Where are these missing Irish children buried?
ASKS CATHERINE CORLESS
As a little girl in Galway, Catherine Corless was always curious about the St. Mary’s Mother and Baby Home in her hometown of Tuam, in County Galway, Ireland.
She always wondered what happened inside the stone walls of the home for unwed mothers and babies run by the Catholic sisters of Bon Secours.
Decades later, as a local historian, she asked the Tuam registry office for the death records of children at the home from 1925 until its closure in 1961. She was horrified at what came back.
“Hundreds of names. I just couldn’t believe it,” Corless said. “Seven hundred and ninety-six names in all. And I wanted to know who these children were.”
That simple act of historical research sparked a nationwide outcry — and now a government investigation — into the conditions inside Ireland’s mother-and-baby homes that existed as recently as the 1980s.
Corless’ research raised several disturbing questions, including: How did the children die and what were the conditions inside the home? And, most important, for Corless, where were the children buried?
Corless says she asked Bon Secours for burial records but was told that none existed. She says her efforts to find burial records at local government archives also turned up empty. She then cross-referenced the death records with local cemetery records but found only two of the children buried nearby.
“I cannot understand why there isn’t a burial record for 796 little precious children,” she said.
But Corless now believes she knows where the children may be buried: on the site of the former Tuam home, now part of a housing estate.
All that is left of the home is a crumbling stone wall. But in an easily overlooked corner, there is a small walled garden dedicated to “those who are buried here.”
It’s been known as The Children’s Graveyard ever since 1975, when two boys playing in the neighborhood broke open a concrete slab and made a grisly discovery. One of them, Francis Hopkins, was 12 years old.
“We found a load of skeletons that were clearly that of children.” Francis said. “We were so frightened, we ran out and our parents told us not to go down there. The priest came to say a blessing and a few days later it was covered up again. And as far as we knew we called it a graveyard since then.”
Corless believes this small plot may be where at least some of the children are buried. It was once a disused sewage tank at the edge of the property to the Tuam home.
“If the children were not buried there and there are no burial records,” says Corless, “then we need to find out: where are they?”
During her research, Corless also found a 1947 state inspection report on the home: There are several descriptions of “emaciated” children in the report. One child is described as so thin that “flesh hanged loosely from limbs.”
The vast majority of the deaths are under the age of 1 but children as old as 9 are also recorded. Causes of death included measles, meningitis and whooping cough. During the worst years, particularly 1946 and 1947, several children were dying every month, sometimes even two in one day.
CNN News Service contacted representatives of the sisters of Bon Secours and asked them about the conditions inside the home and the children who died. In a statement they said:
“The Sisters of Bon Secours today said they were shocked and deeply saddened by recent reports about St. Mary’s Mother and Baby Home, which operated in Tuam, County Galway from 1925 to 1961. In 1961 the Home was closed. All records were returned to the local authority, and would now be within the Health Service Executive, County Galway.
“The Bon Secours Sisters are committed to engaging with Catherine Corless, the Graveyard Committee and the local residents as constructively as they can on the graves initiative connected with the site.
“The Sisters welcome the recent Government announcement to initiate an investigation, in an effort to establish the full truth of what happened.”
The Tuam case is the latest in a string of issues linked to Ireland’s former mother-and-baby homes, funded by the state but run by various religious orders. The government has now promised to investigate the many allegations, including forced separations, illegal adoptions and claims that children were subjected to vaccine trials without parental consent.
Specifically citing the work of Corless, the Irish government is also considering whether to excavate the possible burial site at Tuam.
“If this is not handled properly then Ireland’s soul will be, like babies of so many of these mothers, in an unmarked grave,” said Ireland’s prime minister, Enda Kenny.
Corless says she will continue to dig for more records of the home in Tuam but she doesn’t necessarily want the site to be excavated. More important, she says, is erecting a memorial for the children — if they are indeed buried there.
“The least they might have is a name over them,” she said. “Those illegitimate children need to be respected as much as any other child born. It might bring some justice and maybe healing to those mothers and families.”
More than 3,500 women from Ireland travel to the UK for abortions last year 2013
Since 1980, at least 158,252 women have traveled to the UK to access abortion services.
Last year 2013 over 3,500 women from Ireland travelled to the UK for abortions.
The UK Department of Health published figures today on abortion Statistics for England and Wales in 2013.
It found that 3,679 women who gave Irish addresses had an abortion in the UK last year. Those figures are down from 3,982 in 2012, a decrease of 7.6 per cent.
