Letters Found on Abandoned Children

July 1870 

To the Sisters of the House, 

Necessity compels me to part with my darling boy. I leave him, hoping and trusting  
that you will take good care of him. Will you let some good nurse take charge of him  
and will you try to find some kind hearted lady to adopt him and love him as her  
own while he is young that he may never know but what she is his own mother? It  
would break my heart to have him grow up without a mother to love and care for  
him. God only knows the bitter anguish of my heart in parting with this little dear,  
still if it costs me my life I am obliged to give him up. 

He is just from the breast, he has been sick with his bowels, they have not been  
right for a long time. 

I have cried and worried over him so much that I think my milk hurt him. I think a  
change of milk with good care will make him well soon. I got these things thinking I  
could keep him but as I can not they may be of use to you. I shall always take an  
interest in this Institution. 

He is 4 weeks old. Will you please to remember his given name and if he is  
adopted, request that they will not change his name; so that at some future day, if  
that name should be asked for, you will be able to tell what became of him or where  
he is. Perhaps you will think me very particular, but if any mother will take it home to  
her own heart and think how she would feel to have her dear little boy torn from her  
breast, I think they would excuse me. 

This is the last time I can speak of him as mine, and if in years to come if I could  
hear that he had a home and kind friends, I could die in peace. On the other hand,  
if I should never hear, it would haunt the day of my death. Please excuse all that  
you think is not right but for God's sake remember the last request of a heart  
broken mother. 


St. Patrick's Church Rectory 

263 Mulberry Street