Ann Lovett case - 30 years

mrsdewinter

The Ann Lovett case wrecks my head. I was too young to understand the story and - thankfully - don't remember the coverage at all. But there are a few things I can't figure out like whether it was known that Ann was pregnant, or if anybody locally knew who the father was.
Maybe it's a sign of how much Ireland has changed but it feels like something that happened in a different country.

Femme_Fatale

Muise... wrote: »

Nell McCafferty wrote about Ann Lovett at the time, pointing out that almost everyone knew she was pregnant, but did not intervene because it was deemed a matter for the family.

I wonder what Nell thought people could do though.

I mean, if I discover a teenage girl is pregnant, it's hardly my business.

Muise...

Femme_Fatale wrote: »

I wonder what Nell thought people could do though.

I mean, if I discover a teenage girl is pregnant, it's hardly my business.

The article is in a long-lost book belonging to my grandmother, who loved Nell , but from what I can remember she meant the teachers and local doctor as well as adults like parents of Ann's friends, who would now be obliged to speak to the girl and her family and make sure everything was ok. She also wrote about the sort of omerta that prevailed in Granard immediately after the tragedy - no one wanted to say what they knew or what they thought except that "it was a matter for the family."

fryup

Ireland sure was Bally-go-bogbrained back in those days

as a young person there was only one thing on my mind, and that was to get out ASAP

CrabRevolution

ivytwine wrote: »

Actually, the only person I know from Longford said her family were outcasts in the village for not going to mass- in 2012.

So maybe the church is more influential in certain parts of Ireland than we think!

I find that very very very hard to believe, I live in the country and from colleges/travels and all the people I have met, I have never met anyone who still lives under that atmosphere, whether from Longford or any other county.

snowbabe

This brings back lots of memories for me.I had 2 friends who got pregnant in the mid '80s.One who had the baby and kept it but her mother pretended to country relatives that it was her child,we lived in Dublin.The other girl had twins and had them adopted.She had a year to sign the final papers,she was22.I remember my mother at the time saying to me it was a disgrace in this day and age 1986ish that her family or the boys couldnt help mind the children instead of adoption.I distinctly remember my mother saying if it was me she'd kill me but would yave helped,both were from very comfortable financially families.Without saying too much one of them went on to marry partner and have other children,was sad really.

jam_mac_jam

Muise... wrote: »

The article is in a long-lost book belonging to my grandmother, who loved Nell , but from what I can remember she meant the teachers and local doctor as well as adults like parents of Ann's friends, who would now be obliged to speak to the girl and her family and make sure everything was ok. She also wrote about the sort of omerta that prevailed in Granard immediately after the tragedy - no one wanted to say what they knew or what they thought except that "it was a matter for the family."

Where was her family? I am sorry you can blame the church and society but where was her mother or her aunts or even her father? Did nobody really notice that she wasn't pregnant.

It was 1984, there were plenty of people who had kids out of marriage at that stage and it wasn't the end of the world. There was something similar in my mothers family soon after... 1986, yeah it was a big deal but it wasn't the end of the world,she stayed with an aunt for a year or two and came back. The family got over it, nobody died. It is being made out that it was so different in 1984. Like it was a hundred years ago.

What were you meant to do if you lived in the town? Ok doctors or teachers should have done something but it was the family's business and not really up the collective town of Granard to do something.

Femme_Fatale

jam_mac_jam wrote: »

Where was her family? I am sorry you can blame the church and society but where was her mother or her aunts or even her father? Did nobody really notice that she wasn't pregnant.

In fairness, Muise made that point in her first post to this thread.

Agreed though.

jam_mac_jam

Femme_Fatale wrote: »

In fairness, Muise made that point in her first post to this thread.

Agreed though.

I wasn't really disagreeing with Muise...more with the sentiments of the article.

snowbabe

D'ont think it was the catholic church as much in that time as someone said it was more of a shame thing and what the neighbours would think. This was also during a recession,with alot emmigrating to England in the mid 80's know more who had babies away too and parents never knew,often wonder if they ever told their parents to this day.However,I do feel that someone was most certainly in a position to help Ann ,hope they sleep well.

chosen1

ivytwine wrote: »

Actually, the only person I know from Longford said her family were outcasts in the village for not going to mass- in 2012.

So maybe the church is more influential in certain parts of Ireland than we think!

Sorry but your friend sounds like a bull****ter of the highest order. Don't believe everything you hear.

maguic24

chosen1 wrote: »

Sorry but your friend sounds like a bull****ter of the highest order. Don't believe everything you hear.

I'm from Longford, that is bull****! It's backward but it's not THAT backward!!

Also Longford is a town not a village....

up for anything

jam_mac_jam wrote: »

Where was her family? I am sorry you can blame the church and society but where was her mother or her aunts or even her father? Did nobody really notice that she wasn't pregnant.

Depending on how someone carried the baby it could be easy enough to keep a pregnancy secret from everyone in the house. One of my elder sisters lived at home during her entire pregnancy back in the mid 70s and it was only two weeks before the baby was due when she was leaving to go to an unmarried mothers' home as they were known as that my mother finally copped on. I know other girls who kept their pregnancies hidden from their families right up until they went into labour.

The fear of telling anyone that you were pregnant I don't think has ever been equalled by much else.

ivytwine

maguic24 wrote: »

I'm from Longford, that is bull****! It's backward but it's not THAT backward!!

Also Longford is a town not a village....

She's from a village outside ballymahon, not longford town itself. Know the girl well and she's not the type to lie. Her family would be quite alternative, but she said some of the older people gave out about them not attending mass. Outcast was the word she used.

ivytwine

snowbabe wrote: »

D'ont think it was the catholic church as much in that time as someone said it was more of a shame thing and what the neighbours would think. This was also during a recession,with alot emmigrating to England in the mid 80's know more who had babies away too and parents never knew,often wonder if they ever told their parents to this day.However,I do feel that someone was most certainly in a position to help Ann ,hope they sleep well.

My cousin was born in croydon the sane year as the Ann Lovett case- out of marriage. She was very sick and premature, and there was fear she wouldn't make it. My grandmother said something along the lines 'maybe it would be better for Xxxx if she did die, instead of raising an illegitimate child'. Those were the attitudes people were up against- even being born far from home wasn't enough to alleviate the shame.

ProfessorPlum

jam_mac_jam wrote: »

Where was her family? I am sorry you can blame the church and society but where was her mother or her aunts or even her father? Did nobody really notice that she wasn't pregnant.

It was 1984, there were plenty of people who had kids out of marriage at that stage and it wasn't the end of the world. There was something similar in my mothers family soon after... 1986, yeah it was a big deal but it wasn't the end of the world,she stayed with an aunt for a year or two and came back. The family got over it, nobody died. It is being made out that it was so different in 1984. Like it was a hundred years ago.

What were you meant to do if you lived in the town? Ok doctors or teachers should have done something but it was the family's business and not really up the collective town of Granard to do something.

A friend of my sisters got pregnant around the time Ann Lovett died. Her comfortable, middle class family threw her out of the house, and closed the door behind her. She was 17. They never got over it. They never 'forgave' her. This was in Dublin, not in some small town with twitching curtains.
A girl I knew got pregnant when we were in 6th year. Nobody knew. She had the baby after being brought to hospital with what they thought was appendicitis. The difference was, her family supported her, and her child, and things worked out well for her.
I suppose the difference is the support you have at home. But for some it really was the end of the world, and some body did die. I suppose now, people are generally more open, more accepting, more tolerant. Kids get a bit more sex education in schools than they did before. They have more options now. If they get thrown out, they won't be destitute. They can go to England for an abortion - nobody needs to know. I wonder how many girls have abortions because they can't face the shame of telling their parents? I wonder how many of those parents would have supported their daughters if they'd known. I'm pro choice by the way, but when the decision is borne out of 'shame', it's not really a free choice.
The church had a huge responsibility for what went on. Why were they not preaching love and 'forgiveness' for these 'fallen' women'? Why were they shaming them from the pulpits? Why did their church disappear from them when these women and girls 'fell' at the first hurdle. Why did the priests encourage, even insist on fathers sending their daughters to the laundrys, when they knew what went on there.

rainbow kirby

ProfessorPlum wrote: »

I suppose the difference is the support you have at home.

I'd agree with this. My mother was 21 and unmarried when I was born in 1984, and had immense support from both her family and my dad's family - and everything worked out well. It shocked me when I first found out how badly some people were treated for getting pregnant outside of wedlock...

belinda502

Don't know if this is zombie thread or not but when I voted this evening on the Marriage Equality Bill, Anne Lovett came into my mind. I was the same age as her when she died and I've never forgotten her. There was a strange sort of sick symmetry about the way that she died beside a statue of a fallen woman 'Mary Madalene' praying to the Virgin. I wonder if she felt in some weird way that she might get succour there or something while she gave birth but she just died instead.

I think the code of 'omerta' from that place Granard was awful but it was probably no different to a lot of small towns at the time. Thankfully I knew a few girls who got pregnant around that time and their parents supported them and they kept their children so it wasn't all bad.

belinda502

belinda502 wrote: »

Don't know if this is zombie thread or not but when I voted this evening on the Marriage Equality Bill, Anne Lovett came into my mind...

How?

Why?

What was the connection?

PopePalpatine

I suppose there was an element of cultural oppression in both what the LGBT community has faced in Ireland and the tragically short life of Anne Lovett.

PopePalpatine

PopePalpatine wrote: »

I suppose there was an element of cultural oppression in both what the LGBT community has faced in Ireland and the tragically short life of Anne Lovett.

The comparison seems a bit stretched. Anne Lovett died. Has anyone from the LGBT community died because they are allowed a civil partnership but not marriage? A much better comparison would be with cases like Declan Flynn.

Fleawuss

The sexual lunacy of the Catholic Church. Masturbation a sin. Sexual intercourse must be open to procreation so no contraception. Utter bull**** from "revealed" garbage. How did societies ever fall under the control of such idiocy?

Smidge

belinda502 wrote: »

Don't know if this is zombie thread or not but when I voted this evening on the Marriage Equality Bill, Anne Lovett came into my mind. I was the same age as her when she died and I've never forgotten her. There was a strange sort of sick symmetry about the way that she died beside a statue of a fallen woman 'Mary Madalene' praying to the Virgin. I wonder if she felt in some weird way that she might get succour there or something while she gave birth but she just died instead.

I think the code of 'omerta' from that place Granard was awful but it was probably no different to a lot of small towns at the time. Thankfully I knew a few girls who got pregnant around that time and their parents supported them and they kept their children so it wasn't all bad.

I do get where you thought process kinda came from.
The church had/still to a much lesser extent hopefully had a very detrimental role in so many peoples lives if the stepped outside of church.

It was women, then unmarried women, then unmarried women having children, then contraception, then abortion and now "the gays" (I voted Yes btw )

I'm not going to go into too much detail but I am a child of the 70's and had a very lucky brush with the church. But for people to think the church didnt have the power to make life very difficult for people, even then, are VERY wrong.
Never underestimate the power they still had in the 70's and 80's.
They still could make or break a family in an instant

The Diabolical Monocle

JupiterKid wrote: »

Many if not most here on boards weren't alive in early 1984 when 15 year old Ann Lovett died giving birth at a grotto of the Virgin Mary in Granard, County Longford.

Ireland was a very different country in 1984 and it is deeply shameful that this young girl felt forced to hide her pregnancy because of the social stigma at the time. Remember, girls were being thrown into Magdalen laundries for the so called "sin" of getting pregnant out of wedlock at that time.

Ann Lovett's death was not completely in vain as it made Ireland hold a mirror to itself and question its so-called "morality." As a country and society, Ireland has come a long way but there IMO is still a way to go yet.

- and what ?

news from 1984 derp derp, yours sincerely.

LorMal

Muise... wrote: »

The cleverest trick the church played was to get its congregation to police each other with an atmosphere of fear and shame. Nell McCafferty wrote about Ann Lovett at the time, pointing out that almost everyone knew she was pregnant, but did not intervene because it was deemed a matter for the family. It's possible some of them assumed that the family would bring up the child, or that Ann would go away for a little while under some flimsy premise that would be gossiped about but never addressed. Unfortunately, the family were of the sort who wouldn't help her. Not to mention the more immediate family of whoever it was that fathered the baby.

You don't know ANYTHING about the family. They must have suffered greatly. They lost Ann's sister to suicide if I remember correctly.
Please do not make generalisations against people without knowing the facts.

daisybelle2008

LorMal wrote: »

You don't know ANYTHING about the family. They must have suffered greatly. They lost Ann's sister to suicide if I remember correctly.
Please do not make generalisations against people without knowing the facts.

There is some basis for this view LorMal, a lot of conclusion is also drawn from Gemma Husseys remarks in her memoir about the family and how Anne was doomed from birth (she had access to confidential documents). There is a reported view that her father was responsible and gave the family an awful life. Read this and the comments.

http://clericalwhispers.blogspot.ie/2009/02/vale-of-tears-veil-of-silence.html

LorMal

daisybelle2008 wrote: »

There is some basis for this view LorMal, a lot of conclusion is also drawn from Gemma Husseys remarks in her memoir about the family and how Anne was doomed from birth (she had access to confidential documents). There is a reported view that her father was responsible and gave the family an awful life. Read this and the comments.

http://clericalwhispers.blogspot.ie/2009/02/vale-of-tears-veil-of-silence.html

Thanks for that Daisybelle. It makes harrowing reading - I remember the whole awful business like it was yesterday. I felt so ashamed to be Irish at the time. It is a horrible kip sometimes.
I don't like the innuendo in the article. There is nothing said explicitly - no accusation and no evidence provided.
If Gemma Hussey did know something than she should have acted upon it. I doubt it was anymore than rumour. I worked with one of Ann's sisters at that time. She seemed a well adjusted, happy, popular modern young woman.
The conspiracy of silence is appalling. If people really know something then it needs to come out. Not to hurt anyone but to know why those poor children died. May God cherish their souls.

LorMal

PopePalpatine wrote: »

I suppose there was an element of cultural oppression in both what the LGBT community has faced in Ireland and the tragically short life of Anne Lovett.

That's really the most ridiculous link to make. A poor child dying in childbirth all alone in a grotto is not the same as gay marriage.

LorMal

up for anything wrote: »

Depending on how someone carried the baby it could be easy enough to keep a pregnancy secret from everyone in the house. One of my elder sisters lived at home during her entire pregnancy back in the mid 70s and it was only two weeks before the baby was due when she was leaving to go to an unmarried mothers' home as they were known as that my mother finally copped on. I know other girls who kept their pregnancies hidden from their families right up until they went into labour.

The fear of telling anyone that you were pregnant I don't think has ever been equalled by much else.

Yes, so true. And I also think that while the Church was a horrible institution back then, a huge proportion of the Irish people were complicit. The State was corrupt, the schools were often places of real fear, the police were a law onto themselves, the media was flaccid and complacent, ignorance and insularity abounded. It was Irish people that made up these organs of the State - ordinary Irish people - not people from somewhere else.
It's nearly all gone now, thank goodness. I hope it does not become replaced with a secular, liberal intolerance though. Some balance is needed in any society's- respect for all.

Santa Cruz

LorMal wrote: »

Yes, so true. And I also think that while the Church was a horrible institution back then, a huge proportion of the Irish people were complicit. The State was corrupt, the schools were often places of real fear, the police were a law onto themselves, the media was flaccid and complacent, ignorance and insularity abounded. It was Irish people that made up these organs of the State - ordinary Irish people - not people from somewhere else.
It's nearly all gone now, thank goodness. I hope it does not become replaced with a secular, liberal intolerance though. Some balance is needed in any society's- respect for all.

You forgot to blame the British and 800 years of occupation. Oh any other of the old stereotypes you can come up with