BILL Cotton met his mother for the first time when he was 56 years old. But he never revealed his identity to her.

Bill, who is now chairman of Bransgore Residents' Association, was a Barnardo's Boy and, with his two brothers, was taken into care at the tender age of two.

He has now written the story of his life in Barnardo's Homes, and the various foster homes he lived in, and the impact they made on him.

And it is a no holds barred tale without a happy ending.

His homosexuality caused his marriage to American wife Gladys to flounder.

She has now returned to her home state of Pennsylvania, though Bill says: "We are not getting a divorce and we are not selling the house."

But that element of Bill's life is left to the final chapters of his book.

His frank tale takes the reader from a vermin-infested flat in Plymouth through three mansions used as Dr Barnardo's Homes to Christian missionary.

His institutionalised early life began when he was delivered to Barnardo's Babies' Castle in Hawkhurst, Kent.

He was later fostered in a Cambridge village.

His older brother Len was fostered in the same village, but at his young age he did not even know he had a brother.

He told the Echo: "One day I was walking down the road with my foster mother and she pointed across the road and said, 'You see that boy over there? He's your brother."

"They seemed to have a policy in those days to keep emotions down," he reflected.

After a couple of months at Barnardo's headquarters in Stepney, he went to Honingham Hall, a stately pile in Norfolk.

Thirteen changes of address in 14 years left Bill feeling rootless, which he says helped him later in life when he became a Christian missionary.

A compelling read, Bill's book They Would Have Come Looking for Me. Wouldn't They? is priced £7.50 inc P&P from www.badgerwood.co.uk or email donalg@yahoo.com.

First published: October 12