After we arrived in New York, we headed for rural Caledonia Minnesota. It is unclear how we made the trip across half the United States, but it was probably via rail. We ended up in LaCrosse Wisconsin where we were greeted by Robert and taken to the Malay family farm a few miles west.

Trevor Hall tracked down my mother by following her path to Minnesota. The private detective he used discovered more about us than even I could remember. He prowled around the small towns lining both sides of the Mississippi River on the Minnesota-Wisconsin border. I was astonished to see pictures of many of the houses we had lived as part of Hall's unpublished Marianne Foyster of Borley Rectory. While startled, I was also pleased to see the names of neighbors and relatives I had grown up with as a small child.

Hall was friends with Eileen Garrett at the time, and she helped the investigation move forward. Garrett was a world renowned psychic. As founder of the Parapsychology Foundation in New York City, she was in a position to offer the services of a private detective who worked for her attorney. Hall sent Garrett each volume of Marianne Foyster of Borley Rectory as it was finished. In turn, Robert Swanson read every word that Hall forwarded to Garrett. Swanson became fascinated by the intrigue and read The Haunting of Borley Rectory as well.

Swanson was probably thought of as a bill collector as he questioned people in the Midwest about us. He found many instances where Dad had failed to pay a bill and Mom got in trouble for it. When talking to people, he never mentioned Borley by name, and he never mentioned Trevor Hall.

In the late part of February, and the early part of March 1958, Swanson drove through the snows of Minnesota to the Malay farm near Caledonia. We had lived there immediately after coming to America. My grandmother was a widow, and she had moved in with her bachelor brother and two maiden sisters. My Dad's father, Vincent O'Neil, died when my Dad was 14, so most of Robert's life was spent under the influence of the Malay family. They were a kind and generous people, always talking about the missionaries. We said the rosary faithfully every night. When Grandma O'Neil died, my mother was very upset. "I miss Grandma very much," she told me. "Towards the last she became so very close to me - and she died with her hand in mine. Dear Grandma."

The Malay home was large and warm, with all the peculiar smells of a farm. There was no electricity and no indoor plumbing. We used kerosene lanterns and chamber pots. The phone was one of those crank types that hung on the wall. Both my mother and myself enjoyed the time we spent there very much. Once we spent hours hiking the rugged hillsides together, watching for rattlesnakes all the way. Swanson must have felt he was in another world:

The farm was located deep in the hills. The road leading to the farm was in extremely poor condition and there were hardly any people encountered on the road for a distance of about seven miles.

Mrs. Esther O'Neil. . .was interviewed in the house on the farm. Marianne was described as a very nice girl who loved flowers and occupied much of her time while on the farm raising flowers.

After staying on the farm a short time, Marianne and Robert moved to Hokah [Minnesota - a few miles away] where they purchased a home.

Mrs. O'Neil thought the boy Vincent is the natural son of Robert. She also advised that Marianne taught school for one term near Bangor, Wisconsin. Little Vincent [often stayed] with her when Marianne taught school.

Marianne was regarded as a very pleasant woman who had a hard time of it in England during the bombings by the Germans.⁽¹⁾

While we were staying at the Malay farm, a firm in London sent my mother at least one letter. Among other things, the message proved Marianne was trying to provide some funds for at least one of the children left behind, and it demonstrates her whereabouts was known. This letter was not available to Hall, which may be just as well, since it also indicates Marianne received an additional insurance payment as a result of Foyster's death.

British & Overseas Services Ltd.
69
Moorgate
London, EC2
16th October 1946

We thank you for your letter of 2nd, inst. It is unfortunate that the Royal Trust Co., had to forward the insurance money to us, but this was the instructions of the Exchange Control in Canada.

The cheques have now been cleared by our bankers, the Midland Bank, and the Exchange Control, Bank of England, have given permission for the money to be transferred to you.

We have today given instructions to the Midland Bank, to transfer the proceeds, which amount to £496-9-11, to you c/o Spragues Bank, Caledonia. The transfer will be made in the name of Mrs. Marianne E. R. O'Neil, as this is the name given in the Exchange Control's permit.

Regarding the proceeds of the Endowment Policy of your daughter, she instructed us to pay the money into your bank account at Woodbridge.

We received a cheque for £56-6-8 made payable to your daughter, from the Prudential Assurance Co., and we sent this to her by Registered Post, c/o Mrs. Shaw, requesting her to sign the cheque, in order that we could pay same into your bank. This was sent to her on 21st June 1946. We have had no reply from your daughter.

