About Us

Frustrated with my persistent questioning as well as being terrified that I might meet him one day, my mother once said to me "the day you find your father will be the day you never see me again and there's not a damn thing I can do about it!".

My name is Nathan and I am the son of David, not Daniel (Danny). This may or may not be significant!

Born in Bournemouth during the early seventies, my parents divorced in 1976 and I grew up with my older brother, two younger sisters and mother in Wales, where we had very little contact with other family members.

The move was traumatic at first but growing up in a rural environment certainly has it's benefits.

One of my earliest memories includes tentatively walking downstairs and finding my mother led on the sofa with two black eyes, a broken nose and stitches across her forehead. I'd heard shouting the night before and would have been three or four years of age.

I don't have any real memories of my father per se but I do sort of remember his presence being felt when vaguely recalling other events.

As you could probably imagine, I've wondered about my father and extended family my whole life, and after years of searching for a Danny Kincaid from Stepney, Tower Hamlets, in the East End of London (the details being taken from my birth certificate), I've learned Danny Kincaid had been born David Burrell.

And that's just Hampshire! One or two names is naughty but seven?! He must be a professional...

My mother died early December 2003 and where most people leave a 'skeleton or two in the closet', she left a whole graveyard! Within a month of her death I found out my brother was in fact my half-brother and that I also have a half-sister that is three years older than him. She was given up for adoption before he was born and grew up on a farm in Norfolk.

Then, at my mother's funeral, my maternal grandmother announced "good ol' Brenda, three blonds, three brunettes", which freaked everyone out! There were two blonds, two brunettes, we found a third brunette, which means there's a blond one still missing... She also 'found' a photograph of my father, providing me with the opportunity to see his face for the first time. It was taken in 1971, when I was just a few weeks old.

Originally owned by the 10th Duke of Norfolk's brother, the Hon. Mr. Howard, The Deepdene passed to the Duke before it was sold to Sir William Burrell in 1791.

His family only saw him once after he turned sixteen (in 1960 according to them and his birth certificate, and 1950 according to his marriage certificate) and that was when he introduced them as his 'adopted family' to my mother and us kids in 1974.

His eldest son, Sir Charles Merrik Burrell, instructed John Nash (better known as the 'Prince Regents Architect') to design a new castle that was built by Alexander Kyffin between 1809 and 1812.

Walter Burrell, Sir Charles's younger brother, inherited West Grinstead Park Estate next door. His house, the inspiration for Knepp, was an earlier Nash design. Other works by Nash include Buckingham Palace and The Royal Pavilion in Brighton.

After our move to Wales my father met an Indian lady and spent his time traveling between the Himalayas and her father's tea plantation. He also worked as a stuntman?!

Then, around 1985, a 'British Embassy official' telephoned an aunt and told her David had been killed in a car accident in Greece. He'd been out for a meal with friends and was on his way back to the Himalayas when he ran off the road. His family hasn't heard from him since.

I rang the British Embassy in Greece but they could not confirm my father's death. I called Bromley Police again and they told me he was alive and had committed crimes as recently as 1997. They also told me to leave it alone.

Staying at Ockenden Manor in October 2005, I went to the churches that contain memorials and stained glass windows dedicated to the Burrell family, and also went to Knepp Castle, where I met with Charlie, the present keeper and a true English gentleman.

William de Warrene, 2nd Earl of Surrey, founded Holy Trinity Church in 1090. The clergy of the Priory at Lewes served the church until 1250, when the Bishop of Chichester, S. Richard, erected the Vicarage and appointed as the first Vicar his own Chaplain. Other Vicars include The Rev. Gerard Burrell in 1483 (he later became Archdeacon of Chichester) and Ninian Burrell in 1508. Their names can be seen on two boards hanging on the wall in the bell tower and the church includes thirteen memorials dedicated to them and their descendents.

St. George's Church, unusual in design, incorporates late Saxon and early Norman work. Inside are monuments to the Burrell's by Flaxman (his largest works are in Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's Cathedral) and Nathaniel Smith (his only signed work, he was a pupil of Pieter Scheemaker, who carved keystones for Somerset House). Windows, again by C.E.Kempe, are dedicated to them and the church includes the family vault.

I also found out the eldest of my younger sisters is also a half-sister. My father went back to prison after I was born and my mother went back to her old boyfriend, the father of my other half-siblings.

There are now just two of us Burrell's (the other's are Tuck's), with my youngest sister being born whilst our father was in Dorchester Prison and conceived just before he went in.

I met up with a fellow inmate and old friends of his whilst touring old haunts in Bournemouth. I also met with my mother's old friend, from whom I learned our father had come looking for us around two years after our "sudden and secret move" to Wales.

My sister then found a couple of slides whilst clearing our mother's old house out. They show our father with several tattoos.