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Irish Times
3 days ago
- General
- Irish Times
How Tuam, synonymous with a dark side of Irish history, can finally ‘do the right thing'
The laughter and shouts of children playing filled the air outside Trinity Primary School in Tuam, Co Galway , during break time on Monday morning. Further along the Dublin Road, just a short walk away, there is a very different playground. Under this site, it is believed that hundreds of children could be buried in a mass grave. Mother and baby homes now seem a world away but, not that long ago, they were to be found in towns across the country. In recent years, the name of Tuam has become synonymous with an Ireland of the past - a place which treated children born outside of marriage, and the women who gave birth to them, as problems that needed to be hidden. READ MORE They were often shipped off to live in mother and baby institutions , kept behind high walls. Out of sight and, largely, out of mind. 'They didn't matter in life, and they didn't matter in death,' local historian Catherine Corless said of past attitudes towards 'illegitimate' children. [ Catherine Corless: 'I was told more often than not that I was giving Tuam a bad name' Opens in new window ] Her research set off a chain of events which culminated in more 'walls' being built in Tuam this week but, this time, it is about 'doing the right thing', Ms Corless said. Access to the site of the town's former mother and baby home is being fenced off ahead of an excavation due to start in mid-July . The goal is to locate remains and, where possible, identify them so families can give their loved ones a dignified burial. It has taken a long time to get to this point. In May 2014, the Irish Daily Mail published research by Ms Corless which indicated that almost 800 babies and infants may be buried at the site. In the 11 years since, Ms Corless has become the name most associated with the site. Those years would prove she is a formidable force, but also as a naturally shy person, she initially found the level of public attention difficult. 'It was gruelling at times,' she said in Tuam on Monday. People would stop her in the supermarket and complain about what she was doing. 'I got that so many times, and it really upset me.' She was told she was 'giving Tuam a bad name' and 'tarnishing everyone' in the town. She said people would also stop her relatives and tell them 'she shouldn't be doing that, it's wrong, leave them there, it's terrible what she's doing'. While she has also received a lot of support, Ms Corless said the negative comments have not stopped. On Sunday, a man living in the US emailed her saying: 'You're about as credible as Santa Claus. You're a disgrace. I hope those nuns bring you to court.' From the beginning, she had known she was facing an uphill battle. 'My husband Aidan – he was very uneasy at the start because he said, 'You're taking on the State and you're taking on the [Catholic] Church, the biggest, the most powerful people in Ireland. And still, he backed me.' A truck delivers equipment to the site of the former Mother and Baby Home in Tuam, Co Galway, ahead of impending excavation works. Photograph: Andrew Downes/xposure Despite the setbacks, Ms Corless said the treatment of the babies and the lack of dignity in their burial was 'too horrific' for her to walk away. 'All those lovely little children and babies, that's the one thing that drove me. That's all that was in my mind – these babies are in a sewage system, they have to come out.' Siobhán Holliman, editor of the Tuam Herald newspaper, said some local people may have 'felt they were being blamed for something that they had nothing to do with', especially when international media descended on the town after the revelations were first published. However, most people are now 'supportive of what's going on', said Ms Holliman. 'Once people realised the extent of it, how many babies and infants died there, how many remains are up there – it's not a situation that can just be left. 'It's part of the town's history; you can't ignore history.' A test excavation in 2017 discovered a significant amount of human remains in what appeared to be a decommissioned sewage chamber. Ms Holliman said that while life has continued in the town since then, things felt somewhat 'on hold' while people waited for the full excavation to begin. The process is expected to take two years, but she hopes it will finally bring 'some closure for the relatives, the survivors, the town, and residents up there'. Most people in the street on Monday did not want to talk. Others said what happened at the institution was 'terrible' and they were happy the excavation work is finally set to begin. 'It's about time,' said one man, who did not wish to be named. 'The poor babies.'