As we mentioned to you in our letter of 20th August, we understand from Mrs. Shaw that she is holding correspondence until she is informed where to send it. Will you please let us have the address of Miss Foyster in order that we can communicate with her, and ascertain what happened to the cheque which we sent.

We have not received any remittance from Messrs. Scadding & Bodkins,⁽²⁾ and we shall be glad if you will let us know if you left any instructions with them, for us to collect the payments from them.

We will ascertain from Messrs. Saunders of Ipswich, whether the grave stone has been erected, and we will inform you of the result of our enquiry as soon as possible.

Yours faithfully,
W.L. Moyle

The letter also indicates Marianne was genuinely concerned about Lionel's grave marker. This anxiety was also evident in later messages to "Letty," whom we will meet later.

Swanson also found our home in Hokah, along with our wonderful neighbors, the Blanchards. Mrs. Blanchard said that "Marianne was a very sweet person and a good neighbor." She said that "Marianne worked very hard to make ends meet." Swanson found that "Marianne treated [Vincent] very well and that he was well cared for."

The Swanson investigation could find "no indication that Marianne bothered with any other men, but it was rumoured that her husband liked his women as well as his liquor."⁽³⁾

By coincidence, a newspaper article of the time described a paranormal event in New York. Swanson casually mentioned it, and the Blanchards said they had "never heard of anything so foolish." Mom had never said anything about such things to them.

Our home in Hokah provided me with my first memory, that of sitting on a couch with a home-made Afghan around me and a small dog in my lap. Mom said "Idle hands are the devil's workshop" so hers were constantly knitting blankets or doilies.

The Blanchards had a fish pond, and a pretty white arbor separated out properties. Our home in Hokah was on the edge of town, and Swanson had to travel a muddy road to get to it.

The Wittenbergs were older, and Swanson was given copies of letters my mother had written to them talking about baking and such. Mom had told them she was born in Maine near the Canadian border. "Her father was a doctor who often had to make calls on a horse and cutter." Marianne's mother died when she was quite young, and she had a step-mother. Her maiden name had been Fisher, and she had served in the Army. A brother had been lost during the war.

That the stories told the Wittenbergs matched the ones told to me in every detail made me wonder out loud. "Some of what she told us had to be true," I exclaimed after reading the Swanson account. "Annie Shaw must have died. There had to have been a step-mother. There had to have been a brother killed in the war."

The grocer in Hokah described Dad as a "shifter," but said Mom was "a nice woman, very pleasant, who was liked in town." The barber, on the other had, said both parents drank and that they owed a "considerable amount of money" in town. When they first arrived in town, they were thought to have been financially well off.

In all these reports, nothing is mentioned of Dad's gambling. It became progressively worse over the years and at one time there was fear of retribution from loan sharks. I assume that a great many of the debts Mom paid were to cover bad wagers.

Mom was thought to have worked for the Hokah Chief newspaper until the publisher died. Decades later, she smiled when presenting me a copy of the history of the Hokah Chief, but never said a word about it to me. Unfortunately, I did not hang on to that book, never dreaming it might be important.

On March 16 1949, the daughter of "William Fisher" and "Anne Kiergraf" (not "von Kiergraff") applied for a United States Social Security account number. She put down that her birth date was February 23, 1913. She wrote that her place of birth was Presque Isle, Aroostook, Maine, about 11 miles from the New Brunswick border. Presque Isle is on the opposite side of the province from Sackville. When telling me about her birth place, Mom would say she was born in Aroostook, which I assumed was a city in Maine. Their IS such a city northeast of Presque Isle - in New Brunswick. The application also indicates she was working at Buttreys in LaCrosse. The store no longer exists, but my memory wants it to be a clothing store, but I am not sure. At any rate, she must not have worked there too long.

Swanson was able to verify that Mom taught at the rural school in Bangor, Wisconsin from September 1949 to May 1950. For some odd reason, Mom gave her name as Ena H------ O'Neil, a former student at London University. H------ was the name of my real mother, and when Marianne was registering at the school district, a lady with a similar name was also registering. Mom thought it amusing, and entered her maiden name as H------.

At one point, Mom gave my name as Ira H------ O'Neil.

Mom's teaching record at Bangor was not the best. The clerk there - Myrtle Amborn - said that, "as a teacher Mrs. O'Neil was no good and would not recommend her for any teaching job unless she improved greatly."⁽⁴⁾ Mom must have cleaned up her presentation quite well, as she later taught English to immigrants at the college in Fargo, North Dakota.

Mom and Dad were registered members of St. Peter's Parish in Hokah. Mom asked the priest to loan her the $45 pew rental, which he did, but she never paid him back.

Hospital records and interviews verified the car wreck that severely injured my Dad. He had just purchased a shiny new 1947 Hudson. He let a friend drive and while speeding around a curve on Highway 44, the car was rolled. Dad's friend was not hurt, but both of Dad's jaws were broken. A rumor circulated before Swanson showed up that Dad had been killed in a car accident and Mom had remarried. Neither was true. The rumor must have started when Ian Shaw told Trevor Hall he had seen a newspaper clipping confirming Robert's death.

This erroneous information must have found its way to Peter Underwood, who wrote that "O'Neil died trying to save a child in a road accident, leaving Marianne with a baby son, Vernon O'Neil."⁽⁵⁾

The car accident evidently supplied my mother with the nucleus for a letter she wrote to her old friend Mrs. Fenton back in Wimbledon:

January 28, 1947

Dearest Bill;

I'm ashamed that it has been so long since I wrote to you. I meant to write while I was in hospital, then I thought I'd not until I got home. I'm not making excuses - it sounds bad but its true. I didn't want to worry you.

I wasn't driving, and I'd only left the house a few minutes. The woman who was driving is a good driver. She wasn't hurt. I can't see well and I can't open my mouth to eat solid food. My jaw was broken in four places. I had bad head injuries. I hope my sight gets better. I mind it a lot. Bill, please believe me, there has never been a minute that I've forgotten - and I'm bitterly regretting that I did not stay in England.

But the chances looked good and I thought that I could do best here for the children. As you know its been hard making out for them, but I've got to do the best I can.

Sean is doing well in school - Aster isn't clever except at sewing - I wish I knew what to do. Will things come right? I don't know what to hope for or what to do for the best. If things hadn't been so difficult in England I would have started a sewing shop - but I knew I couldn't get material and I had fears of Johnnie just planking himself down with us - or at least being a cursed nuisance.

I thought it would be fun to be back on the American continent - but one can't go back in life, only forward. I'm a wreck - but I've got to get patched up for the kid's sake. Folk here have been good and kind and life here is full of high-pitched going - just one thing after another yet I've not been happy and tho' I've made acquaintances I've made no friends.

I'm sending two pairs of nylons to you - with my love. One of these days I'll prove my love to you. I hope you can read this. All my love to Bill, Harry, Lorna and Tony.

Yours ever,
Marianne

Mrs. Fenton believed the children were with Marianne in America. Hall was very upset by the obvious lies in this letter and would have confronted her with it, but he was not in Jamestown, Swanson was.

During the Swanson interviews, Marianne was asked about the Fenton letter:

S. You stated that you came from an aristocratic family; the daughter of Count and Sarah Von Kiergraff, of [Schleswig] Holstein, and that you were with the British Intelligence Service. Explain these untruths.

M. Well, those were flights of fancy; kind of a soap opera. It seems so horribly silly, but it seemed to be a lot of fun at the time to tell a continuous story. I told her [Mrs. Fenton] all kinds of silly things and if she had had sense enough to say shut up and don't tell me fairy tales, it would have been much better.

S. When you wrote a letter to Billy [Mrs. Fenton] in January 1947, you stated that you had been in an automobile accident suffering from a broken jaw and this was affecting your eyesight. Actually, you were not in an accident yourself, but your husband Robert. Why did you do that?

M. Why did I do that? I suppose for the same kind of silly reasons. I don't know why I do lots of things, but I wanted to break it off and I thought - I wanted to break off with Bill because since coming to the States, I have not gone around telling lies, and I don't soap opera anymore. Also, I wanted to discontinue the acquaintance.)

My mother may have wanted to stop telling lies, but I wonder how much of another letter to Mrs. Fenton is the truth. It must have been sent after the January 28, 1947 letter, for it describes the nylons she intended to send. It conveys the complete opposite mood to the previous letter, so one cannot help but wonder what took place between the two missives. Although I would have been less than two years old, some of the following would certainly have made an imprint, but it does not.

Bill Darling

Here is a pair of pure silk stockings to cover your nice fat knees. I have decided to stay awhile in these parts which I really like.

I'm having a really nice time, and for the first time since my childhood have a really comfortable and peaceful existence.

