SALE OF BABIES

Hokitika Guardian, 5 July 1932, Page 6

SALE OF BABIES

DEMAND FROM AMERICA,

FOR ENGLISH “BLUE BLOOD.”

LONDON, July 2.

America is buying British babies like yards of cloth over a counter, says an English paper. They cost between £SO and £IOO. each.

The reason is that, since the war the United States have been eager to have British Wood improve her stock. “America could do with 200 British .babies, a month—babies of the real Anglo-Saxon strain,” an American doctor told the English Speaking Union. English* Rabies were sent out in the Aquitania for American adoption'in 1921. HuflHKlts ; of* women clamoured or wtt the beginning of a profitable 'trade. No trace is kept of the they have left this country.' They may be brought up in every comfort and affection or they may, if the purchaser tires of them, be handed over to American charities. ~ : The English mother pays for the adoption of her baby, and that is the last she hears of it. Sometimes it .is brought to the office by the mother and sold to the adopter practically over the counter. Others are put out to nurse in a poor family, temporary* and then, taken to an' expensive home in order that the prospective purchaser can see them against an impressive back-. adopter is usually wealthy, and when he or she ha* bought the baby the greatest attention is lavished on it. Usually, ’it 'is senior taken to America in a first-class cabin, and a nurse engaged to travel with' ft. ne baby was taken away in a n ermine f °one thing these American-bought babies have in common. They are of “good blood” through one parent. The Americans insist that the habv must be of a good family on either the father’s or mother’s side, and the, more aristocratic its “hush-hush” parent the more they are prepared to pay. One man offered £IOOO for a really blueblooded baby. , Miss Constance Bennett, the highest paid .'film star in Hollywood, recently .adopted an English taby. The baby was a matter of a day’s transaction, and was bought through an agent. -