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Mass unmarked grave for 800 babies in Tuam

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  • Registered Users Posts: 595 ✭✭✭Needles73


    eire4 wrote: »
    Well aware of that so lets make the religious actually pay then and still no reason the government cannot pay a portion if needed.

    I don’t disagree. But that’s not what’s happening.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,386 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    Catherine Corless is giving a talk in Trinity College on 7th December:

    https://www.facebook.com/events/2193075484264163/
    https://www.eventbrite.ie/e/in-conversation-with-catherine-corless-tickets-52901360393
    The Trinity Long Room Hub Arts and Humanities Research Institute is delighted to host this special ‘In Conversation’ with Catherine Corless who will be interviewed by Professor of Genetics at Trinity College Dublin, Aoife Mc Lysaght.

    As a family historian researching in her own time and without any university affiliation, Catherine Corless has worked on a particular, and shameful, aspect of Irish history, namely the “Mother and Baby Homes”. Her work in gathering information on the institution in Tuam, Co. Galway, has revealed patterns of the mistreatment of individuals, both adult women and their infants, under de facto incarceration. Though local people may have been aware of the conditions, the absence of records and hard data allowed the hierarchy of these institutions and the state to ignore or deny the extent or even the existence of the mistreatment and incarceration. Catherine Corless meticulously collected records of births, deaths and burials, which ultimately lead to the uncovering of a mass grave in the location of the septic tank system. This meant that the shameful history of the institution could no longer be ignored.

    Catherine Corless’s work required careful collection and cross-referencing of records. When she requested records from the Western Health Boards and from the Bon Secours Sisters (who ran the institution) she was told that they had none. She was informed that because she had no university qualification or affiliation the local county council were also unwilling to give her the records she needed. Ultimately, she requested records of deaths at the home from the Galway registry. There were 796 such deaths but no burial records.

    She has shed light on this Irish institution, while establishing an all too familiar pattern that was not unique to Tuam. Her work has been key to forcing the recognition of the mistreatment of innocent individuals in these institutions and as such is an important agent of social change in Ireland.

    About Catherine Corless

    Catherine Corless is a native of Tuam, Co. Galway, where her work as a family historian has uncovered the dark history of the Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home in Tuam. Catherine has previously been awarded the Bar of Ireland Human Rights Award (2017) in recognition of "exceptional humanitarian service" for her investigation into the Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home, and was one of the Rehab Group People of the Year Award recipients in 2018. President of Ireland, Michael D Higgins commented that Catherine "has demonstrated not only courage and perseverance but a remarkable commitment to uncovering the truth, to historical truth and to moral truth. All of us in this republic owe a debt of gratitude to Catherine for what was an extraordinary act of civic virtue"


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 13,993 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    Very good. I think I remember the professor speaking at the last Dawkins lecture in TCD.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKPYHVpqmsI


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,386 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    At the start of last month, RTE looked into the progress of the Tuam report:

    https://www.rte.ie/news/primetime/2019/0201/1026942-prime-time-tuam-rough-sleepers-ticket-touting/# (Prime Time)
    https://www.rte.ie/news/2019/0131/1026688-special-report-inside-the-tuam-mother-and-baby-home/

    The commission has been given another year to complete its work and an excavation of the site is due to take place later this year.


