, who suffered from epilepsy. I believe he still lived with the family, but rarely saw them, being shut away in another area of the palace with his nanny, who loved him so dearly. There was a BBC drama about him some years ago now, called The Lost Prince. So worth watching but tissue box at the ready!
It was not that terrible. You are young with a young family. This was normal in old families like mine, and I can say Prince John was the happiest of George V's kids.
The BBC drama was not that accurate. Prince John lived at Wood Farm on the Sandringham Estate. At the time his grandmother Queen Alexandra more or less lived permanently at Sandringham House and visited John regularly
2:41 The tears on Katherine 's face and Nerissa's expression of fear and misery is thoroughly heartbreaking. I am, again, completely disgusted by the royal family.
always disgusted by people who pretend to be better than others
What does it have to do with them? They were not members of the royal family
Why? They weren't responsible for these two women, and unless you've willingly taken in 2 intellectually disabled women from your own family yourself, you've got no high horse to stand on. If they were so disabled they never even learned to speak, then even the most caring family in the world would likely have had to institutionalize them at some point anyway. Some people literally can't be handled at home.
i believe those are the actors who portrayed them on the crown
Why , even common working people had relatives with disabilities hidden out of sight and forgotten , this went on for many years after this case , I worked in one such institution till the government started closing them in the eighties
We are going back a few decades here. Different time, different attitude. Don’t let’s judge people back then by today’s standards.
Poor souls who don't deserve to be treated this way to be ignored. Being the Queens first cousins. I hope the queen had time to visit them when they were alive since they stayed in a hospital largely ignored by their extended members of the Royal family. May their beautiful soulsrest in peace.
So this was a chance for a royal family to step up and demonstrate the proper way to care for those who are handicapped. They had the status, the money and the political clout to made things right. Instead, they hid their children and ignored them. It was a great opportunity to make a moral change, and they turned away and committed one of the greatest sins.
It was nothing to do with the Royal Family.
Why? Not even the Queen Mother was responsible. It was her brother and sister-in-law. And Her Majesty was the same age, how would she know? How would they have any right to even visit them?
Are you suggesting there is a list of people who are only allowed to visit people in care homes? They had the right to visit, they chose not to. And how do several members of your family disappear and no one questions it? Of course the queen mother knew, these were her nieces. I can't believe you are defending this.
Callous..... how exactly they were cared for in an institution what's wrong with that? I did voluntary work in 90s there were still these places caring g for all ages babies to elderly mentally handicapped care from the staff was excellent
So sad... Thank you for remembering them!
How heartbreaking! Those poor girls, I hope they had happy lives and were treated well.
That's a nice thought , but I don't think that happened very sadly .
@@Mark64W p
@@Mark64W ikr?! Y r people so naive? I've been 2 1 of the old asylum. Basemnts they used 2 chain them up 2 walls n n beat them. Experiment on them. Tell thr truth n shame the devil! 🙏🏽
@@incognitonegress3453 Could you say that in understandable language please ? Thank you , Mark .
I too suffwith depression and anxiety, I had it for 30 years, and my daughter has it too, with the both of us, she self medicates, with Illegal drugs, she was in a mental institution, twice and was in an atlanticare behavioral health program, she refused medication, because she didn't like how it made her feel, I too took medication, and didn't like how it made me, so I took on other matters like, getting a pet, and helping others. Let's all work on getting rid of the stigma of mental health, and know that we are people who are part of society, and we are here to stay.. thank you so much for bringing this to the world.
Her experience with her sisters disabilities is probably why she was so understanding of her husband's stutter and why she knew of the Dr that worked with him helping him to better understand his speech problem and encourage him to except the Dr's help and improved his speech allowing him to address the public with confidence.The sisters would have received better medical care these days,Bless them all with eternal life together ❤
i think they were her nieces
@@shannonm.4087 oh I thought the Queen Mothers sisters sorry
No The queen mum was a horrible woman
Don't believe everything you see in films.
Thank you what a nice presentation. Those poor souls, not that they knew they were different. Sad their family left them behind.
I am a US American from the South - I find your narration accent lovely, soothing and calming. I could listen to you speak all day.
I absolutely love your videos ❤️
Thank you very much!
You are so darn thorough. How sad is this ??? They inbred, then cast off their own if they didn't check all the boxes just right? How do you do that to a family member? Or even an animal ? Pretty sad and sick
I'm sure that even if they never learned to communicate verbally, they did communicate. People who can't use verbal communication still communicate in all kinds of ways -- gestures, sounds, behaviors, displays of emotion, and many other ways. We just need to actually pay attention and be open to these other forms of communication.
