How hundreds of babies and children ended up in a mass grave in Ireland

Summary

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Consider This from NPR

Episode: How hundreds of babies and children ended up in a mass grave in Ireland

Date: August 19, 2025
Host: NPR’s Consider This team, featuring reporter Lauren Frayer
Length: ~14 minutes

Overview

This episode unpacks the harrowing story of Ireland’s mother and baby homes, infamous institutions where thousands of unmarried pregnant women were sent to give birth, and where many of their children died—often secretly, and sometimes buried en masse in unmarked graves. The episode focuses on the personal journeys of Anna Corrigan, who discovered her family’s hidden connection to these homes, and Kathryn Corless, an amateur historian whose research exposed the scale of this tragedy. It features voices of survivors and local residents, and explores how the legacy of these institutions is only now being reckoned with through excavations and forensics.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Anna Corrigan's Family Secret

• 00:02-01:18
  • Anna Corrigan believed she was an only child until her 50s, when she discovered through ancestral research that her mother had two sons before marriage, both born in a mother and baby home.
  • Anna’s mother never discussed this history, keeping her trauma and the existence of Anna’s brothers a secret until her passing in 2001.
  • Quote:
    • “I never knew what she was going through. And then the fact that I didn't know my brothers, I mean, that was… I was deprived.” – Anna Corrigan (01:18)

2. The Context: Ireland’s Mother and Baby Homes

• 03:02-03:48
  • For decades, Catholic Church-run homes housed unwed mothers, separated them from their babies, and operated under a veil of secrecy and shame.
  • Thousands of children died under dubious conditions, and their remains are only now being unearthed.
  • The societal climate in mid-20th-century Ireland—including lack of sex education, illegal contraception and abortion, and stigmatization of illegitimacy—set the backdrop for these homes.

3. Personal Testimonies: PJ Haverty’s Story

• 04:50-06:36
  • PJ Haverty was born in the Tuam mother and baby home and separated from his mother, who was denied custody despite her repeated pleas and financial support.
  • At age seven, PJ was fostered out and only reunited with his birth mother decades later, in 1977.
  • Quote:
    • “They didn't want any bonding between the baby and the mother… And when the twelve months was up, then they opened the door and told her to get out.” – PJ Haverty (05:03)

4. The Mass Grave Revelation in Tuam

• 06:36-07:58
  • In 1975, children accidentally discovered a mass grave—actually a disused septic tank—containing the skeletons of infants and children, confirming long-standing rumors among local residents.
  • Ellen, a local, described a culture of silence and respect for the Catholic Church, where everyone knew about the grave but no one spoke out.
  • Quote:
    • “Everybody knew it was consecrated ground… and you respected—like we're Catholics, so you don't mess on consecrated ground.” – Ellen (07:26)

5. Kathryn Corless’ Groundbreaking Research

• 07:58-10:19
  • Kathryn Corless, motivated by faint memories of isolated “home” children at her school, investigated the home’s death records.
  • She was shocked to find documentation for 796 children who died in the Tuam facility from 1925-1961—many from preventable diseases, at four times the national infant death rate.
  • The home kept death certificates but no burial records, and the nearby Catholic cemetery was unused for these children.
  • Memorable Quotes:
    • “[The clerk] said, ‘There are hundreds.’ Now I kind of got a cold shiver. Hundreds?” – Kathryn Corless (08:58)
    • “It's blatantly obvious they had no regard for those children because they're illegitimate… it didn't seem to matter.” – Kathryn Corless (09:57)

6. Official Response and Reckoning

• 10:19-11:48
  • Corless’ findings led to national uproar, a government investigation, and international attention.
  • The Irish Taoiseach called Tuam a “chamber of horrors” in 2017. The nuns eventually issued a public apology for failing to live up to Christian ideals.
  • Yet, within the local community and among clergy, there remains defensiveness and denial about the extent of responsibility.
  • Quote:
    • “There's a lot of misinformation about it. These children, they were very well cared for as best they could. They didn't have the resources.” – Anonymous nun, Sisters of Mercy (11:31)

7. The Search for Lost Family and DNA Discoveries

• 11:48-12:49
  • Forensic excavations are underway, with DNA samples being sought from potential relatives.
  • Anna Corrigan is searching for evidence of her missing brother, William Dolan (born 1950), who isn’t listed among the dead—she believes he may have been adopted in the U.S.
  • Many Irish children were sent abroad for adoption, sometimes via private, clandestine arrangements by nuns, complicating family reunifications.
  • Quote:
    • “If anybody knows anything about William Joseph Dolan, born 1950 in Galway.” – Anna Corrigan’s appeal (12:49)

8. Lingering Impact and Unfinished Business

• 12:49-13:30
  • Reporter Lauren Frayer reflects that the Tuam mass grave is “only the tip of the iceberg,” with more missing children and uninvestigated homes across Ireland.
  • Frayer shares a personal revelation: one of her own relatives was adopted from another mother and baby home where over a thousand babies went missing, and excavations have yet to begin.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “They didn't want any bonding between the baby and the mother… And when the twelve months was up, then they opened the door and told her to get out.”

