Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-dh8gc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-13T01:14:16.188Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Registered ‘unknown’ infant fatalities in Ireland, 1916–32: gender and power

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 February 2015

Ciara Breathnach  and
Eunan O’Halpin
Ciara Breathnach
Affiliation:
Department of History, University of Limerick
Eunan O’Halpin
Affiliation:
Department of History, Trinity College, Dublin
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The phenomenon of ‘unknown’ infant deaths addressed in this article was first explored in the course of research on fatalities arising from political violence during the Irish revolution of 1916–1921. Our data are derived from the General Register of Death Indices (G.R.D.I.), held in the General Register Office, Dublin, which are organised alphabetically, and which form an official record of deaths registered either by relatives of the deceased or by medical personnel. When infant ‘unknown’ fatalities were extracted to form a discrete database they showed a curious gender disparity. There were 100 male infant fatalities recorded for every seventy-eight females in the thirty-two counties over the five-year period. On extending the study to 1932, the same ratio was prevalent in the overall dataset of 895 ‘unknown infants’ drawn from the G.R.D.I. (a dataset which excludes the six counties of Northern Ireland for the period from1922). Initial research into the gender imbalance opened out wider questions concerning social mores regarding illegitimacy, and the extent of medical and lay knowledge of how newborn infants might be brought to death.

Type
Research Article
Information
Irish Historical Studies , Volume 38 , Issue 149 , May 2012 , pp. 70 - 88
Copyright
Copyright © Irish Historical Studies Publications Ltd 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 By unknown dead we mean infant bodies whose parents are not identifiable on discovery, or subsequently identified by police inquiry.

2 This was noticed by O’Halpin, Eunan while completing research for the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences-funded ‘Dead of the Irish Revolution’ project (2003–2006).Google Scholar

3 These indices comprise an official record of deaths in Northern Ireland, which were registered by relatives of the deceased.

4 Bock, Gisela and Thane, Pat (eds), Maternity and gender policies: women and the rise of the European welfare states, 1880s–1950s (London, 1991).Google Scholar

5 Foucault, MichelHistory of sexuality, volume I: an introduction (translated by Hurley, Robert) (New York, 1978), p. 10.Google Scholar

6 For a fuller discussion see Earner-Byrne, LindseyMother and child: maternity and child welfare in Ireland, 1922–60 (Manchester, 2007);Google Scholar eadem, ‘Reinforcing the family: the role of gender, morality and sexuality in Irish welfare policy, 1922–1944’, History of the Family, xiii (2008), pp 360–9.

7 Foucault, , History of sexuality, volume I, pp 140–59;Google Scholar idem, ‘Society must be defended’: lectures at the Collège de France, 1975–76 (translated by Macey, David) (New York, 2003), pp 239–63.Google Scholar

8 On the ‘Kerry Babies’ case in 1984 see McCafferty, NellA woman to blame: the Kerry babies case (Dublin, 1985, 2010).Google Scholar

9 McGoff-McCann, MichelleMelancholy madness: a coroner’s casebook (Cork, 2003), pp 74–5.Google Scholar

10 Rattigan, ClíonaWhat else could I do? Single mothers and infanticide, Ireland 1900–1950 (Dublin, 2011).Google Scholar

11 There are practical administrative obstacles to the efficient searching of the G.R.D.I. data and the death registers within a reasonable research timeframe due to a consultation limit of five death register entries per day (http://www.groireland.ie/fees.htm). In addition, the G.R.D.I. do not presently have an accessible electronic database of the registers, and so cannot provide summary data to researchers. Researchers in the G.R.O.N.I. face comparable restrictions.

12 We have elected not to attempt to ‘clean’ or remove possible duplication errors from the data at this juncture, as that would necessitate accessing all 895 register entries at a maximum of five per working day.

13 The G.R.O.N.I. data shows that the total number of Northern Irish unknown infant deaths from 1922 to 1932 was 285.

14 Indices to the ‘Crown and Peace Offices’ files are on open access shelving at the N.A.I.; these detail the extent of surviving Coroners’ Inquests.

15 44 & 45 Vict., c.35.