The total number of abortions carried out in England and Wales during 2013 was 190,800, that is 0.1 per cent more than in 2012.
Last year, there were 5,469 abortions carried out on women living outside England and Wales, compared with 5,850 in 2012.
Sixty-seven per cent of them came from the Republic of Ireland, while 15 per cent were from Northern Ireland.
Since 1980, at least 158,252 women have travelled to the UK to access abortion services.
The figures published today do not give reasons for the drop in figures. Campaign groups from both sides of the abortion debate have commented on the findings.
The Irish Family Planning Association (IFPA) described the numbers as a “modern indictment of the State’s treatment of women with unplanned or unwanted pregnancies”.
Every day our clients tell us about their experiences of being abandoned by the Irish health care system and forced to rely on the services of another country.
“These women are not criminals but the law treats them as such because they are seeking a service that is illegal in almost every circumstance in Ireland.”
Meanwhile, The Life Institute has welcome the decrease in the number of Irish women having abortions over the last year.
Spokeswoman Niamh Uí Bhriain said, “This is good news: the decrease is significant and, while every abortion is a tragedy, it was important that women continue to realise that there were always better options than abortion.
The number of Irish women travelling for abortions has been falling steadily since 2001, as supports for mothers in crisis have improved and awareness of the humanity of the unborn children has improved.
Irish Banks write off over €300m in three deals with Denis O’Brien
Deals saw the Irish businessman invest some €230 million to acquire the properties of Siteserv Group, Topaz Group and Beacon Private Hospital.
The purchase of three major Irish businesses over the past two years by the billionaire businessman Denis O’Brien involved total bank write-offs of more than €300 million.
The deals saw the businessman invest €230 million to acquire the Siteserv Group, the Topaz Group and the Beacon Private Hospital.
The Siteserv deal saw the State-owned Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, which is now in liquidation, write off €110 million of the €150 million it was owed. Mr O’Brien’s move to become the major shareholder in the Topaz Group earlier this year involved the IBRC writing off slightly more than half of the €304 million it was owed.
The Beacon Hospital
Last month, Mr O’Brien bought debt of approximately €100 million due to Ulster Bank for a reported €35 million in a deal that gave him control of the Beacon Hospital in Sandyford, Co Dublin.
Mr O’Brien, who has a 29.9 per cent stake, is the biggest shareholder in the Independent News & Media. In April last year the group did a deal with its eight banks, which include AIB and Bank of Ireland, where the banks wrote off €138 million of an overall debt of €422 million, in exchange for a shareholding in the group worth approximately €10 million.
The Topaz Group was purchased by Mr O’Brien using Kendrick Investments Ltd, an Isle of Man company incorporated in July of last year. Siteserv was bought using another Isle of Man company, Millington Ltd, incorporated in December 2011 to buy the Irish services group.
In March this year Kendrick entered into a mortgage arrangement with the Bank of Ireland, with the Topaz business among the mortgaged assets, according to its filings in the Isle of Man. No charge has been registered against Millington.
Mr O’Brien is not tax-resident in Ireland and his Digicel group is headquartered in Bermuda. The Isle of Man does not impose corporation tax on most companies and does not have capital gains tax.
Sligo’s Lissadell House in set to reopen to public next Friday
MOVE ENDS FIVE YEARS OF LEGAL DISPUTE OVER ACCESS
The Taoiseach Enda Kenny is to re-open Sligo’s Lissadell House and Gardens to the public on next Friday, five years after it closed due to a legal dispute over rights of way.
Senior barristers Eddie Walsh and Constance Cassidy, owners of the ancestral home of 1916 leader Constance Markievicz, said they believed it was time to “put aside negativity” , while stating that they believed “the actions of Sligo County Council were unnecessary”.
Speaking at a press conference in Lissadell House today, Mr Walsh said the litigation – which he and his wife Constance initiated back in 2009 – had a “massive impact” on their family, and was “traumatic, difficult and challenging”.
He credited the influence of their seven children and the goodwill messages they had received after last year’s Supreme Court ruling with their decision to re-open the 19th century house, closely associated with poet WB Yeats.
Mr Walsh also paid tribute to Minister of State for Small Business John Perry for his support and for highlighting the tourism and employment benefits of the house and gardens, and said he was aware that these views were shared by Mr Kenny.
The couple has spent over €9 million on the estate since they purchased it for €3.75 million from Josslyn Gore-Booth in 2003, he said. Since then, the couple have not drawn down “one penny” of State grants, Mr Walsh said.
