Thread by @JamesBarry1789, This is an extremely difficult read. https://www.gov.ie/en/publication/22c0e-executive-summary-of-the-final-report-of-the-commission-of-investigation-into-mother-and-baby-homes/ "While mother and baby homes [...]

This is an extremely difficult read. https://www.gov.ie/en/publication/22c0e-executive-summary-of-the-final-report-of-the-commission-of-investigation-into-mother-and-baby-homes/

"While mother and baby homes were not a peculiarly Irish
phenomenon, the proportion of Irish unmarried mothers who were admitted to mother and baby homes or county homes in the twentieth century was probably the highest in the world."

"The women who were admitted to mother and baby homes ranged in age from 12 years old to women in their forties. However, 80% were aged between 18 and 29 years ... 5,616 women, 11.4% of the total for whom information about their age is available, were under 18 years of age."

"Some pregnancies were the result of rape; some women had mental health problems, some had an intellectual disability. However, the majority were indistinguishable from most Irish women of their time."

"The only difference between the women in mother and baby homes and their sisters, class-mates and work
companions was that they became pregnant while unmarried... and the responses of the father of their
child, their immediate families and the wider community."

"The very high rate of infant mortality (first year of life) in Irish mother and baby homes is probably the most disquieting feature of these institutions."

A total of about 9,000 children died in the institutions under investigation - about 15% of all the children who were in the institutions. In the years before 1960 mother and baby homes did not save the lives of ‘illegitimate’ children;

... in fact, they appear to have significantly reduced their prospects of survival. The very high mortality rates were known to local and national authorities at the time and were recorded in official publications." (So everyone knew.)

"There is no evidence of the sort of gross abuse
that occurred in industrial schools. There are a small number of complaints of physical abuse. The women worked but they were generally doing the sort of work
that they would have done at home." WHAT? They worked for NOTHING.

"Many of the women found childbirth to be a traumatic experience... First-time childbirth can be frightening for any woman; it was undoubtedly worse for women whose pregnancy had devastated their normal life." Oh give me a f**king break.

"Mother and baby homes were greatly superior to the county homes where, until the 1960s, many unmarried mothers and their children were resident." Well, that's just fabulous. Guess they were the fecking Shelbourne by comparison.

"The accommodation and care given to these children in county homes was grossly inadequate; some of the descriptions are extremely distressing."

There follows a great deal of splitting hairs about under whose control the homes were. "The remaining mother and baby homes were private institutions, so governance was a matter for the religious congregation or the charity that owned the institution."

This is irrelevant. The Church and State worked hand in hand, as everyone knows. This is careful legal wording.

"Although the DLGPH/Department of Health received regular inspection reports on mother and baby homes, which were often critical of conditions, the evidence
suggests that the department preferred to use persuasion, not compulsion to implement improvements." So, hand in hand.

"The capitation rates, while they were not overly generous, and often failed to keep pace with inflation, were considerably more generous that the social welfare
payments available to an adult and a child living in the community." Reading this, you'd think it was a holiday camp.

And now we come to the men: "Few Irish men contributed to the maintenance of their ‘illegitimate’ child or acknowledged their existence. For the first half of the century many would have been unable to do so ...

... because they were farm labourers or unpaid workers on
family farms or in family businesses." So "being in a family business" prevented them from acknowledging their children.

"There is also the question of a family’s standing in the community...An ‘illegitimate’ birth could destroy the marriage prospects, not just for the woman who had given birth, but for her siblings, hence the pressures to keep it a secret by sending her to a mother and baby home."

"The Catholic church did not invent Irish attitudes to prudent marriages or family respectability; however, it reinforced them through church teachings".. this section completely downplays the absolute hold the Church held over Irish society for decades.

We then digress into a long bit about the competition between Protestant and Catholic charities in 19th century Ireland. At this point I checked to see if I was reading the correct report. Genuinely. (They're killing the issue here with context, methinks.)

"There is no evidence that unmarried mothers were ever discussed at Cabinet during the first 50 years after independence. Responsibility for unmarried mothers
and their children was seen as resting with the local authorities." Or the Church institutions. Or something.

"The introduction of legal adoption from 1953 removed one of the underlying problems facing Irish mother and baby homes - the long-term future of the children. By the 1960s most women placed their child for adoption.." Well, that worked out great for everyone, didn't it?

"In 1967 the number of babies adopted was 97% of the number of ‘illegitimate’ births."
-So everyone lived happily ever after then, did they, James?
-No, little one, they very much did not.