  • Registered Users Posts: 11,521 ✭✭✭✭aloyisious


    I'm not sure if it applies to this particular piece of Irish history but I think I heard a passing reference on "what it says in the papers" to a Govt decision to apply a 75 year secrecy rule on access to details of abuse and it's victim here. I may have misheard so if anyone has information as to what the reported decision refers to, I'd be obliged.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 13,993 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    aloyisious wrote: »
    I'm not sure if it applies to this particular piece of Irish history but I think I heard a passing reference on "what it says in the papers" to a Govt decision to apply a 75 year secrecy rule on access to details of abuse and it's victim here. I may have misheard so if anyone has information as to what the reported decision refers to, I'd be obliged.
    That's The Hiding of Scandalous Records Act 2015.
    Surviviors of institutional abuse have expressed outrage over Government plans to seal all major industrial school and orphanage investigation records for 75 years.
    The move, which also allows for the possible destruction of documents, must now be ratified by the Dáil in a bill which will be brought forward by Education Minister Jan O'Sullivan.
    The Irish Independent has learned that the bill has been approved by Cabinet for drafting.
    The Retention of Records Bill 2015 will provide for the strict and confidential sealing of documents from the Commission into Child Abuse, the Residential Institutions Redress Board and the Residential Institutions Review Committee.
    Tom Cronin of Irish Survivors of Institutional Abuse International said abuse survivors were "shocked and horrified" that the records would be sealed for so long.


  • Registered Users Posts: 7,890 ✭✭✭Odhinn


    Anything to avoid facing up to their responsibility.


  • Registered Users Posts: 33,650 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato
    Restaurant at the End of the Universe


    robindch wrote: »
    At the start of last month, RTE looked into the progress of the Tuam report:

    https://www.rte.ie/news/primetime/2019/0201/1026942-prime-time-tuam-rough-sleepers-ticket-touting/# (Prime Time)
    https://www.rte.ie/news/2019/0131/1026688-special-report-inside-the-tuam-mother-and-baby-home/

    The commission has been given another year to complete its work and an excavation of the site is due to take place later this year.

    No rush like. It's not as if potential relatives are dropping dead by the day or anything.

    It took a while but I don't mind. How does my body look in this light?



  • Registered Users Posts: 25,594 ✭✭✭✭Mrs OBumble


    aloyisious wrote: »
    I'm not sure if it applies to this particular piece of Irish history but I think I heard a passing reference on "what it says in the papers" to a Govt decision to apply a 75 year secrecy rule on access to details of abuse and it's victim here. I may have misheard so if anyone has information as to what the reported decision refers to, I'd be obliged.

    People who gave evidence to the redress boards were promised confidentiality.

    That promise is going to last for 75 years, apparently ... https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews//ireland/a-dangerous-precedent-75-year-seal-put-on-child-abuse-testimony-907909.html



    Some survivors would be happy to have their stories told in public now (and they are free to do so). But others aren't, and that also needs to be respected.


  • Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators, Regional South East Moderators Posts: 28,440 Mod ✭✭✭✭Cabaal


    People who gave evidence to the redress boards were promised confidentiality.

    That promise is going to last for 75 years, apparently ... https://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews//ireland/a-dangerous-precedent-75-year-seal-put-on-child-abuse-testimony-907909.html



    Some survivors would be happy to have their stories told in public now (and they are free to do so). But others aren't, and that also needs to be respected.

    Interesting to note from the radio today.

    People that gave their statements of abuse have had their records for a copy of these statements denied.

    It's a sad state of affairs when an abuse victims can't even get a copy of their own statement.

    It's almost as if there's an attempt to bury these stories.

    As pointed out on the radio earlier, there is no need to seal anything under new legislation, existing legislation already gives protection.

    This new legislation has a 25 year period before it can be reviewed again, almost like they want to bury the past.


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  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,386 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    aloyisious wrote: »
    [...] a passing reference on "what it says in the papers" to a Govt decision to apply a 75 year secrecy rule on access to details of abuse and it's victim
    Testimonies documenting abuse of children to be sealed for 75 years:

    https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2019/0228/1033488-abuse-records-legislation/


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 13,993 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    If some survivors gave testimonies under conditions of anonymity and confidentiality, then its fair enough to lock away their testimony until after they are dead.


    However, there is no good reason to lock away all the records.
    I wonder what % of them even wanted their testimony to be locked away?


    I sense the unseen hand of The Church at work here, just as I sensed it when Michael Woods decided that Ireland would indemnify the RCC for the costs of Redress.