16 British Medical Journal, 31 Mar. 1888; Clark, Michael J. ‘General practice and coroner’s practice: medico-legal work and the Irish medical profession, c.1830–c.1890,’ in Cox, Catherine and Luddy, Maria (eds), Cultures of care in Irish medical history, 1750–1970 (Basingstoke, 2010), pp 37–56 at p. 39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

17 Clark, Michael and Crawford, Catherine ‘Introduction’ in Clark, and Crawford, (eds), Legal medicine in history (Cambridge, 1994), p. 14.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

18 Hurren, Elizabeth T. ‘Remaking the medico-legal scene: a social history of the late-Victorian coroner in Oxford’, in Journal of the History of Medicine, lxv (2010), pp 207–52 at 209–10.Google ScholarPubMed

19 Annual report of the registrar-general of marriages, births and deaths, 1921 (Dublin, 1922) [hereafter ARR.G.], p. xx.

20 Douglas Wimberly memoir, p. 152 (National Library of Scotland, MS Acc 6119). This child shows in the 1921 G.R.D.I. index (first quarter, 5/49).

21 The Coroners’ Inquests Reports are held at the N.A.I. and organised by county. References like the following CC/Tip/1C-3-1 (County Coroner/Tipperary/shelf number) are purely locational and are thus subject to change. Here we use the date and location of the coroners’ courts. We are grateful to Gregory O’Connor, Senior Archivist, N.A.I., for his advice. The case of the fatality on the railway line is found at CC/Tipperary (1916–1918), 10 Mar. 1910. We crudely codify the names of mothers and their families by giving the first letter of their surname; other names, for example of medical personnel, are given in full.

22 A.RR.G., 1926 (Dublin, 1927), p. xxiii.

23 A.RR.G., 1921 (Dublin, 1922), p. xx.

24 The use of ‘handy women’ or unskilled medical personnel continued until the 1960s: Ciara Breathnach, ‘Medicalizing the female reproductive cycle in rural Ireland 1926–1956’ in Historical Research (forthcoming, August 2012; online publication November 2011).

25 Brunton, DeborahThe politics of vaccination: practice and policy in England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland, 1800–1874 (New York, 2008), p. 132;Google Scholar Registration of Births and Deaths (Ireland) Act 1863, 26 & 27 Vict., c. 11, and Registration of Marriages (Ireland) Act 1863, 26 & 27 Vict., c. 90.

26 Notification of Births Act 1907, 7 Edw. 7, c. 40.

27 Report of the Commission on the relief of the sick and destitute poor including the insane poor (Dublin, 1927), p. 73.

28 Luddy, Maria ‘Unmarried mothers in Ireland, 1880–1973’ in Women’s History Review, 20 (2011), pp 109–26 at p. 122.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

29 For example, the recently uncovered grave at Mount Jerome cemetry in Dublin, where thirty-nine bodies from the Bethany Home were buried. See Meehan, Niall ‘Church and state bear responsibility for the Bethany Home’, in History Ireland, 18, no. 5 (Sept./Oct. 2010), pp 10–11.Google Scholar

30 Sauer, R. ‘Infanticide and abortion in nineteenth-century Britain’ in Population Studies, 22 (1978), pp 81–93 at pp 89–90;Google ScholarRose, LioMassacre of the innocents: infanticide in Britain, 1800–1939 (London, 1986), pp 79–85,Google Scholar 93–108.

31 Ferriter, DiarmaidOccasions of sin: sex and society in modern Ireland (2009), pp 215–370;Google ScholarEarner-Byrne, , Mother and child;Google ScholarKeogh, DermotIreland and the Vatican: the politics and diplomacy of church-state relations, 1922–60 (Cork, 1995).Google Scholar

32 A.RR.G., 1925 (Dublin, 1926), p. xxiv.

33 Ryan, LouiseGender, identity and the Irish press, 1922–1937: embodying the nation (Lewiston, N.Y., 2002), p. 254.Google Scholar

34 O’Donnell, IanO’Sullivan, Eoin and Healy, Deirdre (eds), Crime and punishment in Ireland, 1922 to 2003: a statistical sourcebook (Dublin, 2005), pp 2–5.Google Scholar

35 Smith, James M.Ireland’s Magdalen laundries and the nation’s architecture of containment (South Bend, IN, 2007), p. 56.Google Scholar

36 Report of the Commission on the relief of the sick and destitute poor, p. 69.

37 A.RR.G., 1926 (Dublin, 1927), p. xxiii.

38 A.RR.G., 1927 (Dublin, 1928), p. xxiii; O’Sullivan, O’Donnell & Healy, (eds), Crime and punishment, pp 2–5.Google Scholar

