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Prisoner of the State
At sixteen years old, Lily Arthur was caught between the women’s liberation movement of the ‘swinging sixties and the draconian ideology that young women should be punished for deviating from society's 'moral codes'.
For the 'crime' of being pregnant, Lily was forcibly taken from the man she planned to marry and incarcerated in the notorious Holy Cross Home for ‘wayward’ girls in Wooloowin, Brisbane as a ‘prisoner’ of the state. Lily spent her entire pregnancy performing unpaid labour in its infamous Magdalene Laundry.
On 1 September 1967, the terrified teenager was taken to the Royal Brisbane Hospital where she gave birth shackled to a bed, and her newborn son cruelly stolen from her – one of 250,000 babies forcibly seized from vulnerable unmarried mothers under the Government’s illegal forced adoption policies of the era.
After decades of heartache and an emotional reunion with her long-lost son, Lily remains on a crusade to expose the truth behind the crimes a country tried to hide and has taken the fight to the Human Rights Commission in Geneva, demanding justice for a generation of women who were victims of one of the worst human rights violations in contemporary Australian history.
About the author
Lily Arthur is the Director of Origins Supporting people Separated by Adoption and a campaigner for human rights, and justice for women and children affected by the illegal adoption practices of the past. Lilly is a trailblazer who played a pivotal role in securing National Apologies for Australia's Stolen Generations and Forgotten Australians. Her relentless advocacy addresses forced adoption's legacy and seeks justice for its victims including herself.
Praise for the Book
‘Only a few mothers led the fight for justice, but an army of women stood behind them. Lily Arthur represents a mother who never gave up her child willingly and fought to make sure he and many other adopted children know.’ - Karen Wilson-Buterbaugh, Director of Origins International and USA
‘Deeply personal and at times very raw insight. It is a compelling, powerful, intense, no-holds barred narrative. It clearly shows the lifelong impact of the illegal, cruel practices of forced adoption and a mother's fight for justice." - Senator Rachael Siewert
‘A heart-breaking view of crimes against humanity. For almost three decades, Lily Arthur details the legalised kidnapping of babies from millions of women in Australia and elsewhere who were brainwashed to comply with society's punishment. Punishment for getting pregnant. The truth of the horrors of adoption laid bare." - Joe Soll LCSW, Psychotherapist, and author of Adoption Healing
For the 'crime' of being pregnant, Lily was forcibly taken from the man she planned to marry and incarcerated in the notorious Holy Cross Home for ‘wayward’ girls in Wooloowin, Brisbane as a ‘prisoner’ of the state. Lily spent her entire pregnancy performing unpaid labour in its infamous Magdalene Laundry.
On 1 September 1967, the terrified teenager was taken to the Royal Brisbane Hospital where she gave birth shackled to a bed, and her newborn son cruelly stolen from her – one of 250,000 babies forcibly seized from vulnerable unmarried mothers under the Government’s illegal forced adoption policies of the era.
After decades of heartache and an emotional reunion with her long-lost son, Lily remains on a crusade to expose the truth behind the crimes a country tried to hide and has taken the fight to the Human Rights Commission in Geneva, demanding justice for a generation of women who were victims of one of the worst human rights violations in contemporary Australian history.
About the author
Lily Arthur is the Director of Origins Supporting people Separated by Adoption and a campaigner for human rights, and justice for women and children affected by the illegal adoption practices of the past. Lilly is a trailblazer who played a pivotal role in securing National Apologies for Australia's Stolen Generations and Forgotten Australians. Her relentless advocacy addresses forced adoption's legacy and seeks justice for its victims including herself.
