00:00A quiet, walled patch of grass in the middle of an Irish housing estate is set to reveal
00:09the latest disturbing chapter in Ireland's mother and baby home scandal.
00:15In the town of Tuam, over 200 kilometers west of Dublin,
00:22significant quantities of human remains have been identified.
00:26Local historian Catherine Corliss discovered the unmarked mass burial site that led to an Irish
00:36commission of investigation into the so-called mother and baby homes.
00:41This whole site and this whole area is a tragedy that I came across and researched from the start
00:48and it's going on for about 12 years now since I really started.
00:52The land attached to a home run by nuns between 1925 and 1961 was left largely untouched after the institution was knocked down in 1972.
01:06Excavation crews are set to seal off the site before beginning the search for remains next month.
01:14There are so, so many babies, children just discarded in this area.
01:21At the beginning of my research, no description of that there was a cemetery here or a burial of any type.
01:30No statue, no cross, absolutely nothing.
01:33In 2014, the now 71-year-old produced evidence that 796 children from newborns to a 9-year-old died at Tuam's mother and baby home.
01:44In 2014, the now 71-year-old produced evidence that 796 children from newborns to a 9-year-old died at Tuam's mother and baby home.
01:57Her research pointed to the children's likely final resting place, a disguised septic tank discovered in 1975.
02:08I was just begging for an excavation, take the babies out of this sewage system and give them a decent Christian burial which they were denied.
02:17And I will emphasise that all these babies and children were baptised but still the church turned a blind eye.
02:24That it just didn't matter, they were illegitimate, that's the stance that they took.
02:27When I started this, it was quite simple, it was wrong and nobody wants to listen.
02:34So this is justice and it's right, we're righting the wrongs and maybe a future Ireland will see that this must never happen again.
02:43It was only in 2022 that legislation was passed in Parliament enabling the excavation work to start at Tuam.
02:53In findings published in 2021, the Commission of Investigation found disquieting levels of infant mortality at the institutions.
03:02The state-backed enquiries sparked by the discoveries in Tuam found that 56,000 unmarried women and 57,000 children passed through 18 so-called mother and baby homes over 76 years.
03:18Women pregnant outside of wedlock were soiled in the so-called mother and baby homes by society, the state and the Catholic Church, which has historically held an iron grip on Irish attitudes.
03:31Homes were run in various ways, some funded and managed by local health authorities and others by Catholic religious orders.
03:41Analysis at the Tuam site in 2016 and 2017 identified human remains in underground cavities.
03:49An underground tunnel from the back of the home to that site where the public sewage for the town of Tuam.
03:59And that's where I think that's where she was put, yeah. And it's an awful thing to do to a human being, like, you know, Catholic Ireland's biggest belief.
04:11So why the Catholic would do that to another Catholic? It's unreal.
04:19For Anna Corrigan, who was in her mid-50s when she learned that her late mother gave birth in secret to two boys, John and William in Tuam.
04:31As no death certificate was ever issued for William and John's death was not medically certified, the few official documents Corrigan has been able to access have left her with more questions than answers.
04:44Just as Irish style, we have to battle all the time to get something done.
04:51They prevaricate, they obfuscate, they make it difficult for people to get to the truth.
04:58And that's the way it's been with information and with getting this excavation underway.
05:04It's dirty little secrets in Ireland that has to be kept hidden.
05:09We have a facade around the world that actually makes us look like good, wholesome people.
05:16And we are. But there's also a very dark, sinister side.
05:19And as the homes in around Ireland and in particular, Tum, when that was uncovered, how these children were dumped into a septic tank.
05:29I mean, sentient beings with no dignity in life and no dignity in death.
05:34A team was finally appointed in 2023 to lead the Tuam site excavation.
05:41Tasked with recovering, memorising and reburying remains recovered at the site once the work starts.
05:48My belief is if we can even find and identify a certain amount, it's not going to give us all closure.
05:57So I'm concerned that at the end of this, we may have to start another road.
06:03We're already walking around Tum. I'm on this since 2012.
06:08And I mean, at the end of this in 2026, 2027, am I going to have to start searching again for my brothers if they don't find them?
06:16Sample DNA will be taken from people who have reasonable grounds to believe that they are a close relative.