  • PJ Haverty, survivor (05:03)

• “It’s blatantly obvious they had no regard for those children because they're illegitimate… it didn't seem to matter.”

  • Kathryn Corless, historian (09:57)

• “Everybody knew it was consecrated ground… you didn't go and you respected, like we're Catholics, so you don't mess on consecrated ground.”

  • Ellen, local resident (07:26)

• “If anybody knows anything about William Joseph Dolan, born 1950 in Galway.”

  • Anna Corrigan (12:49)

• “This is only the tip of the iceberg.”

  • Lauren Frayer, reporter (13:30)

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Important Segment Timestamps

• 00:02-01:18 – Anna Corrigan discovers her brothers and her mother’s secret
• 03:02-03:48 – Historical context: mother and baby homes and their social climate
• 04:50-06:36 – PJ Haverty’s testimony and family story
• 06:36-07:58 – Discovery and local knowledge of the mass grave
• 07:58-10:19 – Kathryn Corless’ investigation, shocking findings, and implications
• 10:19-11:48 – Public reaction, government inquiry, nuns’ apology
• 11:48-12:49 – Forensic excavations, missing children, search for family
• 12:49-13:30 – Reflection on broader impact, ongoing investigations

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Tone and Language

The episode maintains a tone of respectful empathy and investigative urgency, balancing emotion-laden personal stories with clear exposition and historical explanation.

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Conclusion

“Consider This” brings to light the tragic and largely hidden history of Ireland’s mother and baby homes, weaving together survivor accounts, historical research, and current efforts to uncover the truth. The episode highlights both the deep, personal scars left by church- and state-sanctioned institutional practices, and the galvanizing work of individuals seeking justice and closure for thousands of lost children and their families.

Transcript

[Anna Corrigan]

This is me and this is me making my Holy Communion.

[Narrator (Lauren Frayer)]

Anna Corrigan pages through family photos looking back at her childhood in Dublin, Ireland, where she still lives today.

[Anna Corrigan]

An only child. I was born on the 1st of September, 1956, so I'd be 70 next year.

[Narrator (Lauren Frayer)]

Or at least she thought she was an only child. It wasn't until Corrigan was in her 50s that she discovered a family secret.

[Anna Corrigan]

This is John's birth certificate. He was born on Friday, 22nd of February, 1946.

[Narrator (Lauren Frayer)]

Corrigan discovered that she had two older brothers who were born before her mother got married. Her mother had never mentioned them. And while researching her family tree, Corrigan found documents showing her mother had spent time in one of Ireland's so called mother and baby homes, places where single women went to give birth.

[Anna Corrigan]

This is the actual slip that was written to admit my mother to the home to the matron, please admit Bridget Dolan, 26 years of age.

[Narrator (Lauren Frayer)]

Conditions inside these homes were often poor and thousands of babies and children died there. Corrigan's mother died in 2001 without ever telling her daughter about her connection to that history.

[Anna Corrigan]

I never knew what she was going through. And then the fact that I didn't know my brothers, I mean, that was, I was deprived. Consider.

[Narrator (Lauren Frayer)]

There are thousands of stories, just like Anna Corrigan's of families whose loved ones suffered and died in Ireland's notorious mother and baby homes. Forensics experts are now unearthing some of that history. From npr, I'm Ailsa Cheng.

[Lauren Frayer]

Shortwave thinks of science as an invisible force showing up in your everyday life, powering the food you eat, the medicine you use, the tech in your pocket. Science is approachable because it's already part of your life. Come explore these connections on the Short Wave podcast. From npr.

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[Narrator (Lauren Frayer)]

It's Consider this from npr. For decades, many unwed pregnant women in Ireland were forced to give birth in places known as mother and baby homes. Then, a few months after giving birth, these women were forced to leave without their babies. They thousands of babies and children died there, and the graves are just now beginning to be unearthed. Anna Corrigan was already in her 50s when she learned of her own ties to this grim legacy with the discovery that her mother had two sons in one of those mother and baby homes. This all happened at a time when the Catholic Church dominated life in Ireland and pregnancy outside marriage brought shame. NPR's Lauren Frayer picks up the story from here.

