The orphans born in Romania – and born again in Britain

After the cover-up was exposed, millions pitied the children who suffered from Ceausescu’s cruelties. In 1990, Angela Lambert met two couples who did more than sympathise

‘I never understood before what it really means to be a mother’: Nancy McNeill with Lucy (Rex)

On New Year’s Day, Sabena and Anthony Leese saw a report on ITN News about the orphanages of Romania. “We instantly felt we should do something, so on 3 January we went to the Romanian embassy,” says Sabena. “But they told us, ‘All these children are well looked after, you shouldn’t worry about them’. We knew that couldn’t be true so we just bought tickets and flew out.” Nancy and Alan McNeil, across the other side of London, also saw the report and felt the same urge to respond. “We had already thought, can we afford a child – can we cope? We’d been together for six years and although we’d talked about adoption and even considered going to South America to find a baby, somehow this crystallised everything. It seemed a once in a lifetime opportunity, so we cashed my savings and I got on a plane to Bucharest,” says Nancy.

The two couples met at the Intercontinental Hotel and became friends. They came by their adoptive baby daughters in quite different ways. The couples now feel very close and the two babies are happily ensconced in London.

The Leeses’ story