39 ARR.G., 1928 (Dublin, 1929), p. xxxix.

40 Smith, , Ireland’s Magdalen laundries, p. 57.Google Scholar

41 ARR.G, 1925 (Dublin, 1926), p. xxv.

42 Ibid., p. xxv.

43 Guinnane, TimothyThe vanishing Irish: households, migration and the rural economy in Ireland, 1850–1914 (Princeton, 1997), p. 260.Google Scholar

44 The Report of the committee on the Criminal Law Amendment Acts (1880–85) and juvenile prostitution (Dublin, 1931), [hereafter Carrigan report] although printed was suppressed, and is available at N.A.I., DT S5998. See Finnane, Mark ‘The Carrigan Committee of 1930–31 and the “moral condition of the Saorstát”’ in Irish Historical Studies, 32, no. 128 (May 2001), pp 519–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

45 N.A.I., CC/Longford, (1916-1926) depositions and reports dated 19 May 1919.

46 Foucault, Cf.History of sexuality, volume I, pp 140–59;Google Scholaridem, , ‘Society must be defended’, pp 239–63.Google Scholar

47 Carrigan report, p. 9.

48 For example, Moykr, JoelWhy Ireland starved: an analytical and quantitative study of Irish poverty, 1800–1851 (London and Boston, 1983);Google ScholarO’Rourke, Kevin H. ‘Culture, Malthus, and Irish demographic history’ in Journal of Economic History, 58 (1998), pp 862–5.Google Scholar

49 Foucault, , History of sexuality, volume I, p. 33.Google Scholar

50 Woods, R.I.Watterson, P.A. and Woodward, J.H. ‘The causes of rapid infant mortality decline in England and Wales, 1861–1921, part I’, Population studies, 42 (1988), pp 343–66.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

51 Baylis, Gayle ‘Stillbirth registration and perceptions of infant death, 1900–60: the Scottish case in national context’ in Economic History Review, 62 (2009), pp 629–54 at p. 631.Google Scholar

52 N.A.I., Inquest Files/Dublin/1922–1936.

53 Frost, Ginger ‘“Revolting to humanity”: oversights, limitations, and complications of the English Legitimacy Act of 1926’ in Women’s History Review, 20 (2011), pp 31–46.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

54 Report of the Commission on evil literature (Dublin, 1927).

55 McAvoy, Sandra ‘Before Cadden: abortion in mid-twentieth century Ireland’ in Keogh, DermotO’Shea, Finbarr and Quinlan, Carmel (eds), The lost decade: Ireland in the 1950s (Cork, 2004), pp 147–63Google Scholar at p. 155.

56 Kennedy, Finola ‘The suppression of the Carrigan Report: a historical perspective on child abuse’ in Studies, 89 (2000), pp 354–63Google Scholar at p. 356.

57 Daly, Mary E.The slow failure: population decline and independent Ireland, 1922–1973 (Madison, WI, 2006), p. 94.Google Scholar

58 Report of the Commission on the relief of the sick and destitute poor, p. 72.

59 A.R.R.G., 1923, p. xxiii.

60 Luddy, ‘Unmarried mothers’, p. 113 calculates the average number of illegitimate births per annum from 1920 to 1930 as 1,706.

61 Carrigan report, p. 9.

62 Maguire, MoiraPrecarious childhood in post-independence Ireland (Manchester, 2009), p. 189.Google Scholar

63 Luddy, ‘Unmarried mothers’, p. 116; Earner-Byrne, ‘Reinforcing the family’, pp 360–9.

64 24 & 25 Vict., c. 100. Brooke, Cf. Stephen ‘“A new world for women”? Abortion law reform in Britain during the 1930s’in American Historical Review, 116 (2001), pp. 431–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

65 Sauer, , ‘Infanticide and abortion’, p. 89.Google ScholarPubMed

66 Drevenstedt, Greg L.Crimmins, Ellen M.Vasunilashorn, Sarinnapha and Finch, Caleb E. ‘The rise and fall of excess male infant mortality’ in Proceedings of the National Academy ofSciences ofthe United States of America, 105, no. 13 (1 Apr. 2008), pp 5016–21.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

67 Hansen, Elizabeth de G.R. ‘“Overlaying” in 19th-century England: infant mortality or infanticide?’ in Human Ecology, 7, no. 4 (Dec. 1979), pp 333–52.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

68 N.A.I., CC/Kildare, (1913–1921), deposition dated 12 May 1919.

69 Wessling, Mary ‘Infanticide trials and forensic medicine: Wurttemberg, 1757–93’, in Clark, & Crawford, (eds), Legal medicine in history, pp 117–45Google Scholar at p. 134.

