Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
Experts find mass grave at ex-Catholic orphanage in Ireland
Source: Associated Press
Experts find mass grave at ex-Catholic orphanage in Ireland
By SHAWN POGATCHNIK
Mar. 3, 2017 9:17 AM EST
DUBLIN (AP) — A mass grave containing the remains of babies and young children has been discovered at a former Catholic orphanage in Ireland, government-appointed investigators announced Friday in a finding that confirmed a local historian's efforts to trace the fates of 800 children who perished at the facility.
The judge-led Mother and Baby Homes Commission announced Friday that excavations at the site of the former Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home in Tuam, County Galway, had found an underground structure divided into 20 chambers containing "significant quantities of human remains."
The commission said DNA analysis of selected remains confirmed the ages of the dead ranged from 35 weeks to 3 years old and were buried chiefly in the 1950s, when the facility was one of more than a dozen in Ireland offering shelter to orphans, unwed mothers and their children. The Tuam home closed in 1961.
The announcement confirms decades of suspicions that the vast majority of children who died at the home were interred on the site in unmarked graves, a relatively common practice at such Catholic-run facilities amid high child mortality rates in early 20th century Ireland.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
By SHAWN POGATCHNIK
Mar. 3, 2017 9:17 AM EST
DUBLIN (AP) — A mass grave containing the remains of babies and young children has been discovered at a former Catholic orphanage in Ireland, government-appointed investigators announced Friday in a finding that confirmed a local historian's efforts to trace the fates of 800 children who perished at the facility.
The judge-led Mother and Baby Homes Commission announced Friday that excavations at the site of the former Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home in Tuam, County Galway, had found an underground structure divided into 20 chambers containing "significant quantities of human remains."
The commission said DNA analysis of selected remains confirmed the ages of the dead ranged from 35 weeks to 3 years old and were buried chiefly in the 1950s, when the facility was one of more than a dozen in Ireland offering shelter to orphans, unwed mothers and their children. The Tuam home closed in 1961.
The announcement confirms decades of suspicions that the vast majority of children who died at the home were interred on the site in unmarked graves, a relatively common practice at such Catholic-run facilities amid high child mortality rates in early 20th century Ireland.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
Read more: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/879a13dc886c458eb2a1b89bfdd2cc22/experts-find-mass-grave-ex-catholic-orphanage-ireland