Praise for the Book
‘Only a few mothers led the fight for justice, but an army of women stood behind them. Lily Arthur represents a mother who never gave up her child willingly and fought to make sure he and many other adopted children know.’ - Karen Wilson-Buterbaugh, Director of Origins International and USA
‘Deeply personal and at times very raw insight. It is a compelling, powerful, intense, no-holds barred narrative. It clearly shows the lifelong impact of the illegal, cruel practices of forced adoption and a mother's fight for justice." - Senator Rachael Siewert
‘A heart-breaking view of crimes against humanity. For almost three decades, Lily Arthur details the legalised kidnapping of babies from millions of women in Australia and elsewhere who were brainwashed to comply with society's punishment. Punishment for getting pregnant. The truth of the horrors of adoption laid bare." - Joe Soll LCSW, Psychotherapist, and author of Adoption Healing
- GenresAudiobookNonfiction
374 pages, Kindle Edition
Published January 29, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
February 6, 2025
Such an incredibly sad story to read. I read this book holding my 3 month old son and couldn’t imagine there being a time only 50 years ago that women my age had their children stolen from them because of misogynistic values held by our government and church. The treatment of Lily and the flow on affection on her life from the trauma of having her baby stolen is devastating. The forgotten women and their babies after decades of mistreatment and forced shame is a dark stain on Australia’s history and there hasn’t been enough done to make amends. An interesting book to learn more about women like Lily and how we can advocate for their mistreatment and mental health trauma.
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May 3, 2025How do you rate a book like this? Eye opening, horrific and a million different words. Did I enjoy reading it- no. It made me angry, sad and frustrated. But it also made me acutely aware of my blessings. Thank you Lily for your courage in telling your story.
February 28, 2025
I couldn't put the book down. As an Adoptee I found this very interesting. I have found out from my birth mother that she had experienced similar treatments when giving me up for Adoption.
July 9, 2025
Lily Arthur is yet another casualty of the 20th-century obsession of nation-states, in cooperation with various Christian religious denominations, with the institutionalization of women who didn't quite fit the desired mould outlined by the dominant social contract. Of Irish and Jewish descent, she found herself pregnant in her teens. Unlike many girls who ended up being treated like criminals for this, however, the author was actually in a job, engaged, and excited and happy to be pregnant. Despite all of this, and the willingness of the child's father to do the right thing, she found herself arrested and incarcerated in a home for unwed mothers. Later, she was coerced through intimidation tactics into putting her child up for adoption. This set her up for a life of untold heartache and misery.
This is a tale we are all familiar with at this stage. The argument that attitudes were different 50-60 years ago only goes so far to excuse the contempt with which these young women were treated and the disregard for their feelings of agony at being separated involuntarily from their babies. Ireland, Australia, Canada, and the UK all had a massive appetite for detaining women whose lives didn't quite follow the dominant, desirable narrative for women of that time. Of course, there's a lot to be said for people having children when they're in their twenties rather than their teens, and there's a lot to be said for this happening within a committed marriage. However, separating mothers from their biological children by force, as opposed to supporting them in the parenting process, goes against nature and best practice. Yet this happened routinely in order to facilitate the overall idea that families could only fit one mould, and incarceration of inconvenient women was regarded as a way to ensure the rest of society didn't need to think about their existence.
Lily Arthur compellingly tells the story of her ongoing search for her son, and her son's father, in the years after she left the institution. Her life has had various ups and downs, including a bad marriage with a highly controlling man, followed by a really good marriage with a highly supportive one. It also portrays the way in which she has used her experiences of adversity to help others who have been through similar situations, organizing with other women and adoptive children, and taking on the Australian state in court. She eventually found her son, living quite close to her, and reunited; similarly with the son's father.
This story is compelling and told in a matter-of-fact way that is easy to absorb. Resilient women such as Lily Arthur who are willing to speak out are our best hope for a more compassionate future, one that is Christian in practice, rather than only in name.
This is a tale we are all familiar with at this stage. The argument that attitudes were different 50-60 years ago only goes so far to excuse the contempt with which these young women were treated and the disregard for their feelings of agony at being separated involuntarily from their babies. Ireland, Australia, Canada, and the UK all had a massive appetite for detaining women whose lives didn't quite follow the dominant, desirable narrative for women of that time. Of course, there's a lot to be said for people having children when they're in their twenties rather than their teens, and there's a lot to be said for this happening within a committed marriage. However, separating mothers from their biological children by force, as opposed to supporting them in the parenting process, goes against nature and best practice. Yet this happened routinely in order to facilitate the overall idea that families could only fit one mould, and incarceration of inconvenient women was regarded as a way to ensure the rest of society didn't need to think about their existence.
