Name: Alice Clifford
Case Classification: Endangered missing
Missing Since: November 28, 1979
Location Last Seen: Lucan, Co. Dublin, Ireland
Date of Birth: 1922
Age: 57 years old
Race: White
Gender: Female
Height: 5'2"
Weight: 8 stones - 112lbs - 50 kg
Hair Color: Brown, curly
Eye Color: Brown
Nickname/Alias: Unknown
Distinguishing Marks/Features: Alice was treated for Alzheimer.
Dentals: Unknown
Fingerprints: Unknown
DNA: Unknown
Clothing: A brown skirt with white stripes, a white jumper and a tan coloured cardigan with red slippers
Jewelry: Unknown
Additional Personal Items: Unknown
Alice Clifford vanished from St Loman's Hospital, where she was being treated for Alzheimer's, in west Dublin on 28 November 1979. Clifford, who had 28 grandchildren, was originally from Cremona Road in Ballyfermot. On the 28 November, two days before she was to return home, she had a craft class at the hospital. When it finished, the patients returned to their wards but nobody noticed she never made it back, according to her daughter. It wasn’t until she didn’t show for dinner that the alarm was raised.
The family received information that led them to believe that Alice might be buried on the grounds of St Loman’s Hospital. A Mr Fitzpatrick, who says he was working in the hospital grounds at the time Alice went missing, says he was laying 100m-long electric cables in a large trench, right outside the building where Alice’s craft class was being held that day. It had then been filled in very early the next morning. Mrs Clifford's daughter, Patricia, thinks that her mother possibly fell into a trench, without being noticed.
In January 2013, An Garda Síochána organized an exhaustive search of the area which stretched out over a number of days.
In 2016, upon meeting with representatives from the Gardaí and HSE, she and her family were told that a new development – a housing estate – was planned for the land. Most of the old hospital building had already been knocked down by then.When they went to visit the site in July this year, they saw that work had already begun on the grounds – but builders told them information that a body might be on the site wasn’t passed onto them.
In 2017, most of the hospital has been knocked down and searching through it has been described by the family as like “a needle in a haystack”.
Agency Name: Lucan Garda Station
Agency Contact Person: N/A
Agency Phone Number: +35316667300
Agency E-Mail: Contact form
Agency Case Number: N/A
Agency Name: Garda Missing Persons Unit
Agency Contact Person: N/A
Agency Phone Number: +353 1 666 9476
Agency E-Mail: missing_persons@garda.ie
Agency Case Number: N/A
NamUs Case Number: Not listed
NCIC Case Number: N/A
Garda
TheJournal.ie
Virgin Media News - MISSING PERSONS: Alice Clifford
Added: Prior to 2011; Last Updated: 01-27-2023 - By: ls
Questions or comments? Please contact appropriate member of the Area Team
** Listed information is from the time of disappearance.
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