  • Registered Users Posts: 11,521 ✭✭✭✭aloyisious


    I reckon (hope) that the bill might be a bargaining chip, the 75 year time-length being for reduction. There'd be no point in keeping the records at all if the living can't see them and those in 75 years time not having any knowledge at all of the scandal or the records existence. However, if that last is the actual plan by whomever came up with it, they must be stopped in their tracks and the bill killed stone dead. The odds of a Catherine Corless not being around in 75 years would suit them down to the ground.

    I can't see Katherine Zappone letting the wool be pulled over the publics eyes. It'd be like a legalized fire of the Customs House records.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 13,993 ✭✭✭✭recedite


    aloyisious wrote: »
    I can't see Katherine Zappone letting the wool be pulled over the publics eyes. It'd be like a legalized fire of the Customs House records.
    She got into politics to promote same sex marriage, and having succeeded in that she has concentrated on promoting gender reassignment in kids and promoting homosexuality in schools.

    In all other matters she sits comfortably with the establishment politicians, who see their role more as covering up child abuse than actually making it stop.
    If you want real change, vote for alternatives instead, such as this woman who knows a lot about the subject...



    Vid takes a minute to start.


  • Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators, Regional South East Moderators Posts: 28,440 Mod ✭✭✭✭Cabaal


    Think its important to just add these links, they make for very, very grim reading on the recent reports.

    First off Tuam
    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/04/17/mother-and-baby-and-burials/
    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/04/17/death-in-tuam/

    and now Bessborough
    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/04/17/bessborough-there-are-900-bodies-after-going-missing/
    More then 900 children's bodies unaccounted for and 14 women


  • Registered Users Posts: 11,521 ✭✭✭✭aloyisious


    Cabaal wrote: »
    Think its important to just add these links, they make for very, very grim reading on the recent reports.

    First off Tuam
    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/04/17/mother-and-baby-and-burials/
    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/04/17/death-in-tuam/

    and now Bessborough
    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/04/17/bessborough-there-are-900-bodies-after-going-missing/
    More then 900 children's bodies unaccounted for and 14 women

    So, if I'm reading a small part of the 1st above item right, the Tuam septic tank was deliberately filled almost to the brim with stones. One has to presume that for the building of separate interment places within the tank (as stated in the latest report) presumably at a later stage that would mean that a majority of the stones would have had to be removed first.

    That would infer there was deliberate schematic planning for the building of the places as a first, presumably with an examination of the tank (or it's map - given the stones in it) followed by the removal of the stones and then the building of the slots, a 2 or 3-part enterprise, followed by the final actual interments. I don't see anyone going to the bother of the first few stages of the enterprise if the interments of the babies remains were done just as a matter of convenient use of a disused septic tank.

    The presumed disappearance of the 900 buried remains from Bessborough also seems to have involved planning for no one at any date to have commented on the repeated moving of bodies as a regular occurrence from within Bessborough, when it had it's own interment plot within its boundaries for those who passed away within its confines.

    If not, there would seem to have been a lot of coincidental unrecorded movement of bodies and remains in both establishments.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,093 ✭✭✭Nobelium


    Are any remaining former employees of these institutions going to be properly questioned and cross examined as part of the inquiry (We should not accept any excuses that those still living can't be). Are we going to be left having to rely on inferences, as the circumstantial evidence presented so far allows for more than one explanation, which is far from ideal.


  • Registered Users Posts: 33,650 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato
    Restaurant at the End of the Universe


    The whole thing is a cover-up job which, if there is to be any blame at all, will blame institutions, no way is any individual to be held to account. Enda Kenny managed to spin it out by a few years which helps more perps slip into the grave unmolested, as it were.

    It took a while but I don't mind. How does my body look in this light?



  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,093 ✭✭✭Nobelium


    The whole thing is a cover-up job which, if there is to be any blame at all, will blame institutions, no way is any individual to be held to account. Enda Kenny managed to spin it out by a few years which helps more perps slip into the grave unmolested, as it were.

    Why though is the big question ? it's not as if Enda or anyone else in power in government is a church supporter ?


  • Registered Users Posts: 33,650 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato
    Restaurant at the End of the Universe


    :pac: Enda is a church supporter

    Leo is too but he hides it

    It took a while but I don't mind. How does my body look in this light?



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  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 1,093 ✭✭✭Nobelium


    :pac: Enda is a church supporter

    Leo is too but he hides it

    Sorry, I'm afraid that's a stretch too far even for me to believe


  • Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators, Regional South East Moderators Posts: 28,440 Mod ✭✭✭✭Cabaal


    Bunch of bast**ds is all I can say

    Money takes priority over their god and morals, thats for sure

    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/05/03/a-no-fault-donation/
    A copy of correspondence between the order and the Department of Children – obtained by Noteworthy under FOI – confirmed that the Bon Secours Sisters wanted to make a €2.5 million “donation” for the works that needed to be carried out at Tuam.

    However, it was explicit that this was voluntary, with country leader Sister Marie Ryan writing: “Our advice is that we do not have any legal liability arising from St Mary’s Mother and Baby Home and we note that at our meeting you [Minister Zappone] agreed and acknowledged same.”

    They said their donation would help to “expedite” the investigations the government wanted to do at Tuam.

    Sister Ryan wrote: “This payment will be the sole contribution made by the Sisters of Bon Secours Ireland to the government in relation to the site.”

    Separately, an account of a meeting between the Bon Secours Sisters and Zappone describes how the order had been “genuinely shocked” by the discovery of remains of the children buried at the site.

    “[They] never expected such a finding,” the notes said.


    Yep, they never expected anyone to find what they had done
    :mad::mad:


    https://www.noteworthy.ie/tuam-mother-and-baby-home-legal-liability-4615571-May2019/
    Bon Secours Says It has no ‘legal liability’ to provide funding before mother and baby home commission ends (Noteworthy)


  • Registered Users Posts: 33,650 ✭✭✭✭Hotblack Desiato
    Restaurant at the End of the Universe


    Nobelium wrote: »
    Sorry, I'm afraid that's a stretch too far even for me to believe

    You must have a short memory. Leo was quoted a few years back saying that he believed in retaining the 8th amendment. Also some pretty nasty things about single mothers.

    Now whether he changed his viewpoint, or pragmatically saw that this political boil had to be lanced to get the toxin out of Irish politics once and for all, is a matter of conjecture.

    Simon Harris has changed his views over time, too - as has Micheal Martin.

    It took a while but I don't mind. How does my body look in this light?



  • Registered Users Posts: 7,890 ✭✭✭Odhinn


    However, it was explicit that this was voluntary, with country leader Sister Marie Ryan writing: “Our advice is that we do not have any legal liability arising from St Mary’s Mother and Baby Home and we note that at our meeting you [Minister Zappone] agreed and acknowledged same.”

    They said their donation would help to “expedite” the investigations the government wanted to do at Tuam.

    Sister Ryan wrote: “This payment will be the sole contribution made by the Sisters of Bon Secours Ireland to the government in relation to the site.”


    It's the warmth that strikes ye.


  • Registered Users Posts: 11,521 ✭✭✭✭aloyisious


    Cabaal wrote: »
    Bunch of bast**ds is all I can say

    Money takes priority over their god and morals, thats for sure

    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/05/03/a-no-fault-donation/




    Yep, they never expected anyone to find what they had done
    :mad::mad:


    https://www.noteworthy.ie/tuam-mother-and-baby-home-legal-liability-4615571-May2019/

    If the above is the entirety or the crux of the official legal position of the Bon Seciours order of nuns in Ireland (country) in relation to the Irish Govt position, investigation and work on the site of the Tuam Home, then I reckon that they may be legally mistaken. Following on from the actual investigation, is probable comfort payment to the survivors, victim-relatives and the dead as well. Stating a public position on responsibility can rebound if a court later decides separately against the order on the lines of financial obligation.

    The costs of the reburial of the remains of the remains found on the site should be seen as separate to the investigation as it could also include (if chosen) for re-interment in hallowed ground. The state did not instruct the nuns to secretly bury the dead in unhallowed ground. That burial position was the official policy of the church belief to which the nuns may have been under theological sufference.

    There is also something probably ignored (not unnaturally) at all by the Nuns and the Curia to whom they allegedly give obeisance, the costs incurred by Catherine Corless for her untiring work of behalf of the dead and living. Catherine's bill has to be totting up daily and that is down to the long-fingering of the curia and the order - given their Christian obligations to the poor and needy.


  • Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,386 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    Cabaal wrote: »
    [...] very, very grim reading on the recent reports.
    Catherine Corless said a few weeks back that she was happy with the progress that the commission is making:

    https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/corless-very-very-pleased-with-findings-of-tuam-report-1.3863366


  • Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators, Regional South East Moderators Posts: 28,440 Mod ✭✭✭✭Cabaal


    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/08/06/burying-the-facts/

    Something wrong with this nutbag....

    Fr Gerry Young claims no children were buried in sewage chambers at Tuam
    Catholic priest, Father Gerry Young recently claimed no babies were buried in sewage chambers at the former Bon Secours mother and baby home in Tuam, Co Galway.

    Fr Young, from Greystones, County Wicklow, said:
    “From the word go, I didn’t believe the story. I happened to have done a bit of study on how the church buried people. As soon as I heard this story about all these little bodies wrapped up on shelves, I thought, ‘Catacombs.’ We’ve always kept the dead with us.”

    However…
    487336.jpg


    Historian Catherine Corless writes today:
    This (above) is what the archaeologists found when they first excavated the Tuam Home babies sewage site.

    Two inlet sewage pipes which facilitated the flow of sewage into the chambers where the babies remains were discovered which caused some little remains to be forced against the wall of the chambers and, to date, one little digit was found compacted in the wall.

    “I do not mean to disturb anyone, but I am only quoting from the Commission of Inquiry’s 5th Interim Report on the Tuam site, and I add (for the non-believers) that neither Catacombs or an Ossuary would need sewage inlet pipes!

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tuam-babies-just-a-hoax-says-priest-l7m5clth0

    https://www.facebook.com/MotherBaby-Home-Research-Catherine-Corless-1381096678815670/?__tn__=kC-R&eid=ARBcz0j5cEUupj0x8KgihsgYEKXfQZ7uiXyDOniylvCY236_pfCxOs4EziySozkkldZLkB5yoVjue8W6&hc_ref=ARQMAWTZq4eHevK5ZSsUBkTkANDdOsFfF_k_y5nDipnK4hT2gTJLwLguSEPDz8rXMJA&fref=nf


  • Registered Users Posts: 10,288 ✭✭✭✭branie2


    Tragic


  • Registered Users Posts: 11,739 ✭✭✭✭expectationlost


    at last we have photos of the pits, its interesting to see how large that site is, are there any better overviews of the site now that its been excavated, surprisingly there isn't in that fifth report, and any photos with bones are redacted, which is ok, but we can still can't really see what everyone been taking about.


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  • Registered Users Posts: 7,890 ✭✭✭Odhinn


    [Historian] Catherine Corless said the exact location of the buried children was known since the publication of the Fifth Interim Report of the Commission of Mother and Baby Homes in April, and that campaigners had mapped out the burial chambers before the ceremony.
    Anyone that walks in here today cannot but be moved by the love and the care that was put into these exhibitions here. People care so much about the babies who were put into the sewage tank, and if only the Government and the Church could show a bit of care, just as the people have here today."

    https://www.broadsheet.ie/2019/08/26/get-these-children-out/?fbclid=IwAR1tDZ7FhgEWx2B10rmx3YdrenQGV3MKmOD3qHJ3kEOwCeSXd1Hh9-eS1zw


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