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Mum’s 30-year nightmare searching for her child
 To
have a child go missing must be every mother’s nightmare.
Imagine the panic that sets in when you realise that your little angel
is gone from your side the thought that your child is in the hands of
a stranger is unbearable.
Co. Donegal mother Ann Boyle knows more than most the anguish the family
of a missing child goes through after her six-year-old daughter Mary disappeared
without a trace over 30 years ago.
Mary Boyle is Ireland’s longest-missing person on record.
A twin, she disappeared on March 18, 1977 while visiting her grandparents
at Cashelard near Ballyshannon in Co. Donegal.
To date, no trace of her has ever been found.
Her mother Ann said: “I’ll never forget the panic that was
in my heart. For days I was sure she would be found.
“My heart goes out to the McCanns. I feel heartfelt sorrow for them.
They probably aren’t even aware of what they are doing.”
Ann —who lives in Kincasslagh, Co. Donegal said she understood
exactly what the McCanns are going through.
She said: “They are going full-steam ahead because that is the way
you go. You try everything to find your child. No matter what it is, you
will try it.
“I know what I went through, and my husband. We felt as if our hearts
were going to burst at times.”
And as the McCanns vow they will not pack-up and come back to Britain,
Ann remembers that returning back home without Mary was one of the hardest
things she had to do.
Speaking during the interview on Highland Radio in Letterkenny, she said:
“I am aware that people have to get back to their own lives. I could
not understand how people go back to normal life and carry on when Mary
was missing. It was very hard to go back to normal life.”
Now a widow and a great-grandmother, Ann still harbours hope that the
mystery that has haunted her for the past 30 years will be solved before
she dies.
“I don’t think I’ll see Mary alive, but I would like
to think that if Mary was dead that I would at least find her body,”
she said.
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