[Lauren Frayer]

This was 1940s Ireland. Altar boys shower rose petals and a.

[Kathryn Corless]

Special place is reserved for women wearing hooded cloaks.

[Lauren Frayer]

There was no sex ed. Birth control and abortion were illegal, and children born outside of marriage were seen as illegitimate. Corrigan scours old photos for any hint of the secret her mother kept.

[Anna Corrigan]

And as you can see, the grip my mother has holding me and what was going through her mind after losing two children, taken away, dead, adopted.

[Lauren Frayer]

Corrigan's search for her missing brothers has brought her to a town called Chum in County Galway, where a mother and baby home closed in 1961 and was demolished about a decade later. Beyond this metal fence, it's just scrubby, muddy ground. A flag pole and I can see a tall stone wall behind it which used to encircle the home. It's now covered in moss.

[PJ Haverty]

It was a prison. And if you look out, all you seen was a high wall all around. You seen nothing.

[Lauren Frayer]

PJ Haverty was one of the babies born on the other side of that wall, and he still lives down the road. He's 73 now.

[PJ Haverty]

I was born in the mother and baby home. They didn't want any bonding between the baby and the mother. You couldn't hold the baby and rocked it. She lived there for 12 months, and when the 12 months was open, then they opened the door and told her to get out.

[Lauren Frayer]

Decades later, PJ found letters his mother had written to nuns who ran the home begging for custody of him.

[PJ Haverty]

And then she gets a letter from the nuns demanding money. She wrote back to the nuns and.

[Lauren Frayer]

This is your mother's handwriting.

[PJ Haverty]

Handwriting.

[Lauren Frayer]

The nuns refused and demanded she make monthly payments instead for his care.

[PJ Haverty]

She used to come down every so often and she'd give them the money and she was hoping that she'd get to see me, but no. And then the final day, she came down. Then the nun said, you don't need to come here anymore. He's gone.

[Lauren Frayer]

He was sent to foster care on a farm outside town just before his seventh birthday. One day he was milking cows there when a stranger pulled up to ask directions.

[PJ Haverty]

The lady in the passenger seat rolled the window down and she looked up and a big smile, she said, could you tell me where Hansberrys are? They were the first apartments. I said, and the house is down the back there. I said like that to her. And as we were walking along, the smile and the lookin she was doing at me, I got scared. Cause I thought then did I let the cows out in front of them. So when I turned down, that was my mother.

[Lauren Frayer]

Haverty's birth mother told him that was her decades later, when they finally reunited.

[PJ Haverty]

Oh my being here, this is. Yeah, that's the first time now. We met in 1977.

[Lauren Frayer]

That's you and your mom? Yeah, same smile.

[PJ Haverty]

Same smile.

[Kathryn Corless]

That's what everybody says.

[Lauren Frayer]

He visited his mother several times in London, where she lived out her days and where she died in 2011. PJ was her only child. Thousands of other children never made it out of that mother and baby home. And in 1975, local boys were playing on the grounds of the home when they fell down a hole into a disused septic tank filled with tiny skeletons. And the fate of those other children became known. Did you grow up in this house?

[Anna Corrigan]

No, I grew up in this house.

[Kathryn Corless]

Oh yes sir.

[Lauren Frayer]

I meet Ellen on a rain slicked street behind where the skeletons were found. She didn't want to give her surname because of the shame she says this has brought her and her community.

[Anna Corrigan]

We always knew there's a mass there every year. Everybody knew it was consecrated ground. We were told when we went out to play, do not go in the baby's graveyard. Stay out of the baby's graveyard. And no, it was fine. We all knew what it was. And you didn't go and you respected like we're Catholics, so you don't mess on consecrated ground.

[Lauren Frayer]

Everyone knew, she says throughout the 1980s and 90s when she was growing up, all the neighbors knew there was a mass grave of infants behind their homes. But out of respect for the Catholic Church, nobody did anything.

[Kathryn Corless]

They're usually all together probably in here.

[Lauren Frayer]

Until Kathryn Corless started nosing around. You have a whole research library here.

[Kathryn Corless]

This is only a tiny part of it.

[Lauren Frayer]

And what was your profession before this?

[Kathryn Corless]

I was a secretary, typist, Corliss Is.

[Lauren Frayer]

An amateur historian who went to school with kids born in the home.

[Kathryn Corless]

Just vaguely remembered them. They sat at the back of the class. They were skinny looking and they would. They did have sores sometimes on their faces and hands and more or less, I think we were told not to go near them or would pick up the disease or whatever.