"By the 1970s unmarried mothers and their children in other western European countries were viewed as part of a wider cohort of one-parent families. The continuing compartmentalisation of unmarried mothers in Ireland - which lasted until the end of the century...

- reflected the constitutional prohibition on divorce and
a failure to recognise broader categories of single parenthood... The status of ‘illegitimacy’ was not abolished until 1987." #irelandhateswomen

Now we go into observations about the individual institutions. Take a deep breath.

Pelletstown: 3,615 children died; 78% of deaths occurred between 1920 and 1942. However, infant mortality was "substantially lower" than other institutions (some children were already seriously ill).

Pelletstown: burial of children properly recorded in Glasnevin Cemetery.

Tuam (formerly Glenamaddy): 2,219 women and 3,251 children. Women remained in Tuam on average for less than a year. Some children remained up to the age of six or seven years. "..the physical conditions were dire."

Tuam: Child deaths: 978 children who were in Tuam or Glenamaddy died; 80% were under a year, and 67% were aged between one and six months. Three-quarters of
the deaths happened in the 1930s and 1940s; the worst years were 1943-1947.

Tuam: Burials: No register of burials was kept and it is likely that most of the children who died in Tuam are buried inappropriately in the grounds of the institution.

Kilrush: a former workhouse and even worse than Tuam. It had no running water, baths or indoor toilets. Child Deaths: The numbers are not known but the medical officer described the death rate in 1927 as appalling.

Bessborough: Child deaths: 923 children who were associated with Bessborough died. In 1934, it had the highest recorded infant mortality rate among mother and baby homes. Infant mortality reached even higher levels in the early 1940s.

"In 1943 three out of every four children born in Bessborough died." I'm going to pause for a moment, and remember all those little people.

"Bessborough failed to keep a register of infant burials and the burial location of the majority of children who died there is still unknown." Let us remember them.

Sean Ross: A total of 1,090 of the 6,079 babies, who were born or admitted died; 79% of the deaths occurred between the years 1932 and 1947.

Sean Ross: Registers of burials were not maintained. There is a designated burial ground and the Commission has established that the coffined remains of some
children under the age of one are buried there.

Castlepollard: 247 children died.
Regina Coeli: 734 children died
There follows descriptions of other places technically described as "mother and baby homes" where conditions were not as dire. These dilute the report, which clearly is the objective.

Now we come to the "county homes"- former workhouses, usually under the control of local authorities, not primarily for unmarried mothers.

Very poor conditions.
Cork County Home Child deaths: 545 children died, 93% were under one year. The death rate was high during the early and mid-1940s, but fell sharply from 1948.

Stranorlar: Child deaths: 343 ‘illegitimate’ children who were in Stranorlar died in infancy or early childhood. The death rate peaked in 1930 with an infant mortality rate of
42%; deaths were also high in the 1940s.

Thomastown: "Most of the domestic work was carried out by the unmarried mothers, without payment, and some women were not sent to Sean Ross or Bessborough because they were needed in the county home." So slavery was legal in Ireland, then.

So, how did the women get there? "The overwhelming majority of women in mother and baby homes were maintained by their local authority and they had to secure prior approval from the local authority before they were admitted." Well, that scuppers "it was the parents".

"County managers often disputed whether a particular woman should be maintained.... One of the most intrusive queries asked whether the infant had been conceived in county Kilkenny or in Laois." Riiight. So nobody knew about this and it was all the girls' wicked families. Uh-huh.

"Some county managers insisted on admitting first-time mothers to the county home in order to ensure there was sufficient unpaid labour." Yes, we've noted upthread about the slavery.

From 1960 to 1998, information is available for almost 75% of the women admitted to Bessborough.
The local authority/health boards- 40% of referrals; 27% adoption society, 13% by a social worker, and 7% were referred by a voluntary organisation -

"The majority of these were referred by CURA, which was established in 1977 by the Catholic hierarchy to support women in crisis pregnancies." Remember the posters with the crying woman and the slogan "Cura Cares"? Well, they cared enough to send you to Bessborough. How lovely.

Now we're on to "exit pathways" which is the most egregious use of nonsense jargon I've seen in this document. (Like anyone in a mother and baby home had even HEARD of HR terms.)

Some went home, some disappeared. Some went to Magdalen laundries. Here the report disappears into granular detail and refers to the previous McAleese report. 313 women sent to Magdalen laundries by mother and babyhomes and adoption societies. Similar number from county homes.

One thing's clear, though: if you were from Galway and had a second illegitimate child, it was straight to the Magdalen laundry with you.

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