Stephen was born four years after her husband, March Buttivant Basey, who served in the Royal Navy returned from Christmas Island where he witnessed two nuclear tests. He died of multiple myeloma, a bone disease, in 1975 and Mrs Basey had been left to care for their son alone.
As in the case of John MacLeod, the authorities wanted to step in. Mrs Basey said: “When Stephen was born they wanted to take him away from us. They said he would be better off in an institution, but we chased them. I told them if anyone was going to look after him, it was me. They weren’t very happy, though.
“I hated those people. My poor late husband had been such a healthy man; strong as an ox and he was so gentle and kind. But he’d changed when he came back from those tests. Disease coursed through his veins and his spirit was broken. They didn’t care.
“He hardly ever talked about the bomb tests, but I knew they’d changed him. He’d become moody and irritable, completely unlike the man I knew before. He seemed to be crumbling inside and I was very worried about him. When I became pregnant, I thought it would change things. I thought we could go back to the way we were before. But then Stephen was born, and March just got worse.
“I tried to talk to him about why Stephen was the way he was, but March didn’t want to discuss it. I spoke to the doctors telling them there had never been any illnesses in either of our families, but they just shrugged their shoulders and said it was one of those things.
“When March got the cancer he lost the will to live, really. The cancer was the last straw. It was a nasty cancer and he suffered a lot. I did my best for him, but the spirit had gone. The only time he spoke about it was just before he died. He told me his sickness was the result of the bomb tests and he also believed our son’s condition was caused by the same thing.
“He was totally convinced about it. He told me not to believe anything the doctors said and to fight for all the help I could get. He said he knew he was dying and that he was sorry for everything, and then he died.”
“I’ve never forgotten what he said. There’s just me and Stephen now and he is our son. I don’t mind looking after him. He goes to a special school during the day, but he always comes home to me in the evening. He is just a big baby really, and I know he would be heart-broken if he was parted from me. I admit we could use some help, but Stephen gets all the love he needs at home. He wouldn’t get that in care.”
Sid Harris a hotel owner from Blackpool cries bitter tears; he cries tears for the boy who wasn’t able to. His only son Trevor couldn’t cry because disease affected the ducts in his eyes, making it impossible for him to shed a tear. When the pain got too bad, all he could do was rock back and forth while he cried inside.
Trevor died at the tender age of 12. Mr Harris, who witnessed three nuclear explosions during service with the RAF on Christmas Island, said: “Trevor was born with an extremely rare disease, a form of cancer that affects the bone and the blood. It’s so unusual there were apparently only 12 cases in the world. It caused my son’s bones to literally crumble to dust, and I had to watch him while he suffered. There was nothing anyone could do.
“I don’t think Trevor had a pain-free day in his short life. It really was a terrible disease and he was always in pain. The more I saw him the more angry I became because no-one could tell me why he was suffering so much. Everyone wants to blame someone or something for this sort of thing. But I must admit I went along with the doctors who said it was probably just pure chance. I’m not so sure now.
Former army motor mechanic Ken McCormack lived with death and disease in his family since witnessing Britain’s first A-bomb at Monte Bello in 1952.
He recalled: “I always blamed the bomb, but no-one would believe me. I have always been convinced it ruined my health and that of my family. I have never been so sure of anything in my life. I have suffered a series of heart attacks, but the loss of our eldest son Peter hit me hardest of all. He was born soon after I returned to Britain and contracted a rare form of kidney cancer to which he eventually succumbed at the age of 28.”
Mr McCormack was so convinced the bomb caused his son’s cancer that tried to get the words ‘radiation induced cancer’ on his death certificate. Of course the doctors wouldn’t comply.
He recalled: “They said they were unable to do that because they did not know what caused Peter’s cancer. The nearest they could get was that it was an act of God. But I am sure it was because of my radiation exposure. I know I was contaminated because of the nature of my work.
“I was stationed about seven miles from the explosion and part of my job was to measure radiation levels in samples recovered from the shore near the test site. The instruments I was handling were highly radioactive, the Geiger counters went off the scale, but the only protection I had was a pair of gloves. I was never told about possible dangers. Like the rest of the men I just did as I was told.”
His wife Muriel lost two other children through stillbirths. “They never let me see those babies because they were so badly deformed,” she said. “They never even told us what sex they were. There is something very wrong with this family, yet neither Ken nor I have had any history of bad health in either side. It is as though we have been cursed; I find it hard to understand what has happened to us.”
Denise Grove was born with no muscles down the left side of her body. It was a mystifying illness which baffled the best medical brains in Harley Street and consultants in the world famous Great Ormond Street hospital. “The doctors didn’t want to touch me,” said Denise. “They had no idea what was wrong with me and didn’t want to do anything for fear of making things worse.”
But as she grew, it became clear something would have to be done. “There were no muscles in my neck, my left arm, or leg. I was all lop-sided. I just flopped all over the place.”
Finally a surgeon was found at the Orsett hospital in Essex who was willing to take on Denise. “I think he regarded me as a bit of a challenge. He was a wonderful man and he became a good friend. All I can remember of my childhood is being in hospital, that’s all I ever knew. The surgeon tried everything he could think of. He would try one operation, and if it didn’t work he’d try another. Then it would be back to the drawing board.”
In the first 10 years of her life, Denise had six major operations and more than a dozen minor procedures. She was cut open, stitched up, then cut open all over again. Gradually Denise was rebuilt. Muscles were grafted into her neck so she could hold her head up, and her left arm was strengthened. False ligaments were put in her leg which stretched with her as she grew.
She suffered agonies on the way and had to wear big red surgical boots and a plastic brace which she had to wear day and night. Her childhood was a nightmare of taunting children and cruel stares. As she entered her teens, the doctors said they’d done all they could and that only exercise would now help her recovery.
“I never had any boyfriends,” she said. “I lacked the confidence. I worked out a technique where I walked beside my girlfriends and got in the same step as them, so people wouldn’t notice my limp. I was often in despair about the cruel things that had happened to me. I used to cry out and I kept wondering why I was born like this. It’s been awful going through the years with people asking, ‘What’s the matter with you?’ and my having to say, I don’t know.
A lot of people thought I had polio or some other disease. Some people used to shy away from me because they thought it might be contagious! In the end I used to invent things like I was run over by a car, or had had a heavy fall. Anything to stop the questions.”