Section 482 of the Finance Act, which allows for expenditure on restoration to be eligible for capital allowances, has been of no great advantage since it was capped some years ago, he noted.
Mr Walsh recalled how the Leonard Cohen performances on the estate in July 2010 had led to offers by other artists, but “all this came to nothing when the High Court case was lost”.
“All this is in the past, “he said. “We look forward to moving forward on a positive note.”
Estate manager Isobel Cassidy confirmed the Yeats and Markievicz galleries, the alpine and kitchen gardens and woodland walks were all ready to re-open. “To paraphrase The Terminator, we are back”, she said.
Mr. John Perry TD welcomed the decision on behalf of the Government as a “huge economic benefit to the region, to the Atlantic corridor and the west of Ireland”.
He recalled Lissadell’s associations with Countess that Markievicz, first female minister in a western democracy, and noted the 150th anniversary of Yeats’s birth is next year.
Recently appointed Sligo County Manager Ciaran Hayesalso welcomed the decision and confirmed that he hoped to meet the Lissadell owners shortly. “I’m drawing a line under the court case,” Mr Hayes said.
Former Fine Gael councillor Joe Leonard, who proposed the original motion that led to the couple’s legal action, said he did not wish to comment further.
Last November, the Supreme Court found in favour of the Lissadell owners when it overturned a High Court ruling that four rights of way existed on four avenues through the estate.
The Supreme Court found only one one right of way existed along part of a coastal route. Sligo County Council faces paying some 75 per cent of costs of the legal challenge, but the final figure will be decided by the taxing master and may take several years, Mr Hayes said.
The Supreme Court ruling has wider implications for public rights of way, with Mountaineering Ireland noting that it had set an “unreasonably high” burden of proof on anyone asserting a right of way anywhere in the State.
Fasting can reduce the risk of getting Diabetes
New research has found that fasting can lower rate of heart disease and diabetes. The study is done by researchers at Intermountain Heart Institute at Intermountain Medical Center in Murray, Utah.
Lead author Benjamin Horne wrote in a news release: “There are a lot of books out there recommending that people fast for two or three days a week,? he added, ?but there are risks with fasting and little evidence that these diets are safe.”
The researchers reported that 10-12 hours of hunger prompts the body to initiate the search for food and the body then starts utilizing the stored amounts of bad cholesterol, LDL, which is found in fat cells of the body.
The researchers claimed that this mechanism influences people suffering from diabetes directly. Horne noted that fasting can become an important diabetes intervention in the future.
“Though we’ve studied fasting and it’s health benefits for years, we didn’t know why fasting could provide the health benefits we observed related to the risk of diabetes,” Horne noted.
The study reported that after six week of fasting, the cholesterol level decreases by around 12 percent. Horne said that since we expect that the cholesterol was used for energy during the fasting episodes and likely came from fat cells, this shows that fasting can prove an effective diabetes intervention.
WATER DISCOVERED DEEP UNDER EARTH’S SURFACE, SCIENTISTS SAY
Scientists just found a new ocean, and it’s not where you think. According to a new study, a huge amount of water is trapped beneath Earth’s surface – enough to fill several oceans. At 440 miles beneath the planet’s surface, the water isn’t accessible for use right any time soon, but it does give clues as to where all our water came from and where we can go from here.
The water isn’t exactly usable in its present state. According to the authors of the study, it’s trapped within a layer of a crystalline mineral called ringwoodite, which acts like an extremely hard, subterranean sponge. Because of the way it’s trapped, the water isn’t even liquid (or ice or vapor), instead taking the form of hydroxide ions containing both hydrogen and oxygen. If it were liquid, though, the researchers say that the pockets of ions could fill the world’s oceans.
There’s one big catch: the size of the ringwoodite layer beneath the planet’s surface has yet to be confirmed. But the scientists did use anetwork of over 2,000 seismometers around the United States to make a map of Earth’s internal structure. They found that material flowing downward melts as it passes through the 400-mile-deep “transition zone” of the planet’s insides. ”If we are seeing this melting, then there has to be this water in the transition zone,” said the University of New Mexico’s Brandon Schmandt, a coauthor of the study. “The transition zone can hold a lot of water, and could potentially have the same amount of H2O as all the world’s oceans.”
The scientists believe their findings are evidence that the water on Earth’s surface originally came from somewhere underground – and that the water cycle extends much deeper than many people thought, perhaps even contributing to the stability of oceans today. ”The surface water we have now came from degassing of molten rock. It came from the original rock ingredients of Earth,” Schmandt said. “How much water is still inside the Earth today relative to the surface?
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