From top: Bessborough Mother and Baby Home, Cork; St Jospeh’s Cemetery, Cork City
This afternoon.
Cork historian Maureen Considine has revealed that a resident of Bessborough Mother and Baby Home, run by the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus, is buried under a false name ‘after being denied her true identity even in death’.
The woman is named as Anne Walsh in archival documents.
However, a plot at St Joseph’s Cemetery, Cork city, identifies her as Doris Walsh
Via EchoLive:
Ms Considine explained that many women were given “house names” after entering the residence.
She has been working with Bessborough survivors to seek justice for women they claim were stripped of their identities.
The Mayfield woman, along with survivors she is working with, is calling on Bessborough nuns to replace such headstones and restore the birth names of mothers who passed away at the facility.
She is also calling for unmarked graves to be acknowledged with headstones, in a bid to prevent the whitewashing of history.
“This was something I felt I couldn’t ignore,” said Ms Considine.
“Restoring these women’s real names is asking so little. If a gesture like this can’t be honoured, we have to ask ourselves how far we’ve really come in our treatment of women and girls.”
Thanks Breeda
Meanwhile…
Our client has launched a #JR of the failure of the @healthdpt to implement a public Inquiry into mother and baby homes.
Pregnant women were detained, abused and had their children removed. These criminal acts must be investigated fully, without further delay. @SAVIA_NI pic.twitter.com/u8nKJvperr— Claire McKeegan (@MckeeganClaire) November 9, 2020
someone better go up to the belfry and wake Terry Prone.
Keep going! We need to expose the full extent of this to prevent it happening again and to accord deceased victims, survivors and the descendants of both the long-overdue justice they merit.
are you sure that top picture is of Bessborough Mother and Baby Home? It looks very similar to Dunboyne Castle mother and baby home; now a luxury spa hotel.where you can get a full body massage over the unmarked graves of unwanted babies
I am sure Roderic O’Gorman and his Greenwash party colleagues, in the spirit of North South intergovernmental relations, will be happy to assist in the sealing and burial of any Bethany Home victims records if contacted.
The pain inflicted on women in this island continues. It’s time the UN were called in and the perpetrators and the facilitators who continue to cover up were put on trial with The International Criminal Court!