AMONG the rubbish on the floor of a red phone box lay a newborn baby girl, her umbilical cord still attached after her mother abandoned her.
She might have gone unnoticed had a stranger not stopped to make a call and spotted what he first thought was a discarded chip wrapper one bitterly cold morning. Now, 32 years later, April Paul is telling her extraordinary story – including the heartbreaking encounter with the mum who gave her up.
April was found by kind-hearted Joe Campbell in the early hours of the morning in Forest Gate, East London.
He immediately called the police, who rushed the tiny tot to Newham General Hospital, where she was given the name April after the month in which she was born.
But while Joe had saved her life, he would spend years wondering what had happened to the little girl he had rescued.
He never forgot her, taking birthday cards, gifts and money to social services every year in the hope they would reach her.
He even asked if he could adopt her, but was turned down because he was unmarried at the time.
After years of trying to maintain contact, he was eventually told by social workers to stop.
April, meanwhile, was adopted by another family and given a new name, only learning the truth about her traumatic start in life when she was eight.
The pair were finally reunited in 2016 after a public appeal, when Joe’s colleague recognised him as the man who had found the abandoned baby decades earlier.
Since then, he has become one of the most important people in April’s life, offering the love and support she says she struggled to find elsewhere.
Now, for the first time, April has laid bare her anger towards her biological mother, accusing her of selfishly abandoning her.
She told The Sun: “My mother was so selfish.
“She neglected me and gave me the toughest start in life.”
April told The Sun she had tried to reach out to her mum years later, hoping to understand why she had been “left to die” in the phone box.
But she claims the woman slammed the door in her face, swore at her and told her never to make contact again.
She said: “Can you imagine how heartbreaking that was? What had I actually done wrong to her?
“It felt like I could have died for all she cared, she left me in the phone box on what I have learnt was a bitterly cold morning.”
April said she wanted to try to bring the family back together and reconcile with her mother, but those efforts have failed.
And she had previously kept in touch with one of her siblings, but the two have since lost contact .
She said: “Sadly though for one reason or another we are not in touch these days.
“Like I said, I have tried to unite us, and reconcile with my mum, but it just isn’t happening, she doesn’t want to know.”
Despite the pain of her childhood, April has since built a life of her own.
She works in a bank and is now a mother herself, raising a son while continuing to rely on Joe for the support she says has made such a difference.
She said: “I am now a mother to a son, I work in a bank, and I have Joe there, who is the closest thing to family, other than my son, who I can have, he actually cares about me.”
April has not ruled out a reconciliation with her biological mother, saying she would not prevent her son from having a relationship with his grandmother if the woman came forward.
She said: “If she wants to come out of wherever she is and reunite, then that is on her, she is a grandmother now and I would never stand in the way of my son and her having a relationship.”
Now in her 30s, April said she was no longer holding grudges, but still struggled to make sense of the decision that changed her life before it had barely begun.
She said: “Obviously, I am upset and putting feelings into words is not easy for me, but my message to her is where is your humanity and ultimately why?
“Why would you do this to me?”
April said she was shocked that no action appeared to have been taken despite what happened.
She said: “To be honest, I am surprised, now as an adult and a parent looking back.
“I was a newborn baby, in a phone box with my umbilical cord attached.”
“It seems crazy to me that the authorities took no action.”
While April has been left with painful questions about her past, she says she will always be grateful to the man who stopped that freezing morning from ending in tragedy.
Joe, who never gave up hope of finding the little girl he rescued, has remained a constant in her life since their reunion.
April has now launched a fundraising appeal to help him enjoy a more comfortable retirement, hoping to repay some of the kindness he showed her when she was at her most vulnerable.
She said Joe had given her a chance at life without ever asking for anything in return – and now she wants to give something back to the man who became family when she needed it most.