Lily Arthur compellingly tells the story of her ongoing search for her son, and her son's father, in the years after she left the institution. Her life has had various ups and downs, including a bad marriage with a highly controlling man, followed by a really good marriage with a highly supportive one. It also portrays the way in which she has used her experiences of adversity to help others who have been through similar situations, organizing with other women and adoptive children, and taking on the Australian state in court. She eventually found her son, living quite close to her, and reunited; similarly with the son's father.
This story is compelling and told in a matter-of-fact way that is easy to absorb. Resilient women such as Lily Arthur who are willing to speak out are our best hope for a more compassionate future, one that is Christian in practice, rather than only in name.
October 6, 2025
This book was loaned to me and I am grateful for the chance to read it. Here are my personal thoughts, observations and book review comments on a very serious and quite shocking topic. Forced adoption, such a brutal and inhuman thing to do to young mothers. I only had to read the first chapters of the story to be enraged. Such lies and deceit, such an underhanded and basically illegal activity in the name of social propriety and Church teachings. What were the parents of these girls thinking? Perhaps their 1960s puritanical fear of being socially marked was worse than what happened to their vulnerable young daughters. Surely not all ‘hospital’ staff involved were corrupt and morally wrong? Why didn’t someone speak out? Do they regret not alerting the proper authorities? Everyone turned away, didn’t want to get involved, ‘Not my problem; I can’t change the system; what will the neighbours think?’ Three wrong responses! For badly treated and bereft young women their situation became much worse once their babies were taken from them. Mentally and physically they were broken, drugged, lied to and later doomed to wonder at the cruelty of the Australian city they called home.
It doesn’t matter your status, all that matters is that you are a mother and your baby is the most precious being on the planet and no person or organisation has any right to lie and take such a living breathing joyous gift away from you. In this 1960s case, steps were taken many years later and a mother, Lily Arthur, sprung into action to find out the truth of what happened to her stolen son all those years ago. Not only for her own piece of mind but for hundreds of other young unmarried mothers who were coerced, deceived and told their baby had died. As a mother myself I feel sadness for the other women, the adopters, who thought those vulnerable young mothers willingly gave away their supposedly unwanted babies. Who needs a document to say they can birth their baby? Who needs a document to say they can keep their baby? Should a document, a law, a church or organisation of any kind have the power to decree outcomes which sever a fundamental mother/baby bond?
Would a mother give up her new-born child if she was given clear options? Those new mothers should have been given clear, concise information, counselling, legal assistance, social services support and every accessible help for their future. Instead they got human rights abuse and social stigma. Indeed treated like criminals when in fact a victim of crime. Can a man feel and experience the fundamental changes wrought by pregnancy and childbirth? No. The male attitude Lily Arthur faced in courts of law was pompous, disparaging and cruel. Similar to nurses and those convent nuns mentioned in the book, ruled by priests and made barren by repetition and ancient doctrine. If you or anyone you know is going through pregnancy and facing adoption, forced or otherwise, this is the book you should read. It was a long, hard road for Lily Arthur to travel. She kept going. She is still going and has reached milestones in law courts and certainly shines a strong light on the appalling secrets of white and indigenous baby birth exploitation in Australia.
https://www.lilyarthur.com/about-author
It doesn’t matter your status, all that matters is that you are a mother and your baby is the most precious being on the planet and no person or organisation has any right to lie and take such a living breathing joyous gift away from you. In this 1960s case, steps were taken many years later and a mother, Lily Arthur, sprung into action to find out the truth of what happened to her stolen son all those years ago. Not only for her own piece of mind but for hundreds of other young unmarried mothers who were coerced, deceived and told their baby had died. As a mother myself I feel sadness for the other women, the adopters, who thought those vulnerable young mothers willingly gave away their supposedly unwanted babies. Who needs a document to say they can birth their baby? Who needs a document to say they can keep their baby? Should a document, a law, a church or organisation of any kind have the power to decree outcomes which sever a fundamental mother/baby bond?