I am keeping house for Laurenz and liking it. NO I'M NOT LIVING WITH HIM. He has started an extension of business over here and he entertains a great deal. I act as hostess and do all the catering. I have a Chinese boy to do the work. So far it is working out all right. I hope to have a trip to England in September of 1947. Or if not Sept. then February '48.

The weather here is marvelous, and I gained so much weight that I had to diet. I weighed 11 stone 2, but now I only weigh 14 and am still dieting.

I have a white lamb coat and a squirrel (grey) coat, so I'm in hot style.

I hope Donna got her parcel - you never wrote to me. Let me know as I have the insurance slip for it.

I play bridge every Thursday in a club for Bridge. Friday we stay home and have friends in. Sunday we go to a night club for dinner and dancing. Monday we play bowls at a club, and Wednesday we go to a literary club, so you see my nights are busy.

Prices are high here, and lots of things one can't get. Do write to me, Bill, and tell me your news.

Yours ever, Marianne

While I do remember the lamb coat very clearly, I do not recognize the life of entertaining, servants, and parties. If they ever happened, it must have been during a very brief window between our arrival in the States and our escape to Minneapolis and our eventual stay in North Dakota - roughly three years. "Laurenz" must refer to my Dad - Robert O'Neil. His "business" was plumbing, which surely does not require entertaining of clients!

Swanson discovered Mom either separated or divorced Dad in 1952. My recollection is that the divorce was years later, but it was obvious during my childhood we tried everything possible to get away from my Dad.

Swanson also found out the Credit Bureau of LaCrosse [Wisconsin] was seeking both of them. When we left Hokah, we were delinquent in the mortgage payments. Whatever money Mom had managed to collect in England was now exhausted.

The trail then went across the river to LaCrosse where I had been sent to the children's home. Swanson located the copy of a letter describing my circumstances there:

February 26, 1951
Mrs. O'Neil;

About a month ago, your husband came in to this office and brought his son, stating that you had left for Jamestown [North Dakota] for a job and that he needed a foster home to place his little boy until you were settled.

We arranged for Mr. O'Neil to place the youngster in the LaCrosse Home for Children, 609 South 11th Street. It is a small home and has only 25 children. Mr. O'Neil agreed to pay the Court $35 per month for the board of his child. He has been working for the Smith Plumbing Company on the north side. He has made no payments for the care of the youngster, and on February 23rd he was brought into County Court on several driving charges and he is now in County Jail awaiting trial on Wednesday, February 28th. He had not been at work a week previous to that time, and the Smith's tell me that creditors are constantly calling and coming to the plumbing shop, trying to collect money from Mr. O'Neil.

The youngster is very happy attending school but does not have any clothes. Mr. O'Neil stated that you had taken his clothes with you. Any suggestions or arrangements you can make for your son will be greatly appreciated. If you do not have his clothes and wish him to remain at the LaCrosse Home for Children, will you be able to help contribute to his support and will you please send his clothes.

May we please hear from you as soon as possible.

Miss Minnette Sprian
Probation Officer
Juvenile Court of LaCrosse County

I don't know how or when I was "bailed out" of the home, but I was there long enough to contract chicken pox and be confined to my room. I was old enough (six) to form lasting memories of the place with its black, wrought iron fence, polished floors and jukebox. There was a large tree outside my bedroom window, and I dreamed of climbing down it like Tom Sawyer.

Mom did come for me, and my next memory is that of a small hotel room - possibly in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It was about this time Mom ended up washing floors and doing whatever she could to survive. My time was spent in the hotel room, but I do recall attending a school of some sort. I remember making an extremely crude ashtray for Mom out of clay. It was green, with blue trim, and had her name inscribed on the bottom. It was hideous, but she treasured it more than gold. It traveled with us for many years before being lost or broken.

It was while at the hotel that one of Dad's relatives came to see us. Uncle Willy Malay brought me a set of Hopalong Cassidy pistols and holsters. I loved them, but Mom was not so thrilled.

Some time later, Mom landed a job as a reporter for the Jamestown Sun in North Dakota. We were on the move once again.

1. Hall, Trevor. Marianne Foyster of Borley Rectory. Unpublished, 1958. Vol. IV, pp. 52-53.

2. "Most of the Foyster family who didn't go into the church went into law. I think all of the partners in Scadding & Bodkins were Foysters, except for a cousin. Most of the Bull and Foyster wills were drawn up by this firm." Alan Roper.

3. Hall, op.cit. p. 51.

4. Ibid, p. 58.

5. Tabori, Paul; Underwood, Peter. The Ghosts of Borley. Newton Abbot; 1973. p. 229.