The Bowes-Lyons family was certainly not the only one putting away family members in hospital asylums. Far from it.
And when Thatcher closed down many such hospitals in the UK, years later, don't for one minute think that every displaced patient was gathered up by eager family members, cared for, and that all their funerals were attended in due course.
My mother worked in a elderly people's care home (for all mental capabilities) and regularly attended the funerals of her patients. She often told me how she was the only one who'd turned up or with just one of the other nurses, and yet these folks had daughters, sons, nephews and nieces still alive somewhere.
Thank you for speaking on behalf of those who can’t,
You always are so respectful and professional.
You have a great vice too!
Another excellent producción of FL. Thanks for the upload and the worl you put into your videos.
Wow! I had never heard of them until now. Thank you.
British born but not raised in England I had always known of them since childhood. And so many ways I think Brits who lived in the territories were more aware of British history and even controversies.
@@IntriguedLioness How did the people in the territories get the knowledge of the "put away people" that the people in Britain did not?
Persons who shall remain nameless said they observed Nerissa and Katherine and that they recognised and followed their cousin when they saw her and other family members in the news. Not allowing the narrator to spread shame and blame over the British public...the Bowes Lyons had means not available to most Britons...their treatment of Nerissa and Katherine was shameful. Similarly I am not being the
"Queen didn't know" approach. She was extremely well informed on most matters. It is very likely that if Nerissa and Katherine had some instruction they would have communicated very well...I don't know anything about Fenella but Elizabeth Bowes Lyon was very fond of gin and horses. No time to visit the nieces then.
They seem to have an unpleasant habit of isolating certain members of the family - more recently Diana, and now Harry...conduct quite abhorrent. Pas de "noblesse (sont) obligee..."
People keep saying “let’s not forget those were different times” and “it was normal back then” hello? One of the sisters died in 1986, the family could’ve moved - discretely if they wanted to - the other sister to a private facility or even hire a live in carer for her.
To my knowledge it was never addressed by the royal family. Stop making excuses for them.
Very Well Done, a Definite listen again and share.
Thank you:)
Not unlikely. Even the present time first cousin of QE2, the Prince William of Gloucester, who fell in love with a beautiful foreigner model but whose love was blocked by her. Prince William was an expert pilot but after being separated from his love, upon take-off of his plane suddenly crashed and he died. After his death, results yielded he has Porphyria, a blood disorder that affects the body and even result to mental sickness. Queen Victoria was a carrier of hemophilia and porphyria and she transferred it to one of her son, Prince Leopold. She transferred it also to one of her daughter Alexandra who transferred it to the only son heir but still died & history has it the Romanovs (because her husband was a Tzar in Russia) were all murdered. So Prince William was very near in contemporaries to QE2 and it's a scandal if found out. These porphyria disorders are usually inherited, meaning they are caused by gene mutations link passed from parents to children. If you have porphyria, cells fail to change chemicals in your body-called porphyrins and porphyrin precursors-into heme, the substance that gives blood its red color.
That is how it was in those days, people with learning difficulties or mental health issues were shut away, thank goodness things have changed. Although having said that, there is still stigma attached to people with mental health issues. Why can't people realise that it is still an illness, just like any other. Even girls who became pregnant in the 40's and 50's were sometimes sent to an asylum, because they were classed as promiscuous.
I'm glad my nephew can enjoy his life with all his issues
Did you do any research on the Queen Mother's brothers wife? Her sister also had a child mentally compromised, and further family also had children likewise! So, although the two girls were Bowes-Lyons, they did not share the same genetics as these poor girls had! It still does not excuse them from showing care towards them, instead of having them locked away!
Queen Victoria also had a son that was never seen
You always are respectful and fair in relating people’s lives. you don’t judge, you just tell us what the situations are in a very interesting way.
i’ve been seeing so many historical vids in my YT feeds, where they make people and their lives - well, ugly - not just regular people in certain situations. it’s really depressing. So, thanks so much for your integrity and fairness. Salud! :) 🌷🌱
I’m not justifying it, but up through the early to mid-1960’s, institutionalizing “defective” children was considered the “right” and best thing to do. Doctors almost always instructed parents to place such children under care because it was not available at home. It was believed that defective children would stunt the mental and social development of any siblings, also, that they could destroy marriages. Back in 1956, I had a friend with an institutionalized, Down Syndrome older sister. Her parents created a stir of social disapproval when they decided to take her out and raise and educate her at home.
Thank God for the kindness of strangers. The Queen's cousins and their unknown caretakers received their crowns in Heaven.
It's quite sad that they were abandoned but let's not forget that those were different times with different morals.