Would a mother give up her new-born child if she was given clear options? Those new mothers should have been given clear, concise information, counselling, legal assistance, social services support and every accessible help for their future. Instead they got human rights abuse and social stigma. Indeed treated like criminals when in fact a victim of crime. Can a man feel and experience the fundamental changes wrought by pregnancy and childbirth? No. The male attitude Lily Arthur faced in courts of law was pompous, disparaging and cruel. Similar to nurses and those convent nuns mentioned in the book, ruled by priests and made barren by repetition and ancient doctrine. If you or anyone you know is going through pregnancy and facing adoption, forced or otherwise, this is the book you should read. It was a long, hard road for Lily Arthur to travel. She kept going. She is still going and has reached milestones in law courts and certainly shines a strong light on the appalling secrets of white and indigenous baby birth exploitation in Australia.
https://www.lilyarthur.com/about-author
May 26, 2025
Reviewed by Nan van Dissel for Bluewolf Reviews and Big Sky Publishing.
On 13th of February 2008, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd offered a formal Apology on behalf of the nation to Australia's Indigenous Peoples, particularly the Stolen Generations, on behalf of the nation at Australian Parliament House.
It wasn’t until 21 March 2013, that the then Prime Minister Julia Gillard made the historic apology on behalf of the Australian Government to people affected by forced adoption or removal policies and practices.
Author, Lily Arthur, herself a victim of these policies, in her important book “Prisoner of the State” not only relates her own tragic story but also the struggle, mothers affected by these policies endured to secure this momentous apology.
At sixteen, young defenseless Lily became a prisoner of the state of Queensland for the crime of being unmarried and pregnant. Her son was born and whisked away, during her incarceration, immediately after his birth; he was never held by his mother.
Her decades long journey to find her son is mirrored by an estimated 150,000 women, who also had their babies taken away at birth and adopted out to married couples in Australia; their only crime was that they were unmarried. It is estimated that 250,000 Australians were affected by policies and practices of forced adoption, with most adoptions occurring between 1950 and 1975.
Readers who are unaware of this practice, will find Lily Arthur’s book both moving and enlightening; it is personal and written from the heart – ‘no punches pulled’. It will leave them wishing to find out more about this blot on Australia’s history. Its importance to the understanding of forced adoptions cannot be underestimated; no wonder it is being re-printed!
On 13th of February 2008, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd offered a formal Apology on behalf of the nation to Australia's Indigenous Peoples, particularly the Stolen Generations, on behalf of the nation at Australian Parliament House.
It wasn’t until 21 March 2013, that the then Prime Minister Julia Gillard made the historic apology on behalf of the Australian Government to people affected by forced adoption or removal policies and practices.
Author, Lily Arthur, herself a victim of these policies, in her important book “Prisoner of the State” not only relates her own tragic story but also the struggle, mothers affected by these policies endured to secure this momentous apology.
At sixteen, young defenseless Lily became a prisoner of the state of Queensland for the crime of being unmarried and pregnant. Her son was born and whisked away, during her incarceration, immediately after his birth; he was never held by his mother.
Her decades long journey to find her son is mirrored by an estimated 150,000 women, who also had their babies taken away at birth and adopted out to married couples in Australia; their only crime was that they were unmarried. It is estimated that 250,000 Australians were affected by policies and practices of forced adoption, with most adoptions occurring between 1950 and 1975.
Readers who are unaware of this practice, will find Lily Arthur’s book both moving and enlightening; it is personal and written from the heart – ‘no punches pulled’. It will leave them wishing to find out more about this blot on Australia’s history. Its importance to the understanding of forced adoptions cannot be underestimated; no wonder it is being re-printed!
March 17, 2025
Bought it today and couldn’t put it down Haunting
May 13, 2025
how disgusting shame on Australia and new zealand for your actions
July 24, 2025
very heartbreaking and infuriating. the fact that this was happening not so long ago is just insane to think about.
December 5, 2025
Makes me wonder what Gay's experience was like
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews