And so the long-awaited dig at the site of the former Tuam Children’s Home, to use its proper name, has begun. It is estimated that the dig will take around two years. The purpose is to find how many bodies are buried there, to give them a more appropriate burial and where possible to match up the DNA of those who died at the home with the DNA of family members willing to provide their own DNA. So far, several dozen have shown an interest in doing so.
Contrary to the popular impression, the home, which operated from 1925 until 1961, was not purely a mother and baby home.
As the report of the official investigation into the mother and baby homes says about Tuam: “In addition to unmarried mothers and their children, the Children’s Home also admitted children of married couples or widowers/widows whose parent(s) was unable to care for them, and married women or widows with their children who were homeless and/or destitute. It was never exclusively a mother and baby home.”
The common view is that both society and the nuns were happy for the children of unmarried mothers to die in these places, because both the mothers and the children were looked down on. And of course, it is true that they were looked down on and sometimes treated very cruelly. No-one doubts that.
But as we can see, women and children from ‘respectable’ families were also in the home, mostly because of dire poverty, and they were living in the same extremely sub-standard conditions that led to the high infant and child mortality rate which persisted there for most of its history.
Factors
It makes no sense that the nuns also wanted these children to die but it does highlight the fact that the home was very under-funded and overcrowded, with no hot water, little heating, no isolation room for sick children, no means to properly screen those coming in for illness, and some women and children were already coming in hungry and in poor health.
All of this created the conditions that led to the high death toll in the home, which only come down properly towards the end of its operation in the 1950s as vaccines and antibiotics became more common in society.
You will discover that Galway County Council, and not the Bon Secours Sisters, were officially responsible for the burials”
The Bons Secours Sisters ran the home on behalf of Galway County Council. They must be regretting they ever did so, and that the home was not instead run by lay employees of the council. Had this been the case, the home would still have had a high infant mortality rate because it would still have been poorly funded and provisioned.
I keep suggesting to people who have reached the worst possible conclusions about the home, and who sincerely believe that the nuns wanted the children to die, or may even have murdered them, after which they dropped the bodies into a still-in-use septic tank, to read the report of the official investigation, and not sensationalised media reporting which often seems to have been written by journalists who have not read the official report.
That report came out in 2021. It is available online. Look up ‘Commission of Investigation into the Mother and Baby Homes’. Then look up the chapter on Tuam and also the ‘Fifth Interim Report’ which investigates how the bodies were buried at the various institutions, including Tuam.
In the section on burials, you will discover that Galway County Council, and not the Bon Secours Sisters, were officially responsible for the burials and should have kept burial records. You will also find that the bodies of the hundreds of children who died at the home over its 37-year history were never put in an active septic tank as lots of people seem to believe.
Breakdown
Unfortunately, many were put into another underground chamber which the Commission says “appears to be related to the treatment/containment of sewage and/or waste water. The Commission has also not yet determined if it was ever used for this purpose”.
We don’t know whose idea it was to place some of the bodies in this structure, or why. Was it Galway County Council, or the nuns? If the Council, then why did the nuns agree to it? We will probably never know at this stage.
Bodies will also be found in other parts of this same general area, that is, those who were simply buried in the ground. Some of those who died may have been taken away and buried in family plots.
Was the burial area ever blessed or consecrated? It seems likely we will never know this either.
But we do know that the nuns were constantly pleading with Galway County Council for more resources so they could make the home more liveable for all concerned. (Why would they do this if they wanted the children to die?)
The main problem they faced was the chronic underfunding of the home by Galway County Council”
There are inspection reports from the era, often conducted and written by Ms Alice Litster (a member of the Church of Ireland, by the way, and therefore not beholden to the nuns). She was an official inspector for the State.
She seems to think the nuns at Tuam were generally doing as well as they could under very difficult circumstances and the main problem they faced was the chronic underfunding of the home by Galway County Council. (Ask yourself this question: if you slashed funding for hospitals today by 90% and those same hospitals no longer had hot water, were not properly heated, had few to no isolation units, few trained medical staff, and were chronically overcrowded, what do you think would happen to the mortality rates in those hospitals?)
One of Ms Litster’s big complaints was that Galway County Council would not allow mothers into the home before the seventh month of pregnancy meaning they often arrived in poor health and therefore their babies were often born in poor health. She said this contributed the high mortality rate (as high as 40% in some years). The lack of pre-natal care was not the fault of the nuns.
Inspection
In her 1947 inspection report, Ms Litster said one big cause of infections was the “admissions of entire families, ‘itinerants, destitutes, evicted persons etc. into the Children’s Home’”, with no isolation room to put them in first.
Despite this she also said that the infants “received good care in the Children’s Home. The Bon Secours Sisters being careful and attentive and excellent diets were available”. This seems to mean that the Sisters were doing their best despite the conditions in which they were working.
None of the above fits the now almost universal image of the ‘monstrous’ nuns who ran the home”
By the way, in the chapter on Tuam (which is just 63 pages long), we have a number of eye-witness accounts of the nun who ran the home for most of its history, namely Sr Hortense, and she is praised in them.
None of the above fits the now almost universal image of the ‘monstrous’ nuns who ran the home. But a lot of people, including all too many journalists and politicians, seem to have no interest at all in being fair-minded. They are prepared to believe the absolute worst of the nuns, up to and including the accusation that they are actual murderers. This appalling caricature is not remotely borne out by the official report.