70 Rattigan, Clíona ‘Dark spots in Irish society: unmarried motherhood, crime and prosecution in Ireland, 1900–1950’ (Ph.D. thesis, Trinity College Dublin, 2005), p. 59.Google Scholar

71 N.A.I., CC/Louth, (1923–27), report and depositions dated 20 Apr. 1927. Also the cases of an unknown male child found near an old graveyard, who died a few hours after birth from neglect (G.R.D.I., second quarter, Dundalk, 1927, 2, 433), and of an unknown female child found in a brown paper parcel in a graveyard at Chapel Street, Dundalk, with a verdict of ‘neglect at birth’ (N.A.I., CC/ Louth, (1923–27) Coroner’s Court, report and depositions dated 1 Dec. 1924).

72 O’Connor, AnneThe blessed and the damned: sinful women and unbaptized children in Irish folklore (Bern, 2005), pp 37,Google Scholar 73–8.

73 Crualaoích, Gearóid Ó ‘The “merry wake”’ in Donnelly, James S. and Miller, Kerby A. (eds), Irish popular culture, 1650–1850 (Dublin, 1998), pp 173–200Google Scholar at p. 173.

74 Findlay, Nyree ‘Traditions of infant burial in Ireland from cillin to cist’, World archaeology, 31, no. 3 (Feb. 2000), pp 407–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

75 N.A.I., CC/Galway (1920–1923), depositions and reports dated 14 Sept. 1922.

76 N.A.I., CC/Kildare (1913–1921), report dated 4 Mar. 1915.

77 N.A.I., CC/Kildare (1913–1921), deposition dated 4 Mar. 1915.

78 Court of inquiry, 6 Dec. 1920 (T.N.A., WO35/155B); 1911 Census of Ireland.

79 N.A.I., CC/Kildare (1913–1921), deposition dated 22 Mar. 1915.

80 N.A.I., CC/Kildare (1913–1921), records and deposition dated 3 Nov. 1919.

81 N.A.I., CC/Meath (1914–15), report and depositions dated 27 Mar. 1927

82 King v Alice C. concealment of birth charges, deposition dated 11 June 1922 (N.A.I., Crown files at quarter sessions: Trinity, Michaelmas 1922), recorded as male infant C, June 1922, entry 107, p. 59 (Dublin Coroner’s Court: Registers of Inquests, 1917–1931, CSER/CC/DN).

83 Carrigan Report, p. 14.

84 The handwritten name is indecipherable it resembles Breadin which may be an Anglicisation of Brídín.

85 N.A.I., CC/Donegal (1909–1915), reports dated 16 June 1914.

86 N.A.I.., CC/Longford (1916–1926), depositions and reports dated 29 May 1919.

87 Rattigan, Clíona ‘“Half-mad at the time’: unmarried mothers and infanticide in Ireland 1922–1950’ in Cox, & Luddy, (eds), Cultures of care, pp 168–90Google Scholar at p. 170; N.A.I., CC/Donegal (1909–1915), reports dated 16 June 1914, case of B.F. and N.A.I., CC/Donegal (1916–1925), reports dated 17 Aug. 1914, case of Sarah McL.

88 N.A.I., CC/Donegal (1909–1915), reports dated 17 Aug. 1914.

89 N.A.I., CC/Clare (1916–1920), report dated 17 Dec. 1919.

90 N.A.I., CC/Donegal (1916–1925), reports dated 20 June 1922.

91 N.A.I., CC/Longford (1916–1926), reports dated 15 Aug. 1926.

92 Irish Independent, 28 Sept. 1926.

93 N.A.I., CC/Clare (1916–1927), reports dated 3 Nov. 1924; the child is referred to both as unnamed and unknown.

94 N.A.I., CC/Clare (1925–1927), reports dated 20 June 1926.

95 N.A.I., CC/Donegal (1909–1915) report dated 16 Jan. 1922; CC/Donegal (1909–1915), depositions and reports dated 14 Oct. 1911; CC/Donegal (1916–1925), report dated 20 Sept. 1923.