Bessborough: 'We stop building if we find Viking remains. These babies died into the 1990s'

Cork mother and baby home site has been approved for 140 apartments. But today a survivor told a vigil that 'it’s an attempt to concrete over an inconvenient history'

Carmel Cantwell holding a teddy bear bearing the name of her deceased infant brother William during Sunday's vigil at Bessborough, the site of a Cork City mother and baby home. Picture: Chani Anderson

A rally held in opposition to plans for 140 apartments on the site of the former Bessborough mother and baby home has heard the proposal is an "attempt to concrete over the past".

Cork City Council gave the green light recently to Estuary View Enterprises 2020, despite three previous refusals, to build 140 apartments on the site. 

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

Bessborough survivor Noelle Brown, who was born into the mother and baby home, appealed for the public’s support.

“I call myself a survivor because I didn’t die in Bessborough like so many children did,” she said. 

"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.” 

Ms Brown described the decision to give planning permission as an attempt to cover over an inconvenient truth.

“It’s an attempt to concrete over the past, to concrete over an inconvenient history.

Soft toys and teddy bears covered the gates of the Bessborough mother and baby home, Blackrock, Cork, on Sunday. Picture: Chani Anderson

"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 the UK for Sunday's rally and 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 he 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.” 

Meanwhile, Joy Kelly O’Regan, said she feels the site should remain untouched.

PJ Coogan; Brian and Carmel Cantwell with Stephen; Joy O’Regan; and Christy Kirwan — organisers of Sunday's protest vigil at Bessborough site of the former mother and baby home. Picture: Chani Anderson

“I was born in Bessborough in 1979. 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."

The Cork Survivors and Supporters Alliance opted not to attend the vigil.

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

“The mothers were not at the Bessborough protest,” a representative 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.”