Daily Mail
4 days ago
- Daily Mail
Dig begins for the remains of 800 children believed to have been buried at Irish 'mother and baby home' where bodies 'were dumped into sewage tank called The Pit'
A long-awaited excavation has begun at a notorious former 'mother and baby home' in Ireland where the remains of almost 800 children are believed to have been buried. Pre-excavation work began on Monday ahead of a full-scale dig to try to identify hundreds of children who died at the home in Tuam, Co Galway between 1925 and 1961, years after campaigners first aired their horrifying revelations. The institutions mainly housed women who fell pregnant outside marriage, which was viewed as socially unacceptable in Ireland at the time. Unmarried mothers were often sent to such facilities at the behest of their own families. An investigation into the facility was prompted by research by local historian Catherine Corless, who discovered that there were death certificates for 796 children at the home - but no burial records. Many of the children who died at the institution are believed to have been dumped into a former sewage tank known as 'The Pit', according to Ms Corless. She told Sky News she was 'feeling very relieved' as excavation work began at the site on Monday. 'It's been a long, long journey,' she told the outlet. 'Not knowing what's going to happen, if it's just going to fall apart or if it's really going to happen.' A report in 2017 revealed that a mass grave containing the remains of children had been uncovered in a disused sewer during preliminary excavations. The ages of the dead ranged from 35 foetal weeks to three years old. The story has sparked outrage and horror since coming to international attention in 2014, when the Irish Mail on Sunday first reported on the claims. The work at the burial site, which is being undertaken by the Office of the Director of Authorised Intervention, Tuam (ODAIT), will involve exhumation, analysis, identification if possible, and re-interment of the remains at the site. Its objective is to 'recover and forensically analyse, and to memorialise and bury with respect and dignity, human remains recovered from the site'. The pre-excavation work includes the installation of a 2.4-metre hoarding around the perimeter. The site will now be subject to security monitoring on a 24-hour basis to ensure the forensic integrity of the site during the excavation. Family members and survivors of the institution will have an opportunity to view the perimeter to see the works being carried out in the coming weeks. The full excavation is anticipated to last two years. Ahead of the preparatory work, Daniel MacSweeney, who leads the ODAIT, described the planned excavation as 'unique and incredibly complex'. One of Mr MacSweeney's main responsibilities will be to ensure any remains that are uncovered are re-interred in a respectful and appropriate way. In 2021, Irish premier Micheal Martin delivered an apology on behalf of the state for the treatment of women and children who were housed in mother and baby homes across Ireland. The St Mary's home for unmarried mothers and their children was run by the Bon Secours Sisters, a religious order of Catholic nuns, until it closed in 1961. The Bon Secours Sisters also offered a 'profound apology' after acknowledging the order had 'failed to protect the inherent dignity' of women and children in the Tuam home. Ms Corless completed her efforts to collate the death certificates of 798 children who died at the home in September 2013. In all but two cases, she was unable to trace their burial records. The Connacht Tribune interviewed Ms Corless about her campaign to memorialise the children the following February, and the story gained international attention that May, when the Irish Mail on Sunday reported on fears the children had been buried in a 'mass grave' at the home. The Irish government ordered a nationwide commission of investigation into mother and baby homes a month later, coming together in January 2015 to look back on practices. Test excavations at the site of the home in Tuam only began in October 2016, uncovering 'significant quantities of human remains' in a report published in March 2017. It revealed that children at the home suffered malnutrition and neglect, which caused the deaths of many, while others died of measles, convulsions, TB, gastroenteritis and pneumonia. The commission said the remains were found in a large underground 'structure', divided into 20 chambers. It said the structure 'appears to be related' to the treatment or storage of sewage or waste water. The commission later said the remains were 'not in a sewage tank, but in a second within the decommissioned large sewage tank'. Ireland's Minister for Children ordered a full forensic excavation of the site in 2018.
The Guardian
4 days ago
- General
- The Guardian
Preparatory work to identify remains of 800 infants at Irish mother and baby home begins
Preliminary work aimed at identifying the remains of nearly 800 infants is starting on the site in Tuam, Co Galway, as Ireland continues to wrestle with the traumatic legacy of its mother and baby homes scandal. Catherine Corless, a local historian who first sounded the alarm about the dark past of the institution run by nuns from the Bon Secours order, uncovered the names of 796 infants who are believed to have been buried there between 1925 and 1961, some in a disused subterranean septic tank. There were no burial records. On Monday, excavation crews began sealing off the site before the search for remains next month. 'There are so many babies, children just discarded here,' Corless told Agence France-Presse. It was Corless's work that led to an Irish commission of investigation into the so-called mother and baby homes, to which young women and girls were sent for decades to give birth in, rather than in hospital or at home. Doubling as orphanages and adoption agencies for much of the 20th century, the institutions were run by religious orders with sanction by the state, which overlooked deprivation, misogyny, stigma and high infant mortality rates. The government made a formal state apology in 2021 after the commission report. In Tuam, hoarding has been placed around the excavation site, now in the middle of a housing estate. The preliminary work is expected to last four weeks before a full-scale excavation begins on 14 July. The site was once a workhouse and the search for the infants' remains could be complicated by the fact that victims of the 19th century great famine are also thought to be buried there. Daniel MacSweeney, who is overseeing the operation, told RTE radio: 'It's an incredibly complex challenge because of the size of the site and the fact that we are dealing with infant remains that we know, at least in the case of the memorial gardens (on the site), are co-mingled.' The existence of mother and baby homes has been described as a dark stain on Irish society. In 2017, the then taoiseach Enda Kenny described what was revealed about Tuam as 'a chamber of horrors'. Sign up to This is Europe The most pressing stories and debates for Europeans – from identity to economics to the environment after newsletter promotion Speaking in the Dáil, the Irish parliament, he didn't spare his fellow citizens. 'No nuns broke into our homes to kidnap our children. We gave them up to what we convinced ourselves was the nuns' care. We gave them up maybe to spare them the savagery of gossip, the wink and the elbow language of delight in which the holier-than-thous were particularly fluent. We gave them up because of our perverse, in fact, morbid relationship with what is called respectability,' he added.
