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A 3,000-page report tries to resolve an account left hanging for too long, that of death of over 9,000 children and babies whose lives were destroyed in institutions for single mothers and children from 1922 to 1988. In many cases through neglect, malnutrition or illness, in all for heartlessness.
These are the historical mistreatments that have taken place for years within the religious institutes they have claimed innocent victims, the very ones who had to protect them, thus coloring one of the most tragic chapters in the history of the whole of Ireland with a deep black.
A story that ended with that very long relationship released in January 2021, after years of investigations that uncovered terrifying truths and a place to shed bitter tears for all that has happened: the Tuam mass grave in County Galway.
The Tuam mass grave
A story, sadly known, also thanks to the film Philomena, with Judi Dench, and Magdalene, by Peter Mullan, which, inspired by a true story, tells of a Irish woman looking for the child which was taken from her immediately after giving birth.
Ireland asks for forgiveness
“The worst thing is that this is not a violence imposed by a foreign country, but an evil that we did ourselves,” said Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin before releasing the report. And he asked for forgiveness. Even if this cannot erase all the pain of those mothers and children who, entering these predominantly religious institutions, they went through hell, from which many have never left.
With the report, the premier presented a official act of apology by the state because he too was guilty along with the institutions, the church and the society that accepted one extremely perverse and harmful religious morality. And the consequences of all this have been paid dearly.
The orphanages of horrors
Orphanages and family homes had to be places of shelter and comfort for single mothers and children, and instead they have become real houses of horrors. The children who were born in the houses run by the Irish nuns came snatched away from their mothers because they are considered illegitimate, only for the absence of the father figure. Some have been adopted by other families, others have not made it: 9,000 children and babies died from 1922 to 1998.
And all this happened for one unjustified emotional violence towards those mothers and children, those situations that did not respect the stereotype of the traditional family and that have become the sacrificial victims of a misogynist culture. 9000 dead, a number that indicates that 15% of all children who have passed through those institutions have not made it.
Hell for women and children: Catherine Corless’s investigations
The investigation was opened in 2015 thanks above all to historical work Catherine Corless. The woman began her research by writing an article in the annual local history journal to explain how they were handled single mothers and their children from the order of the Bon Secours nuns in the St. Mary house, a house with very high walls, isolated from the rest of the country.
Catherine knew that single mothers, considered sinful, they were sent to that great building to atone for their evil committed. She knew this because she saw their children, abused and malnourished, who were relegated to separate classrooms, in the same school she attended. And remember well too sermons by religious officials who invited the parents of those sinful mothers to send their daughters to these institutions if they remained pregnant before marriage.
Thus, research after research, it emerged that the institutions were funded by the government, even if the children were not treated, while the mothers were emotionally abused. It was found that death certificates were missing for many children even though they had actually disappeared.
And then here they are found, the small corpses of the children, placed by the nuns in a tunnel of an old sewer under the St. Mary home orphanage, suffocated by the earth. You stayed there for years.
The Tuam mass grave
A life of violence and lies
The story of religious orphanages and family homes is tragic, frightening and terrifying, a veritable hell for thousands of Irish women and single mothers whose destiny had been decided by someone else. In the 5 years of investigation they have been indicted 18 of these Catholic structures: the mothers were in fact imprisoned against their will as against their will the children were snatched away from them to be given up for adoption.
Mother and baby homes were gods places of inhuman cruelty. In the full government report, there is also a video that collects some testimonies from whom he experienced that hell firsthand.
Fionn Davenport tells it, who was born there in one of those houses, and that he struggled 40 years to find out the whole truth about his birth: “Immediately after my birth, the mother changed her mind and said she wanted to keep the baby, but the nuns said no,” you are not allowed, you signed the documents, you signed the forms, so you have given up all your rights over this child ”. It took my mom and me 40 years to discover that this was a terrible lie, that they lied to her. In fact, according to the 1952 adoption law, the birth mother has six months to change her mind about the child’s future. And of course the nuns knew it ”.
Mary too, like Fionn, was born in one of these structures and reported her testimony: “My mother had knitted my dresses and after they had given me to my adoptive mother, the nuns brought back the clothes that my mother he had done for me, they threw them in his face and said: Mary won’t need them anymore, now she has real clothes! And that broke my mom’s heart ”.
These facilities lacked food, clothing and affection. But above all humanity was missing.
Marianvale Mother and Bay home, Newry
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