Rally held at Bessborough mother and baby home site

“An inhuman attempt to concrete over the past.” This was how Bessborough survivor Noelle Brown described the recent granting of planning permission at the former mother and baby home site in Blackrock, Cork.

The activist and artist was speaking at a rally yesterday which was organised in response to plans for the construction of 140 apartments at the site. 

It follows Cork City Council’s green light to Estuary View Enterprises 2020, despite three previous refusals linked to works in the past. 

A number of families of the 900 children who lived there desperately want to see the land preserved. This is due to the possibility of hundreds of unmarked graves there, just one of which has been identified to date.

Noelle, who was born at the facility appealed for the public’s support.

“I call myself a survivor because I didn’t die in Bessborough like so many children did,” she told those present at yesterday’s vigil. “It’s time to change the narrative in this country and understand that every child matters, no matter how long ago it was. We stop building if we find Viking remains, yet some of these babies died into the 1980s and the '90s. We have to start caring about them.” 

She described the decision as an attempt to cover over the past. “This is inhuman. It’s an attempt to concrete over the past, to concrete over an inconvenient history, one that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael refuse to acknowledge. It’s an attempt to concrete over a history that the Catholic Church is not being held accountable for. 

"The mothers, infants, and children did not choose to be in Bessborough. They were incarcerated against their will.” 

A number of people had travelled from as far afield as the UK for the vigil. One woman, who wished to remain anonymous, said she visits the site every year to acknowledge her baby brother who, to this day, her father remains unaware of.

“My dad doesn’t know there is a baby here. My mum had a baby here in 1961 and she had no problems with the pregnancy. However, after giving birth, the nuns told her that her baby was dead. She never got to see him. 

"My mum told us what happened when we were teenagers but she never told my father. There was a lot of shame and secrecy. She feared telling my dad in case he would leave. She is in palliative care now and has no plans to ever tell my father.” 

Joy Kelly O’Regan said she feels the site should remain untouched. “I was born in Bessborough in 1979. I died for five minutes shortly after the birth. Every time I walk through that folly I think about how lucky I am to be above ground. 

"At least 923 innocent beautiful babies and birth mothers died. I could have been one of them. As a child, I was obsessed with finding out where I came from. Even though my dad was very open about where I came from, we had this story that I was born a princess in Blackrock Castle. As a little treat he always took me down to Blackrock Castle which I pretended was my birth place. 

"However, I was never actually down to the folly in Bessborough until I had my first son.” 

The Cork Survivors and Supporters Alliance, which represents a group of survivors of Bessborough Mother and Baby Home, opted not to attend the vigil.

A representative said there are mothers in the group supporting the development following engagement with Estuary View Enterprises 2020 who offered a parcel of land for a memorial in the event that construction goes ahead.

“The mothers were not at the Bessborough protest,” the group said. “They were busy living their lives in defiance of those who wish to define the terms of closure without understanding that these were, first and foremost, private losses.”