BreakingNews.ie
4 days ago
- General
- BreakingNews.ie
Preparatory work begins ahead of mass grave excavation at mother and baby home
Pre-excavation work on the site of a notorious former mother and baby home in Tuam in Co Galway has begun. The preparatory phase, which will last around four weeks, comes ahead of the full-scale excavation of the site to try to identify the remains of infants who died at the home between 1925 and 1961. Advertisement In 2014, research led by local historian Catherine Corless indicated that 796 babies and young children were buried in a sewage system at the Co Galway institution across that time period. Historian Catherine Corless. Photo: Brian Lawless/PA. The St Mary's home for unmarried mothers and their children was run by the Bon Secours Sisters, a religious order of Catholic nuns. In 2021, Taoiseach Micheál Martin delivered an apology on behalf of the state for the treatment of women and children who were housed in mother and baby homes across Ireland. The Bon Secours Sisters also offered a 'profound apology' after acknowledging the order had 'failed to protect the inherent dignity' of women and children in the Tuam home. Advertisement The work at the burial site, which is being undertaken by the Office of the Director of Authorised Intervention, Tuam (ODAIT), will involve exhumation, analysis, identification if possible, and re-interment of the remains at the site. The pre-excavation work includes the installation of a 2.4-metre hoarding around the perimeter. The site of the Tuam mother and baby home. Photo: Niall Carson/PA. The site will now be subject to security monitoring on a 24-hour basis to ensure the forensic integrity of the site during the excavation. Ireland Weather: Met Éireann predicts warm week ahead with... Read More The excavation is anticipated to last two years. Advertisement Ahead of the preparatory work, Daniel MacSweeney, who leads the ODAIT, described the planned excavation as 'unique and incredibly complex'. One of Mr MacSweeney's main responsibilities will be to ensure any remains that are uncovered are re-interred in a respectful and appropriate way.
Irish Times
4 days ago
- General
- Irish Times
Work to excavate Tuam mother and baby home site to begin
Preparatory work will begin on Monday at the site of the former mother and baby institution in Tuam, Co Galway , in advance of a long-awaited excavation due to start in mid-July. The excavation will take place 11 years after research by local historian Catherine Corless revealed that 796 children died at the institution, which was run by the Bon Secours religious order between 1925-1961. A lack of burial records indicated the children could be buried on the site. When a test excavation in 2017 discovered a significant amount of human remains in what appeared to be a decommissioned sewage chamber, Ms Corless said she thought the site would be fully excavated shortly afterwards. However, the process was delayed while the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes carried out its work. READ MORE Ms Corless said she thought her work was complete in 2017, but 'instead of that I had to fight harder and harder ... perhaps I was naive at the start'. She said she is naturally a shy person and becoming a public figure was 'painful', but she knew she could not give up. 'I just had to, the babies kept me going. It was so unfair what happened to them,' she said. Ms Corless said she received a lot of support from the public, but some locals in Tuam 'didn't want to hear about it'. 'They would say, 'Why are you doing this? Don't disturb them, let them rest in peace. We'll put up a plaque'.' [ I want to give the 796 children buried at Tuam their dignity and, if we can, an identity Opens in new window ] Ms Corless said the children buried at the site deserve more than a plaque, as do their relatives. She said it was a 'disgrace' that they had been 'treated like they were nothing'. She said she hopes the excavation will finally give survivors and relatives some 'closure'. Anna Corrigan, whose two brothers John and William Dolan might be buried at the site, said the children were 'denied dignity in life and in death'. Ms Corrigan, from Dublin , said the treatment of the children and mothers in question is 'a wrong that should never have happened, but hopefully we can go some way to righting that wrong'. The director of the exhumation, Daniel MacSweeney , said the process is likely to take two years and will be a 'unique and incredibly complex excavation' as efforts are made to identify any remains found.
