Sean Ross Abbey mother and baby home to be scanned for children's remains

There is a well-known angel’s plot in the centre of the grounds in Roscrea, However, a ground penetrating radar scan in 2019 found just 42 babies graves in coffins.

The grounds of the former mother and baby home, Sean Ross Abbey, are to undergo a ground penetrating scan to search for the remains of children who died there, a survivors group has announced.

A team of engineers from Limerick will be brought into the large site in Roscrea, Co. Tipperary, after government funding was approved last month to carry out the work. It comes after the Minister for Children Roderic O’Gorman announced the recent appointment of Daniel MacSweeney as director of the proposed excavation of the Tuam burial site.

In a post uploaded on Facebook on Tuesday, an email from the Department of Children dated May 30, said: “I am pleased to inform you that the request of funding support by We Are Still Here of a proposal involving carrying out a geophysical survey at the site of the former Mother and Baby home institution in Sean Ross was approved. You might let the other members of the group know”.

Teresa Collins, spokesperson for the We Are Still Here survivors group and who was born in Sean Ross Abbey, wrote online that “approval was given to an in-depth application for a geophysical survey on a parcel of land adjacent to the angels plot".

“The letter in the photo is confirmation of what is ahead," she wrote.

There is a well-known angel’s plot in the centre of the grounds in Roscrea, However, a ground penetrating radar scan in 2019 found just 42 babies graves in coffins. Survivors had called for further scans to cover the vast area of land there.

On Monday, Magdalene laundry survivor Maureen Sullivan told the Irish Examiner she wanted to see inquests for every child buried in the grounds of former mother and baby homes. Up to 9,000 children are believed to have died in 18 homes.

The scanning of the land is a geophysical way of examining the ground by using radar pulses and is a non-intrusive way of surveying underneath the ground for human remains. Further slit trenches could be used should the results recommend further tests.

A previous, similar scan at the former Tuam mother and baby home in 2016 found anomalies on the site. A further in-depth exam found “a significant quantity of human remains” of children aged from approximately 35 foetal weeks to two or three years were buried there.

Up to 1,090 children are believed to have died at Sean Ross Abbey, which was run by the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary from 1931 to 1969. Their causes of death include heart failure, influenza, marasmus, sun stroke and choking on porridge.

Colleen Anderson who was born in Sean Ross Abbey welcomed the announcement of further tests. “I feel very sad as one of the babies born there but it has to be done. There are too many secrets all the way around for mothers and babies and this is the saddest, not knowing what happened and how disrespectfully they were discarded."

Colleen Anderson was born at Sean Ross Abbey for unmarried mothers on August 4, 1965, and was adopted to the American niece of the head nun Sr Hildergarde McNulty when she was three years old. Coleen suffered years of abuse at the hands of her violent adoptive mother before running away from home and sleeping rough as a teenager.

In a statement to the Irish Examiner the Department of Children said "The Final Report of the Commission included a Report of Forensic Archaeological Investigations at Sean Ross Abbey Mother and Baby Home Children’s Burial Ground. 

"The report, which was commissioned on foot of concerns about the burial ground in Sean Ross Abbey, found that infant human burials were located across the Children’s Burial ground and these had not been impacted by any utilities or drainage works. The report notes that coffins, or evidence of coffins were located with the majority of remains (84%).

"The Minister has engaged with a group of survivors in relation to undertaking a geophysical survey to establish whether the area bordering the acknowledged burial site at Sean Ross Abbey may also contains graves. The Department can confirm the approval of a request by the group for funding support for the geophysical survey".