Tag Archives: Bessborough mother and baby home

Last night.

Academic and Mother and Baby Home campaigner Maureen Considine (at top bottom left), of The Cork Survivors and Supporters Alliance, joined fellow activists Breeda Murphy (top left) and Eunan Duffy (bottom right) to discuss plans under consideration to build 246 apartments on land overlapping a possible children’s burial site linked to the former mother and baby home in Bessborough, Blackrock , County Cork.

An interim report by The Mother and Baby Home Commission found that some 900 children died in Bessborough or in hospital after being transferred from Bessborough.

It could only establish the burial place of some 64 children who died between 1922 and 1928 despite “very extensive inquiries and searches”.

However, along with witness testimonies, an early map of the land, discovered by Maureen, shows a ‘Children’s Burial site’ clearly marked.

This is the second in a series of shows looking at aspects of the Mother and Baby home regime ahead of publication of the report of the Commission of Investigation commencing the week of January 11.

Last week: Trafficked With Three Birth Certs

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.”

‘Why should someone have the power to take away someone’s identity?’: Cork Mother and Baby home resident buried under ‘house name (EchoLIve)

Thanks Breeda

Meanwhile…

Yesterday.

All Saints Famine Graveyard at Carr’s Hill, Moneygourney, County Cork

Carmel Cantwell writes:

My mother at Carr’s Hill Cemetery for the first time after hearing her son was buried there over 58 years ago…A lonely figure looking for any evidence of burials on a huge site.

It is also believed 113 children that died in St Finbarr’s hospital that were born in Bessboro are also buried here…..

Meanwhile

Previously: Bessborough on Broadsheet

The former mother and Baby Home at Bessborough, Blackrock, County Cork

Further to publication last week of a report from the Mother and Baby Homes Commission which revealed that some 900 children died at the Bessborough home in Cork.

Via Conall Ó Fátharta in the Irish Examiner:

The report on burials practices in mother and baby homes is to be referred to An Garda Síochána to see if any of the issues raised warrant criminal investigation.

….The burial locations of more than 800 infants [at Bessborough] — including some 470 infants on the order’s own death register as revealed by the Irish Examiner — remain unknown.

…The commission was scathing in its criticism of the order that ran the institution — the Sisters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary — stating that the affidavit it supplied on burial arrangements was “in many respects, speculative, inaccurate, and misleading”.

Meanwhile, last month, without warning, workers ploughed up waste ground around a castle folly at Bessborough – where survivors believe the Bessborough babies are buried.

Bessborough Report Referred To Gardai (Irish Examiner)

Previously: Bessborough: ‘There Are 900 Bodies After Going Missing’

The Girls of Bessborough.

An illustrated, long-form essay by Deirdre Finnerty for the BBC World Service on the now grown women who were raised at Bessborough.

The Girls Of Bessborough (BBC)

Illustration: Charlotte Edey

Thanks Bebe

Bessborough Mother and Baby Home; the ‘Little Angels’ plot on the grounds of Bessborough House in Blackrock, Cork

The publication this morning of a report into burial arrangements at Mother and Baby homes includes a section on the former Bessborough Mother and Baby Home in Cork which was opened in 1922 and owned and run by the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary.

More than 900 children who were born in, or admitted to, Bessborough died in infancy or early childhood.

The report states it had been “assumed by former residents and advocacy groups” that the children who died in the home were buried in a small burial ground on the grounds of Bessborough.

But, the commission said, from “an early stage”, the commission believed this was unlikely – as the area wasn’t big enough and because it was unlikely the children would be buried in the same burial ground as the congregation.

It has since only been able to establish that just one child was buried in the congregation’s burial ground.

After examining burial records of separate burial grounds in Cork city, the commission also established that, between 1922 and 1929, 54 children who died in Bessborough were buried in St Joseph’s Cemetery on the Tory Top Road in Cork; two infants who lived in Bessborough were buried in St Michael’s Cemetery in Blackrock, Cork in 1958 and 1986; at least one child was buried in Cork District Cemeteray, Carr’s Hill; and four children who had an association with Bessborough were buried in St Finbarr’s Cemetery in Cork.

This morning, on RTÉ’s Today with Seán O’Rourke, Paul Redmond, of the Coalition of Mother and Baby Homes, said:

“The really big headline report here is the fact that the entire Bessborough angels’ plot seems to have gone missing. What we’ve always thought of as the angels’ plot and there is a marker there for it – a little memorial mentioning the babies – the report is basically saying ‘there are no babies buried there’ or there might be one or two.

