A woman who tracked down her long-lost brother after only finding out he existed when their mother died has revealed how her life has been ‘enriched’ in the midst of tragedy.
Jess Basey-Fisher, 53, was perched on the end of a bed holding her mother’s ashes in 2019 when her father Nicholas dropped a bombshell that would change her life forever.
Unbeknown to her, Jess, a nurse from Carleton St Peter, Norfolk, had a biological brother living on the other side of the world who had been hidden from her through her whole life.
Her mother, Ann Weir, had given birth to a baby boy years before meeting Nicholas, but put him up for adoption in the 1960s due to the societal pressures of raising a child out of wedlock.
In a bizarre coincidence in 1991, the secret sibling travelled from his adoptive family home in Australia to stay with his paternal aunt in the Norfolk village of Brundall – just 10 minutes away from where Jess was living at the time.
However, it would not be until April 1 2025 – some 63 years after her brother was born – that the siblings would finally meet for the first time after Jess tracked him down through Ancestry and Facebook.
In another heartbreaking layer to their extraordinary story, he was diagnosed with stage four cancer in November 2024 – just a month after they first made contact online.
What followed was an emotional reunion between Ann’s separated children which came at a key moment in Jess’ life when she was battling through a double tragedy along with the revelation that she had a secret older brother.
Her GP father Nicholas, who had strongly urged her to track down her brother, died in a fatal cycling crash in Amsterdam just five months after Ann’s death – and six days after the family laid her to rest.
Jess Basey-Fisher, 53, is pictured with her long-lost brother who she tracked down in Australia
Jess is pictured as a young girl. She had no idea she had a secret brother until her father told her upon her mother’s death
Secret brother Alistair is pictured on the right after being adopted as a young boy. He is seen alongside his adoptive siblings Janet and Andrew in 1964
‘I remember him saying you’ve got to find him. And I said, “Yeah, too right”… I just had this yearning to find him.’
She added: ‘When when dad told me, obviously my jaw just dropped. It was just a real surprise but I had such an urge to find him.
‘The reason why dad had told me was because he’d read a book by Joanna Trollope, called Brother and Sister. He waited until probably six weeks after mum died to tell me so. It wasn’t something that he told me straight away.
‘But he felt that we should know, because he’d read this book, and I’ve read it now, and I can see why he felt he needed to, and he was very keen for me to find Alistair.
‘I haven’t got a very big family, so I suppose you want to find out any extra members. It was just something that I was really important to me.
‘I can’t even begin to think how mum would have felt.’
Despite being filled with determination to find her brother, the only information that Jess had to go off was her mother’s name.
She subsequently discovered that her mother and the father of her long-lost brother had met at a ball at a US airbase in Sculthorpe. Ann, who went on to work as a nurse and a midwife, was then sent to London to give birth.
Jess then managed to track down her brother’s birth record from September 1962 on the Ancestry website after guessing what his first name would be.
She was met with 50 different results for ‘A Weir’ but incredibly tracked her brother down by guessing what his first name would be based on knowing what her mother would have picked.
Jess went out to Australia to finally meet Alistair in the flesh. They are pictured with his wife Suzie (right)
In a devastating twist, Alistair was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer – just a month after the siblings made contact
‘I searched down and looked at all the names that mum would have chosen. It was just a hunch. I thought I’ve got to start somewhere, so let’s start with James. And it was the right one, so I didn’t have to do any more searching, which was rather lovely.
Thrilled with the discovery, Jess then contacted a social worker who tracked James down on Facebook in 2021. He had been renamed Alistair Dalgliesh and was 62 and living in Australia, having moved over with his new family from Kent when he was three.
His new parents had a daughter but were struggling to have another child when they adopted Alistair.
They had moved Down Under via the Ten Pound Poms scheme, a term given to British immigrants who migrated to Australia and New Zealand after the Second World War.
Back in England, Ann would go on to marry Nicholas, with the wedding taking place on Alistair’s birthday – six years after he was born.
‘I think the fact that she got married on his birthday says a lot,’ Jess said. ‘That was her nod.
‘I mean it could be total coincidence that but equally I think you’d never forget.’
Bearing extraordinary similarities to her own childhood, Alistair’s adoptive mother was also a nurse, his father also a GP.
Jess, Alistair and Suzie are pictured on the beach in Australia. Alistair is due to come to Norfolk in October
Jess is pictured with Marjorie, Alistair’s adoptive mother who has welcomed her into the family
The journey to find Alistair did not come without stumbling blocks. To begin with, there was a red herring where Jess was told by a social worker they had found her brother, only for them to realise he was born 10 years too late.
Then when the social worker found the right Alistair on Facebook, he failed to respond to follow-up emails.
‘I was quite nervous as well, because he might not want to be found, he might not know he was adopted for a start, he might have changed his mind, and I went through all the possible scenarios,’ she added.
Social workers came and went but persistent Jess always asked them to keep contacting Alistair – and then one day he started replying.
The pair first started exchanging messages on October 3 2024 and held their first phone call, starting with Jess asking him ‘Have you got red curly hair?’ to which he replied yes.
The siblings then proceeded to have a two-hour FaceTime and connected instantly, laughing about how similar they look.
‘We were just having two hour conversations every couple of days, because we had so much to catch up on.’
But then came another tragedy.
‘Literally a month later, he was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer,’ Jess said.
‘And I also had to tell him that his birth mum was no longer alive, which wasn’t an easy thing to do.
‘But he he actually said to me, he said, “Do you know what, Jess? The only thing I regret is not being able to say to her, “Thank you, I had a really lovely life”.”‘
Jess then travelled to Australia in April this year to finally meet Alistair in person and support him through his chemotherapy.
Describing the moment she met her brother for the first time, Jess said: ‘I was really cross with myself because I’d asked Suzie, his wife, to video us.
In a reference to ITV show Long Lost Families, she quipped: ‘I said, all we need is Davina McCall to be there!
‘But I stupidly crept up on them which is just a bit stupid because she couldn’t video it.
‘I saw them, and I was just so excited I forgot to do it properly. But never mind!
‘I couldn’t stop looking at him. You’re looking at every single detail. I was comparing him to my mum. I just kept saying, “God, this is just so unreal. Is this happening?” It’s so weird.’
Jess was stunned by the similarities between Alistair and their mother, including his love for history and music.
‘I think I watched more English television when I was out there than I ever watched. That’s all we watched, Antiques Roadshow, Antiques Road Trip, 1 % Club and all those.’
Jess said she was welcomed into the family by Alistair’s adoptive mother, Marjorie, and has even been added to the family tree. She also has two nephews through Alistair.
Jess revealed how the pair nearly crossed paths 34 years ago, when Alistair came back to the UK to stay with a relative.
She explained: ‘Alistair’s been out there since he was three, and ironically, in 1991, he was staying with his adoptive father’s sister in Brundall, which is 10 minutes from where I was living.
‘How weird is that? The parallel lives, it’s just a bit weird, there’s some real coincidences.’
Alistair is having chemotherapy every three weeks but is due to come over and stay with jess in Norfolk.
She joked how he will have to adjust to his ‘life in Suburbia’ to the ‘mud of the Norfolk farm’.
Jess says that Alistair as ‘really enriched my life’, adding: ‘I still can’t comprehend it really.
‘She said they are ‘making up for lost time’, adding: ‘We’re just basically picking up a little bit later.
‘It is weird because it’s like I’ve known him all my life.
‘Every morning, every night, we’d have a hug and a kiss, and he’s just such a loving person. I still can’t believe it.’
