“SIAMESE” TWINS

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 182, 22 October 1927, Page 11

“SIAMESE” TWINS

BORN IN LONDON MARY AND ANN In a cot in one of the children’s wards at St. Thomas’s Hospital, London. are lying, face to face, most remarkable twins—both girls. They are joined from the middle of the chest almost to the lowest part of the abdomen, and they have been taken to the hospital for observation. Their names are Mary and Ann, and they are the children of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Edward Church, living at Peabody Buildings, Ebury Bridge, Pimlico, S.W. Mr. and Mrs. Church have one other child, a girl, aged 4. The need for having the twins under special observation was recognised when it was found that Ann was not so healthy as her sister. The surgeons at St. Thomas’s have considered the possibility, in the event of her death, of saving the life of Mary, but recently Ann began to ra |y. One of the surgeons said that both twins are suffering from congenital heart disease and that the shock to the system of the survivor would be very great if an operation for separation were performed. Both babies in essentials have a separate existence; their hearts do not beat together. But they are so much alike that they have been distinguished by different coloured ribbons. Mary wears pink and Ann blue. The most famous of all twins joined together were the Siamese-—r Chang and Eng—who were born about 1811 and died in America within two hours of each other in 1874. They married two sisters.