The remains of a further 22 infants have been discovered at the site of a former mother and baby home in Tuam, Co Galway, bringing the total number of historic infant remains found at the site to 99.
Discovery Details
The search, which commenced in July last year, has uncovered the remains of 99 infants to date. The most recently discovered remains were found during the search period from June 1 to July 15, in an area that had been covered with gravel and used for vehicle access, with no surface markers indicating the presence of burials.
The excavation of the former St Mary's mother and baby home is endeavouring to identify the remains of infants who perished at the home between 1925 and 1961.
Historical Context
In 2014, research led by local historian Catherine Corless indicated 796 babies and young children were buried in a sewage system at the Co Galway institution across that time period.
The Office of the Director of Authorised Intervention Tuam (ODAIT), which is overseeing the search, confirmed that coffined infants were recovered and that hand-excavation is ongoing. The Identification Programme team gathered an additional seven DNA reference samples during this period, bringing the total number collected to 62.
Previous Findings and Official Response
In 2017, a commission found 'significant quantities' of child and infant remains in subsurface chambered tanks situated in the memorial garden area of the site.
Speaking on Wednesday, Daniel MacSweeney, director of ODAIT, stated that the progress of the project thus far has vindicated the decision not to begin the search in that area. 'To date we have started outside of the memorial garden, in an area where there is a map from a Galway County Council planning file from the 1970s that shows a burial ground, but there's nothing on the surface to indicate that there's any burials there and then when we've excavated there, this is where we found 99 sets of remains, really very closely together,' he said.
'So this concentration of remains buried very closely together, is extremely challenging because each burial is an archaeological context of its own and has to be recovered in that way. Then at the other end of the site we've dealt with and resolved a very large area where we found no remains whatsoever. So there's all these different elements that are difficult, but I think a year in, I'm quite happy that we've now recovered 99 sets of remains in a place where we didn't really know there were any remains there, so it has, I think, justified our decision not to start with the memorial garden, but to leave it until later.'
Challenges of the Excavation
Dr Niamh McCullagh, senior forensic consultant at ODAIT, explained several factors making the search 'particularly challenging'. 'If I work from the outside in, the challenge of the physical location of the site, it's within a housing estate that is populated with people living there, the rears of their gardens all face onto this playground area,' she said. 'The physical situation of the chamber tank where the remains were discovered in that sample excavation, they're over three metres beneath the surface, they're in 20 individual chambers, all adjacent to one another, and that in itself is also a very physically challenging situation. So, from an archaeological perspective, it is not like going out and excavating a greenfield site or an open area where we would have a lot more space, we have to try and manage the space that we have to get the access that we need to to recover the remains.'
Broader Impact
St Mary's home for unmarried mothers and their children was operated by the Bon Secours Sisters, a religious order of Catholic nuns. In 2021, Irish premier Micheál Martin apologised on behalf of the state for the treatment of women and children who were housed in mother and baby homes across Ireland.
The excavation continues as ODAIT works to recover and identify all remains, with the total number of infants discovered now at 99.
