Remembering ‘Baby Mary’ At Christmas Eve Mendham Police Memorial

MENDHAM, NJ — A tradition began close to four decades ago, after two young boys made a shocking Christmas Eve discovery.

Playing in the woods in the area of Mount Pleasant Road on Christmas Eve 1984, the children found a bag near a waterfall, which turned out to be holding the body of an unidentified, deceased baby girl, less than a day old.

Her umbilical cord still attached, authorities believe the abandoned infant died alone from exposure to the elements and hypothermia.

Though attempts have been made in hopes of finding out more about her identity, through DNA technology, her case still remains a cold one.

After she was found, the department’s Chaplain Father Mike Drury named the baby girl, “Mary,” the Mendham Township Police Department adopting the child into their hearts, ensuring that she was laid to eternal rest with a proper place and service.

On Christmas Eve in 1984, the body of a new born baby was discovered in the woods in the Twp by a couple of boys playing. The baby was subsequently adopted by the MTPD with the assistance of our Chaplain Father Mike Drury, appropriately named Baby Mary and given a proper… pic.twitter.com/5hoc6kkvdm
— Mendham Twp Police (@MendhamTwpPD) December 22, 2021

“She was a perfect, perfect child,” Drury told Patch in a previous interview.

“Someone was fearful to have a child,” he added. “All she had to do was drop her off somewhere. It’s very disturbing.”

Drury, then a newly-named chaplain, and the department's officers, bore the pain of this discarded child’s ending, blended with the possibility of finding who may have left her there.

Tom Costanza, then police chief, also previously told Patch that investigators believed that the person who left Baby Mary at the river, likely knew the area well, with the search for women known to have been pregnant at that time, visits to local high schools and an overall canvassing of the community, none of the efforts drumming up leads.

Thanks to the Mendham Township Police Department, Baby Mary lays peacefully in the St. Joseph Church cemetery off of Route 24, officers ensuring each year the tiny girl is never forgotten. The rose-hued headstone is etched with a cross, a Mendham Police shield atop of it.

Isaiah 49:15 is the epitaph, which reiterates the child’s place with those who have embraced her case, as well as in heaven, the scripture reading, “I will never forget you, I have carved you in the palm of my hand.”

She rests forever by another unknown baby, “Hope,” a cold case that came up seven years later, of an abandoned infant found dead near Route 78 on Dec. 18, 1991.

Every Christmas Eve at noon, the police department gathers to remember babies Mary and Hope with a graveside service, Chief Ross Johnson having read the poem “Roses in December" at past services.

The poem's first stanzas say, “God gave us memory that we may have roses in December and snowflakes in July, that we may find laughter amid the tears and sunshine even on the darkest days.”

Burial at St. Joe's in the Boro. Every Christmas Eve at 12 Noon, officers from the MTPD do a small grave side service along with other members of the community in her memory so she is not forgotten(Baby Hope was found deceased on I-78 a couple years later and was also buried…
— Mendham Twp Police (@MendhamTwpPD) December 22, 2021

here). The public is welcome as always. Both cases sadly remain open to this day.
— Mendham Twp Police (@MendhamTwpPD) December 22, 2021

The public is welcome to come to the service, Mendham Police Department says, to be a part of the touching though heartbreaking tradition that shows the lives of both of these children are always remembered.

This story contains reporting by Russ Crespolini and Jason Koestenblatt.

Questions or comments about this story? Have a local news tip? Contact me at: jennifer.miller@patch.com.