“But they don’t know where they are. Literally there are 900 bodies after going missing because of this report. It’s quite stunning.”

This morning’s report also found that, between 1927 and 1985, 12 adult women, who were former residents of Bessborough and whose deaths were not childbirth related, were buried in St Joseph’s Cemetery.

One of these women entered Bessborough in 1922 at the age of 20 and remained there until she died in 1984. Another of the women started living in Bessborough, aged 21, in 1924 and remained there until her death in 1985.

The commission also identified the deaths of 14 mothers who lived in Bessborough – nine of whom died of pregnancy or childbirth-related reasons. However the commission was unable to established the burial place of these 14 women.

The commission asked the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary about the burial arrangements but the congregation “said it had very little information as the records compiled in the institution were held by the Child and Family Agency (TUSLA) and it did not have access to these records”.

However the commission explained there is “no information about burials in these records”.

It found:

A number of members of the congregation provided affidavits and/or oral evidence to the Commission. They were able to provide remarkably little evidence about burial arrangements.

“The congregation told the Commission that the burial ground in Bessborough was opened in 1956 for deceased members of the congregation and the congregation does not know where the vast majority of the children who died in Bessborough are buried.

The Commission has not seen any evidence that the approval of the Minister for Local Government for the opening of this burial ground was sought or granted as required by the Local Government (Sanitary Services) Act 1948.

A member of the congregation who was in Bessborough for most of the period 1948-1998 told the Commission that she did not remember any child deaths during her time there but she implied that the children who did die there were buried in the congregation burial ground.

“In the years 1950-1960 (inclusive), 31 children died in Bessborough so it is rather surprising that she does not remember any deaths.

“Another congregation member who was in Bessborough from 1978-1985 told the Commission that one baby died during her time there. She said that the manager of the maternity hospital (who was also a member of the congregation) “took over the arrangements for the burial”.

“She “vaguely remembered” that the mother wanted the baby buried in St Michael’s Cemetery but she did not know where the baby was actually buried.

“The Commission has established that there is no record of this baby in St Michael’s burial records. She did not remember if the mother’s family was involved in the burial arrangements but she was clear that the congregation had bought the coffin for the baby.

“In evidence to the Commission, a member of the congregation who was there in the 1980s said that there were two children buried in the burial ground during her time there and a third was disinterred elsewhere and reinterred in this ground.

“Another member of the congregation who was in Bessborough for a period in 1971 and again between 1975 and 1981 swore an affidavit in which she said that she remembered one child who died and was buried in the congregation’s plot in the grounds.

“The recollections of these two congregation members seem to be incorrect In fact, it would appear that there is only one child buried in the congregation’s burial ground and that burial took place in 1994.

“The burial ground has some individual memorials to other children who died in Bessborough but it is unlikely that they are buried in this plot.

“It is possible that children who died in Bessborough were buried within the grounds. However, to date, the Commission has found no physical or documentary evidence which indicates that this occurred.”

In relation to the commission’s efforts to establish if there are other burial grounds on the Bessborough site, the report found:

“The Commission engaged forensic archaeologists to carry out a cartographic and landscape assessment of possible unrecorded burial arrangements in the Bessborough grounds.

“As already stated, the grounds measure approximately 60 acres. It is also possible that burials took place in the grounds that no longer form part of the Bessborough estate, that is, a total area of 200 acres.

“The forensic archaeologists and the Commission’s researchers reviewed all available cartographic sources and aerial images in order to identify possible burials within the
grounds of Bessborough. A site survey was also conducted.

“It is clear that there are a number of locations within the grounds where burials could have taken place. However, there is no significant surface evidence of systematic burial anywhere except for the congregation burial ground.”

The report also examined aerial photography taken in 1951. It states:

“The Commission examined vertical aerial photography taken by the Irish Air Corps in 1951. This series includes high resolution aerial photography of the Bessborough Estate.

The majority of child deaths at Bessborough occurred before 1951 (over 700 and it would be reasonable to expect that, if there were burials there, an aerial photograph taken in February 1951 would show up some ground disturbance, or anomaly on the landscape.

“If over 700 children were buried on the Bessborough Estate before 1951 the aerial photograph would be expected to give some indication of where the remains are located.

