Growing up with a volatile and obsessive mother, Justine Cowan couldn’t get far enough away. It was only after her mother died that she found herself pulling at the threads of a story half-told – her mother’s upbringing as a foundling in the famous British institution. Haunted by this secret history, Justine travelled across the sea and deep into the past to discover the girl her mother once was. Here, with the vividness of a true storyteller, she pieces together her mother’s childhood alongside the history of the Foundling Hospital: from its idealistic beginnings in the 18th century, famous patrons from Handel to Dickens, its approach to childcare and teaching, and how it survived the Blitz only to close after the Second World War.