Item MM 149522 Photograph - Shelagh Philpott (Bannister), Somerset House, London, 10 Sep 1965

Summary

Photograph of Shelagh (formerly Sheila) Philpott (nee Bannister) outside Somerset House, London, England, 10 September 1965. Shelagh had travelled from Australia in August on a quest to find her family and her story was followed and reported by the Daily Express newpaper in London.

Part of a collection of documents, photographs and an oral history inteview relating to Shelagh (formerly Sheila)Philpott (nee Bannister), an unaccompanied British child migrant. The material documents her time in care in the National Children's Home and Orphanage in England at Bramhope, near Leeds; her migration to Australia in 1950 and her efforts to trace her family later in life. The research file includes photocopied material.

Description of Content

Woman in a dark buttoned-up coat, shown from waist up, with her left hand tucked inside her coat and with a handbag on her arm. She is standing outside the iron railing entry gate and arched windows of a three-storey, stone Victorian building with Corinthian columns on the upper floors. There is a purple-inked stamp on the reverse.

Physical Description

Black and white photograph

Significance

Statement of Historical Significance:
This collection documents the experience of an unaccompanied British child migrant who was relocated to Australia under the UK child migration programmes of the post War period, and to whom an apology was formally made in 2010 and reparations made under the UK Child Migrants Fund in 2019.

The documents are enriched by an oral history interview of the former child migrant, now in her eighties. The material covers the period before her migration as well as the lengthy period in Australia when she suffered from the ongoing impact of that migration programme. It documents her later return as an adult to England to find her family and her mental struggle with her identity. The material includes items showing the part played by local Australian social welfare organisations and their relationship to the after-care efforts of the UK National Children's Home.