OSi says Bessborough maps could indicate children were buried away from apartment site 

The  Ordnance Survey Ireland says it can’t be more specific about the precise location of the burial site at the Bessborough estate and that a definitive view can only be determined by information beyond its available records.

The graveyard at the former Bessborough House Mother and Baby home. The  Ordnance Survey Ireland said there is an  “alternative interpretation” of historic maps of the estate which could suggest that children were buried away from a site earmarked for apartments.  Picture: Laura Hutton/RollingNews.ie

The national mapping agency says there is an “alternative interpretation” of historic maps of the former Bessborough mother and baby home estate in Cork which could suggest that children were buried away from a site earmarked for apartments.

But Ordnance Survey Ireland (OSi) says it can’t be more specific about the precise location of the burial site and that a definitive view can only be determined by information beyond its available records.

The news comes following a review by OSi of old maps and records on foot of a request from Cork City Council chief executive, Ann Doherty, for its assistance and input on the Bessborough site as part of the council’s drafting of a new city development plan.

A spokesperson for the Cork Survivors and Supporters Alliance, which wants the burial site protected from development, said An Bórd Pleanála has already ruled on the burial matter by refusing a grant of planning.

"In any event, this view from OSi, in our opinion, simply extends the area which we feel should be protected. That would be the safest options and would avoid any risk of disturbance of burials.” 

Ms Doherty asked for OSi input following Bórd Pleanála's oral hearing last April into plans for a strategic housing development (SHD) project on a privately-owned landbank on the former Bessborough estate.

The SHD site overlaps an area of land labelled as a ‘children’s burial ground’ on a 1950s OSi trace map.

Label ambiguity

Retired OSi cartographer Michael Flynn told the hearing, on behalf of the developers, that the label referred to a nearby smaller area next to a graveyard for nuns.

But OSi expert mapper John Clarkin, who gave evidence on behalf of the Cork Survivors’ and Supporters’ Alliance, said he believes the label indicates the location of the burial ground.

The following month, the board refused planning saying it would be premature to grant it before establishing the presence and extent of any such burial site. It said it made its decision having regard to the reports of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes, which was unable to account for the burial places of some 859 infants who died at Bessborough between 1922 and 1998.

OSi chief executive, Colin Bray, has now confirmed OSi's further review work has concluded. It included an analysis of its archive records of all other similar scale maps of burial grounds in Cork County — 98 in total, nine of which were marked as “children's”.

He said the research and analysis indicate that in a significant majority of instances, the burial ground text on other similar scale maps is associated with a defined physical feature.

While Mr Clarkin believes that in the Bessborough map, the burial ground text relates to a location in a field north-west of a circular feature around the site's folly, OSi has now concluded there is “an alternative interpretation” which suggests that the 'children's burial ground' text on that map relates to the circular feature, based on the proximity of the text to that physical feature. “Therefore, this alternative interpretation is that the children's burial ground text could potentially relate to that area,” he said.