(WHTM) — New DNA evidence helped identify the remains of a Pennsylvania woman and reunite her children.

In July 1971, police located an unconscious woman in a Howard County, Maryland, field. The victim of an apparent assault, she was transported to the hospital and underwent brain surgery. She never regained consciousness and died two months later.

Known as the Howard County Jane Doe, she became the Howard County Police Department’s oldest cold case homicide.

That is until this summer, 54 years later, when DNA samples from the unknown woman were compared with potential relatives using a KinSNP Rapid Relationship test. The woman had a name, Sarah Sharkey (born Sadie Belle Murray), and she had two living children.

Cold case detectives reunited the siblings — Charles Leroy Sharkey, 79 of Cleveland, and Mildred Marie Cantwell, 81, of Springfield, Illinois — in July this year. Both lived in an orphanage from a young age.

Charles Sharkey said he tried to locate family for years, even returning to where he was born in Pennsylvania to search for relatives, but failed to find anyone. Despite the circumstance, it’s a moment both have longed wished for.

“Learning about my mother was closure for me,” Cantwell said. “Being reunited with my brother is awesome. He’s the only thing in that family that I remember.”

The investigation into Sadie Sharkey’s homicide remains open, the county said. Detectives said they believe she was living in Pennsylvania before her death and do not know why she she was in Maryland or who she was with.

Anyone with information on the case can contact the department at (410) 313-STOP.