“The aerial photographs of the Bessborough site were examined by forensic archaeologists who determined that no visible features on the Bessborough landscape were indicative of any obvious site hosting the remains of such a large number of children.”

It later states:

“…as no physical evidence of possible locations was found, the Commission did not consider it feasible to excavate 60 acres not to mention the rest of the former 200 acre estate.”

The report states that records of admissions, births, discharges and deaths were compiled by the congregation and given to the HSE in 2011 who subsequently gave them to TUSLA in 2013.

Read the 96-page report in full here

Earlier: Death In Tuam

Burials As Late As 1990

Remains of the ‘Castle Folly’ at the former Bessborough Mother and Baby Home

“Maintenance work” began two weeks ago on a stone structure, known locally as the Castle Folly, which backs onto a burial plot on the grounds of the former Bessborough Mother and Baby Home in Cork.

Last month, Minister for Children Katherine Zappone said the Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation had examined the home’s burial plot but had not conducted a geophysical examination of the site.

Further to this…

Ghost of Castle Folly

I should have left here long ago
I should have gone away
The cloth and gown have torn me down
A sorry thing to say
My walls were tall they kissed the sky
Below they kissed the clay
Evicted by those “Sacred Hearts“
Now I must go away

Hark, listen to those distant sounds
My ancestors in song
Their carriages and sailing boats
Once here have long since gone
Gone off to find another shore
Where they can be and stay
I must be off and follow them
I must be on my way.

Alas when I have reached that land
A far and distant shore
My ancestors will welcome me
And take me in for sure
The news that I relate to them
Will shake them to the core
You tore me down and slaughtered time
My walls they stand no more

John Gibbs

Previously: Meanwhile, At Bessborough

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Conall Ó Fátharta, of The Irish Examiner

It’s been almost two years since Conall Ó Fátharta first reported in The Irish Examiner that, two years before historian Catherine Corless raised fears about the Tuam mother and baby home in Co Galway, a HSE West social worker, in 2012, had expressed concerns that up to 1,000 children may have been trafficked to the US from the home.

The social worker came to the conclusion after she examined both the Tuam and Bessborough mother and baby homes while preparing material for the Magdalene laundries inquiry, led by then Senator Martin McAleese – material which was not included in the McAleese report.

Readers should note Fine Gael’s Dr James Reilly was the Minister for Health at the time, while Phoenix magazine has previously reported Dr Reilly paid The Communications Clinic nearly  €60,000 between 2012 and 2014  – out of an Oireachtas fund, called the Special Secretarial Allowance (SSA).

Further to this.

Yesterday.

On RTÉ’s This Week.

Presenter Conor Brophy spoke to Ó Fátharta about his research and asked what, if any, action was taken after the HSE social worker raised her concerns back in 2012.

Conor Brophy: “In 2012, the HSE had examined both the Tuam mother and baby home and Bessborough in Cork as part of the Magdalene laundries inquiry [by then Senator Martin McAleese]. It’s findings in relation to high mortality rates at both homes, as well as trafficking of up to 1,000 children from Tuam for adoption were described by officials as ‘shocking’ and ‘staggering’. The HSE recommended a fully fledged, a fully resourced investigation and a State inquiry be established.”

Later

Brophy: “Where did the reports go and what action, if any, was taken after this?

Conall Ó Fátharta: “Well that’s where you run into… it’s difficult to understand, first of all, why nothing was done. I suppose, the answer that I’ve gotten from the departments, while they initially said they hadn’t seen it, they then said that the important thing to note was that this was outside the terms of reference of the McAleese committee. It was specifically examining… Magdalene laundries and that any issues surrounding mother and baby homes, and any validated findings of concerns, I think was the wording they used, should be reported through a separate process. But to me, to my mind, it’s pretty clear that they were being reported. I mean, the wording was clear – ‘this needs to be looked at further’. You get the sense that they had only scratched the surface and the reason they were raising this at senior levels was because they felt, you know, someone needs to look at this, they need to look at it forensically. Again, the defence has always been that, you know, the McAleese committee wasn’t really tasked with this, somebody else needs to look at it, at a later date.”

“But as I’ve always said, and I’ve said it in innumerable pieces, the line that was thrown at me was kind of that, the findings, in particular in relation to the Bessborough report, were a matter of conjecture, which is a sentence that the author of that report does use but not in relation to infant mortality, and uses it in the context of ‘well, look, this is what I’m seeing, these are the concerns that come out of it, when you examine this documentation, and these are all conjecture, until somebody has a look and sees are my suspicions founded’. That’s the context of that wording. What you can’t deny is that the death rate figures are coming directly from a register and if the work of Catherine Corless, which is fantastic, was enough to launch a State inquiry, it seems beyond me why figures held by the HSE themselves, taken directly from the order, weren’t worthy of that same level of interest two years earlier.”

