‘Something to say where my blood is from’: UK-born adoptee wins Irish passport battle

UK-born adoptee traces her roots to a mother sent abroad to give birth and finds peace through Irish citizenship

Sarah Fairfoull: 'I wanted my mother’s identity because of the journey she went on as an unmarried mother.' Picture: Moya Nolan

Sarah Fairfoull has always considered herself to be Irish despite being born in the UK. Her birth mother was forcibly removed from her hometown of Belmullet in Co Cavan in the 1970s and shipped off to Britain to give birth in secret.

This was not unusual for the time, the young unmarried mother being one of thousands of Irish women who were banished from their hometowns to give birth in secret after falling pregnant outside of wedlock.