[Lauren Frayer]

Corliss always wondered what happened to those kids. She too heard rumors about a mass grave and decided to chase them up. In 2012, she asked a clerk at city hall for death certificates of anyone who died in the mother and baby home during its years of operation, from 1925 to 1961. She was expecting one a year maybe.

[Kathryn Corless]

And she said, there are hundreds now. I kind of got a cold shiver. Hundreds? I said yes, she said. I said in the home itself? Yes, she said. Eventually, a few weeks later, she made a sort of a list for me.

[Lauren Frayer]

A list of 796 children who died in the six facility. And this is the printout.

[Kathryn Corless]

That's the printout. They're from age infants up to four years old.

[Lauren Frayer]

She spreads their death certificates across her kitchen table next to a paper mache model she's built of the sprawling facility where they died.

[Kathryn Corless]

Measles, diphtheria, hoop and cough, some of them boils all over the body. There was a lot of children in Ireland at the time, before penicillin they were dying with. But the home had a rate of four times higher than the death rate of children and infants in Ireland of those diseases.

[Lauren Frayer]

Why would the nuns not take them to a hospital, I ask, and why are there death certificates but no burial records? There's a Catholic cemetery right across the road.

[Kathryn Corless]

It's blatantly obvious they had no regard for those children because they're illegitimate and it didn't seem to matter. They didn't bother bringing them to the cemetery across the road and they just hid them. And then when that sewage system became defunct in 1937, that's when they started putting them into that tank. And it was a way of hiding, I suppose, all the deaths, all the babies that were dying.

[Lauren Frayer]

After Corliss published her findings in a local history journal, the Irish government ordered an investigation into several mother and baby homes across the country. In 2017, the Irish Taoiseach, or prime Minister, called the tomb home a chamber of horrors. In 2018, Corliss was named one of Ireland's people of the year. The actor Liam Neeson is making a film about her now. And in 2021, the Catholic order of nuns that ran the tomb home issued an apology saying they were part of a system that didn't live up to their Christianity. At a dark stone cathedral that still towers over this town.

[Anna Corrigan]

May Almighty God Almighty.

[Lauren Frayer]

The daily mass is sparsely attended and nobody is willing to talk to me about any collective responsibility.

[Kathryn Corless]

Thank you, darling.

[Anna Corrigan]

We don't know anything.

[Lauren Frayer]

A nun who didn't want to give her name because she's not authorized to speak for her order, the Sisters of Mercy, tells me she thinks the clergy have been treated unfairly because these children.

[Kathryn Corless]

There'S a lot of misinformation about it. These children, they were very well cared for as best they could. They didn't have the resources. You know, today people would say, like children have too much and families.

[Lauren Frayer]

Excavations are now underway on a mass grave of children who died here with nothing, led by forensics experts who normally work in war zones. Among those who've given DNA samples is Anna Corrigan, the Dubliner who thought she was an only child and is now searching for two brothers. She's located their birth certificates, but only one death certificate. So her brother, William Dolan, born in.

[Anna Corrigan]

1950, he's not on the list of the 796. So are they digging for him? And Chum, in your heart of hearts.

[Lauren Frayer]

What are you hoping for?

[Anna Corrigan]

Well, I believe he was adopted stateside.

[Lauren Frayer]

Do you even know if his name is still William?

[Anna Corrigan]

No, it wouldn't be with him. Anyone that was adopted would give him a new family name.

[Lauren Frayer]

And she believes her brother may have survived and been sent to the United States for adoption, like thousands of Irish babies from this era. Some of those adoptions were legal, but many were private, arranged by the nuns. Names were changed and money also changed hands.

[Anna Corrigan]

And if anybody knows anything about William Joseph Dolan, born 1950 in Galway.

[Lauren Frayer]

Through DNA testing, biological relatives are only now finding each other. And while reporting this story, I even found out one of my own cousins, adopted into my extended family in New Jersey, was born in another mother and baby home in Tipperary, Ireland, where more than 1,000 babies went missing. And no excavations have been done there. And so standing on the edge of this one mass grave, Corrigan tells me this is only the tip of the iceberg.

[Narrator (Lauren Frayer)]

That was NPR's Lauren Frayer reporting from Chum Ireland. This episode was produced by Michael Levitt and Emma Klein. It was edited by William Troup and Nick Spicer. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigun.

[Lauren Frayer]

It's consistent.

[Narrator (Lauren Frayer)]

Consider this. From npr, I'm Ailsa Chang.

[Lauren Frayer]

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[Anna Corrigan]

We had the end caps.

[Lauren Frayer]

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