Brophy: “What, for you then, are the key questions now?”

Ó Fátharta: “They key questions, we’re probably trying to answer them now. My point has always been, we could be a bit further down the track with all of this. If the concerns raised about Tuam and Bessborough had been noted when they were reported in 2012, we could be at the end of a State inquiry into mother and baby homes. Who knows? We have to hope that the commission is now going to, it does seem like it’s going to broaden the scope a bit, more than Tuam. It’s clear that the same concerns that we’ve now found in Tuam were noted in other institutions. The figures are there. The records are there. So, it’s a matter of spreading the net a bit wider and looking at other institutions which it does seem like they’re going to do but, I suppose, we could be a little further down the track if the right people had been listened to back in 2012.”

Brophy: “That’s journalist Conall Ó Fátharta speaking to me earlier. Now, in addition to asking for a spokesperson from the HSE to join us, we submitted a list of questions to the HSE this weekend. Specifically, they were related to what, if any, notification was provided to the minister [for health, Dr James Reilly] back in 2012 and what steps were taken to investigate the findings contained in its own internal documents at the time. The HSE wasn’t in a position to provide us with a spokesperson. In a statement, the HSE said it was liaising with the mother and baby homes commission in relation to the disclosure of all documentation relevant to the commission’s work.”

Listen back in full here

SPECIAL INVESTIGATION: Government already knew of baby deaths (June 3, 2015, Irish Examiner)

Related: ‘The Irish Martin Sixsmith’ Episode 56 with Conall O Fatharta (YouTube)

Previously: Open The Files

Meanwhile, In Tuam

Pic: YouTube

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Children’s toys and flowers at the ‘Little Angels’ memorial plot in the grounds of Bessborough House in Blackrock, Cork in 2014

You may recall a post from 2014 which detailed a timeline of the known medical trials conducted on children in Mother and Baby Homes in Ireland, the response of successive health ministers and the contemporaneous expansion in Ireland of the medical companies involved in those trials.

Further to this…

In today’s Irish Examiner, Conall Ó Fátharta reports:

The files of vaccine trial victims in Bessborough Mother and Baby Home were altered in 2002 — just weeks after the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse sought discovery of records from the order running the home.

Material obtained by the Irish Examiner under Freedom of Information shows that changes were made to the records of mothers and children used in the 1960/61 4-in-1 vaccine trials.

The Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse (CICA) had sought discovery of the records from the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Mary on July 22, 2002. An affidavit was sworn on October 3, 2002, and on a number of later dates in 2002 and 2003.

The document listing the changes opens with: “8.8.02 Checked the 20 files.” This is immediately followed by: “9.8.02 Made the changes.” The changes made to files Nos 5, 8, 11, 12, and 15 to 20 are then detailed.

The changes include:

The alteration of discharge dates of mothers (by a period of one year and two years);
The changing of discharge dates of children;
The changing of admission dates of mothers;
The alteration of the age of a mother (by two years);
The alteration of dates of adoption;
The changing of baptism dates and location of baptism;
The insertion of certain named locations and information into admission books.

Bessborough Mother and baby vaccine trial files altered (Irish Examiner)

Read more of Mr Ó Fátharta’s work here

Previously: Medical Trials And Children Of Lesser Gods

Laura Hutton/Rollingnews

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Teddies and flowers placed outside the former Bessborough mother and baby home in Cork at a memorial service yesterday afternoon held by the Bessborough Mother and Baby Support Group.

And this morning:

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Alan writes:

Meanwhile, the Irish Examiner reports:

Speaking to Red FM News, Helen Murphy [who was born in Bessborough mother and baby home in 1962] said that the only way of knowing how many babies are buried in Bessborough is by digging up the site.

“The nuns said and there was a statement from the Sacred Heart Sisters at the weekend, and they said they didn’t know whether the babies were buried in a coffins or shrouds,”

“They were the people running the home.

“How are we going to know how many babies are buried there unless they actually go in and see how many bodies [there are]?”

Mother and baby groups calls on Government to excavate Bessborough site (Irish Examiner)

Top pic: Kev