Shocking Discovery: Nearly 800 Infant Bodies Feared Hidden in Septic Tank at Catholic Home for Unwed Mothers
Only two of the children who passed away there are buried in a local cemetery.
Corless, who tirelessly campaigned after releasing her stunning findings in 2014, has welcomed the excavation and said the situation was “too horrific” for her to walk away from.
“It’s great for all the families of the babies and relatives in that sewage system because it was horrific,” she told The Irish Times.
Image credits: Charles McQuillan / Getty Images
“A lot of businesses and a lot of people in authority, they really and truly wanted to keep this quiet and just put up a monument, not to let on that there’s so many [buried there]. They were minimizing it the whole time,” she said.
“I was told more often than not that I was giving Tuam a bad name and giving the church a bad name. Their take on it was just: leave it, this was the past and leave it there.”
But Colness said it was impossible to walk away from what she had uncovered because it was so horrific, and the children deserved justice.
Image credits: Charles McQuillan / Getty Images
In 2017, a test excavation found what is understood to be a decommissioned sewage chamber and a significant amount of human remains.
There were countless delays, but Colness pushed on, and now the site is finally being excavated.
The work is expected to last up to two years, and DNA testing will be used to try to identify the remains.
“All those lovely little children and babies, that’s the one thing that drove me. That’s all that was in my mind, these babies are in a sewage system, they have to come out,” Colness added.
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