And available institutions of varying class and care. At least no one slept under bridges, or defecated on public roadways as we see in 2022 in USA. This Era also saw children as mini adults both socially, and medically. Adolescence didn't exist. If you were a wealthy healthy child you saw your parents once a day for a presentation and as you got older occasionally a meal. Otherwise you ate, and lived in the children's quarters ubder the Nannies and tutors and maids. So there wasn't close bonding and parenting of young kids. So having a disabled child who wasn't going to develop, you placed them in a well off institution, most families would see them occasionally unless it distressed the child. Did the institutionalized child ever spend time with mom and dad having gone from nursery to institution? If you weren't wealthy by age 8 to 10 you were working in the UK coal mines, or out In the fields, becom8ng a stable boy, or a maid. So I love how commenters compare life from the early 1900s to 2022 and think everything is the same and pass judgment. No I don't approve of the mother of these 2 lying about their deaths etc. My own ancestors of that Era back in England had one mentally handicapped daughter, and as they were working class, they kept her at home, and she helped as she could in tne family fish shoppe. But siblings took turns minding her early on. Life was different by Era, class, medical knowledge, technology, war, and each country.
Yet these people rocked up to church, acting like they were Christians.
@@joywebster2678 you're confused, Joy. People have very much defecated in the streets and lived under bridges and other public spaces throughout history.
@@angiebaby9981 key phrase - acting like Christians.
I was married into a socially prominent family in a large city in the south. There was an older sister who had been in an institution all her life. (back in the 1920s) She was NEVER spoken of and I only found out about her accidentally. Until just the 1970s (or so) people just DID NOT speak about personal tragedies. People just took care of their business and didn't burden other people with unpleasant information. Probably part of the thinking was that everybody has their own family problems, why burden others? It's just the way families dealt with issues like this way back a long time ago. It was considered responsible to let medical professionals deal with it.
Yukkkkk
Also because the technology wasn't available to determine the cause of the disability, families didn't advertise that their family had potential genetic issues that would deter desirable matches for the healthy children. Sadly we now know many of the issues were from issues of birth trauma, insufficient oxygen, ladies held the birth push until the Dr was present. Other causes amongst tne high nobility was too close interbreeding. .
@@joywebster2678 exactly!
The soldiers returning from WWI & WWII were not allowed to speak of their horror either. Everybody just happy, happy, making money for the capitalists dreams.
Not talking of mental issues had to be learned. From the beginning of man there had to be issues. What’s it say of our success as a society that we do this? Profit before people sucks. Stand up people and vote. If you want better for today and tomorrow then pay attention and vote.
This whole world needs mental counseling after everything we have been through. Yet, people are good and most have huge hearts. So I have faith in humanity. Vote!
@@hereitis.2587 guess u never knew WW1 soldiers, or Nursed them, or WW2 soldiers when they were hospitalized. They didn't have to be happy happy. My WW1 grandfather said " you compartmentalize the battlefield and only look at it in remembrance of fallen friends", this is how you move on. There were institutions that held veterans that couldn't cope, "shell shocked" it was called, now known as PTSD. So you disrespect those men and women of WW1 who made a life, and those who lived a living death. I've not even mentioned tne physically wounded.
That is just the saddest story I think I have ever heard Not just someone but the whole family,
how could they have done that to them It's such a shame
I trained in a Victorian Institution. Saw a lot of atrocious treatments, human beings can be very cruel to one another
Good work. My late husband worked in Earlswood hospital I think, in the early 70s. There were people in there who had been put there by their families because they had had a baby out of wedlock. There was actually nothing wrong with them; but they were institutionalised through being there so long and couldn't cope with the outside world. A tragedy. I do wish I could ask my husband whether he ever crossed paths with the sisters.
Btw, I'm pretty sure 'Glamis' is usually pronounced 'Glahms'.
I had 2 that I know of.
My great grandma’s younger half sister (though, her father did actually include his daughter in his will with her older full brother, my great grandma’s younger half brother, as a guardian).
My granduncle’s oldest daughter (recently passed away in 2018) was put into a home when she was still a child (she was born in 1930 and it was before 1940 that she was already in the home as she’s not even mentioned in her parents’ divorce papers). My grandparents were about the only ones that visited her as anyone else would upset her (dad said that they took him once, but she had a tantrum about unexpected visitors that she didn’t know that he never went after that and his older sister refused to go). I had to track down the funeral home to confirm where she was buried as we were never contacted about her passing and I still need to confirm that she was buried with her father and baby brother as it doesn’t look like the ground was ever disturbed.
Lovely presentation. Thank you.