Tony Kelly (Click on image to hear Tony)
Email: info@unitedsurvivors.ie

 

Tony Kelly from Kilnamanagh in Tallaght was born in 1946 as the love child of a married man and a pretty young housemaid. He was placed in the care of St Teresa’s facility in Blackrock. After suffering a litany of abuse at nine foster homes across Ireland he left for the UK at 16 and stayed there for 20 years carving out a career as a champion wrestler.

After decades of denying his roots whilst in the UK he came home and set about a 31-year search to find his biological mother. But Tony was lied to by the authorities and the wrong woman was identified as his mother which resulted in him attending his birth mother’s funeral without realising it was her. His search only ended in 2013 when an 84-year-old woman sent him a letter outlining the facts he had spent most of his life searching for.

Tony said “I was devastated that my mother was dead but delighted that I finally knew the truth. Everything the lady said was true. My mother was Bridget Mary Kelly from Meath who used to do some housework for my father Patrick Quinn”.