The grossly unfair caricature of the nuns who ran Tuam Children’s Home
And so the long-awaited dig at the site of the former Tuam Children’s Home, to use its proper name, has begun. It is estimated that the dig will take around two years. The purpose is to find how many bodies are buried there, to give them a more appropriate burial and where possible to match up the DNA of those who died at the home with the DNA of family members willing to provide their own DNA. So far, several dozen have shown an interest in doing so.
Contrary to the popular impression, the home, which operated from 1925 until 1961, was not purely a mother and baby home.
As the report of the official investigation into the mother and baby homes says about Tuam: “In addition to unmarried mothers and their children, the Children’s Home also admitted children of married couples or widowers/widows whose parent(s) was unable to care for them, and married women or widows with their children who were homeless and/or destitute. It was never exclusively a mother and baby home.”
The common view is that both society and the nuns were happy for the children of unmarried mothers to die in these places, because both the mothers and the children were looked down on. And of course, it is true that they were looked down on and sometimes treated very cruelly. No-one doubts that.
But as we can see, women and children from ‘respectable’ families were also in the home, mostly because of dire poverty, and they were living in the same extremely sub-standard conditions that led to the high infant and child mortality rate which persisted there for most of its history.
Factors
It makes no sense that the nuns also wanted these children to die but it does highlight the fact that the home was very under-funded and overcrowded, with no hot water, little heating, no isolation room for sick children, no means to properly screen those coming in for illness, and some women and children were already coming in hungry and in poor health.
All of this created the conditions that led to the high death toll in the home, which only come down properly towards the end of its operation in the 1950s as vaccines and antibiotics became more common in society.
The Bons Secours Sisters ran the home on behalf of Galway County Council. They must be regretting they ever did so, and that the home was not instead run by lay employees of the council. Had this been the case, the home would still have had a high infant mortality rate because it would still have been poorly funded and provisioned.
I keep suggesting to people who have reached the worst possible conclusions about the home, and who sincerely believe that the nuns wanted the children to die, or may even have murdered them, after which they dropped the bodies into a still-in-use septic tank, to read the report of the official investigation, and not sensationalised media reporting which often seems to have been written by journalists who have not read the official report.
That report came out in 2021. It is available online. Look up ‘Commission of Investigation into the Mother and Baby Homes’. Then look up the chapter on Tuam and also the ‘Fifth Interim Report’ which investigates how the bodies were buried at the various institutions, including Tuam.
In the section on burials, you will discover that Galway County Council, and not the Bon Secours Sisters, were officially responsible for the burials and should have kept burial records. You will also find that the bodies of the hundreds of children who died at the home over its 37-year history were never put in an active septic tank as lots of people seem to believe.
Breakdown
Unfortunately, many were put into another underground chamber which the Commission says “appears to be related to the treatment/containment of sewage and/or waste water. The Commission has also not yet determined if it was ever used for this purpose”.
We don’t know whose idea it was to place some of the bodies in this structure, or why. Was it Galway County Council, or the nuns? If the Council, then why did the nuns agree to it? We will probably never know at this stage.
Bodies will also be found in other parts of this same general area, that is, those who were simply buried in the ground. Some of those who died may have been taken away and buried in family plots.
Was the burial area ever blessed or consecrated? It seems likely we will never know this either.
But we do know that the nuns were constantly pleading with Galway County Council for more resources so they could make the home more liveable for all concerned. (Why would they do this if they wanted the children to die?)
There are inspection reports from the era, often conducted and written by Ms Alice Litster (a member of the Church of Ireland, by the way, and therefore not beholden to the nuns). She was an official inspector for the State.
She seems to think the nuns at Tuam were generally doing as well as they could under very difficult circumstances and the main problem they faced was the chronic underfunding of the home by Galway County Council. (Ask yourself this question: if you slashed funding for hospitals today by 90% and those same hospitals no longer had hot water, were not properly heated, had few to no isolation units, few trained medical staff, and were chronically overcrowded, what do you think would happen to the mortality rates in those hospitals?)
One of Ms Litster’s big complaints was that Galway County Council would not allow mothers into the home before the seventh month of pregnancy meaning they often arrived in poor health and therefore their babies were often born in poor health. She said this contributed the high mortality rate (as high as 40% in some years). The lack of pre-natal care was not the fault of the nuns.
Inspection
In her 1947 inspection report, Ms Litster said one big cause of infections was the “admissions of entire families, ‘itinerants, destitutes, evicted persons etc. into the Children’s Home’”, with no isolation room to put them in first.
Despite this she also said that the infants “received good care in the Children’s Home. The Bon Secours Sisters being careful and attentive and excellent diets were available”. This seems to mean that the Sisters were doing their best despite the conditions in which they were working.
By the way, in the chapter on Tuam (which is just 63 pages long), we have a number of eye-witness accounts of the nun who ran the home for most of its history, namely Sr Hortense, and she is praised in them.
None of the above fits the now almost universal image of the ‘monstrous’ nuns who ran the home. But a lot of people, including all too many journalists and politicians, seem to have no interest at all in being fair-minded. They are prepared to believe the absolute worst of the nuns, up to and including the accusation that they are actual murderers. This appalling caricature is not remotely borne out by the official report.
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