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The Story of Baby Marion Howe

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  • The Story of Baby Marion Howe

    This story grabbed my interest on Facebook so I copied it to here -- I wanted everyone to have a glimpse at how children and parents too were dealt with by the religious... and perhaps sill are.

    I'm at a loss as to which forum to put it in, so here we are.....

    On May 17th 1955, Christina Howe dressed her beloved baby daughter Marion in her best frilly lemon dress, combed her freshly washed blonde hair, adding a kiss curl to the top, before giving her a last kiss and cuddle. Marion, a happy bouncing baby, waved goodbye, calling out 'dayday' to her mother and one of her sister's, Mary, in the normal baby vernacular of a bright child just discovering language. She was then handed over to the 'care' of the nuns in Goldenbridge Orphanage; where she was due to spend the next two weeks while Christina recovered from an illness in hospital. Christina never saw her baby daughter alive again; for after only four days in the nun's care, the nuns claimed baby Marion was dead. She was only eleven months old and perfectly healthy baby.

    Marion's father Myles was working in England in the 1950's, supporting his wife and five children, when Christina was taken ill and sent into hospital to convalesce. With their grandmother caring for the other children, on the suggestion of the Almoner of Meath Hospital- who assured Christina her youngest baby would be well-cared for by the Sisters of Mercy - she agreed to send Marion to Goldenbridge Orphanage for two weeks while she got better. On May 21st just four days after Christina sent her baby to Goldenbridge, Myles received a telegram in England informing him that his baby daughter was dead.

    ‘Our father got a telegram, telling him Marion was dead and not to bother corning back as they would take care of everything,' says Frances Howe, Marion's sister. 'They hadn't even bothered to tell my mother. He was in shock, grief-stricken, so he dropped everything and came home immediately. He went straight to Saint Ultan's hospital, and asked the sisters what had happened to his baby, and was brought in to see baby Marion, where one of the sisters said to him that it was a 'shame we had got to her far too late.' Frances adds: 'her legs and head were bandaged -when he pulled the leg bandages aside he saw that her legs had been burned. There were two identical bums on the inner part of her knees that were so deep you could see the bone. My dad always described them as being the size of silver dollars.'

    Myles Howe realized immediately that something terrible had happened to his daughter, so went straight to Kilrnainharn Garda (local police) station to file a complaint. ‘The police told him to come back in a couple of days,' says Frances. 'When he went back he was told it was just an unfortunate accident and to let it go. In those days the law just wasn’t on their side. People had no voice.'

    In the grief and pain of losing their baby, Myles and Christina went to Goldenbridge two weeks after her death to try and get some answers. They were not looking to cause trouble; like any parents they only wanted to understand why their beloved child had died. However when the door was opened on the bereft couple, Sister Xavier, the nun in charge, responded to their heartfelt pleas by waving her hand in a gesture of dismissal, saying 'it was only a baby' before the door was closed in their faces. That any human being could treat grieving parents with such callousness beggar’s belief, but she did, and the Howe’s were forced to go home distraught; no closer to the truth of what had happened to their adored youngest child.

    The death certificate stated that baby Marion had died of acute dysentery infection, (with no mention of bums) but the couple never saw a post mortem report, police report or hospital report pertaining to their daughter. Broken-hearted they had no choice but to get on with their lives for the sake of their other children, and although they did, much had changed:

    ‘Our parents never trusted anyone to look after their kids,' remembers Frances. 'We went to adifferent school away from all our friends as they didn't trust us to be educated by nuns. Our mother used to say if she had pockets in her apron big enough, she’d mind us all in it.'

    Baby Marion was a constant presence in their lives, with Christina including her in their thoughts and celebrating her birthdays without fail; talking about her, wondering who she would look like if she had lived. But there was also sadness: 'We would see our mother upset,' recalls Frances with tears in her eyes. ‘We’d ask her what was wrong and she would try and hide it, but it was always there, that sadness.' Mary, the sister who waved goodbye to Marion on that day in 1955 has no memory of the rest of her childhood, so badly traumatized was she by what happened to her sister. But somehow the family retained their faith and Christina would tell her children that their baby sister' was an angel up in heaven, with God'.

    In 1996 when the police re-opened the case, the Sisters of Mercy told them that there had never been a Marion Howe in their care. There was no record of her arrival in Goldenbridge so it was only when the police discovered her name in the 'sick book' (beside the entry, 'leg burnt/ history of vomiting') after a search of the orphanage, that they finally admitted baby Marion had been in Goldenbridge. Do we need to ask ourselves why the sisters would go to such lengths to conceal the truth, or do we already know the answer? The Howe’s discovered that people would not, or could not, speak out. 'We put out an appeal in the newspapers in 1997, asking people if they remembered anything,' explains Frances, ‘but people were afraid to talk. They still are.'

    Baby Marion’s case went before the courts in 1997. It was to be a test case, the outcome of which would either open, or close forever, the floodgates for all the other victims of institutional abuse in Ireland. Before trial the Howe’s agreed to settle the case out of court for the sum of £20,000. While the money never mattered, Christina Howe, who had fought the case while ill with cancer, saw the settlement as the only way of ensuring that other victims of institutional abuse got their chance to be heard in court.

    ‘Our mother said that if she couldn't help those children in 1955, she’d help them now’ remembers Frances. 'She died six months and seven days after the trial. And she died with a broken heart, never knowing what had happened to her baby.' Myles also died never knowing what happened to his much loved daughter.

    Incredibly the Sisters of Mercy never admitted any liability for what happened to baby Marion; nor did they apologize for her death. Instead they apologized: 'IF there had been a lack of caring or compassion at the time.' That says it all- even with their backs against the wall the Sisters of Mercy did not have the humanity to stand up and acknowledge their own failings.

    Today, 54 years after baby Marion's death, her family- whose grief and pain at the loss of their sister is still palpable- has yet to discover the truth about what happened to that beautiful baby girl during those four days at Goldenbridge. This shadow has affected every aspect of their lives. ‘Our own children are also touched by this' explains Geraldine Howe, who also works within this close-knit family to find the truth. 'My own nine-year old daughter told me she was sick of this project I was always doing, and asked 'why those people couldn't tell the truth so that we could then go the police, who live up by aunty Frances' . All our children are deeply affected.'

    This is not about compensation or money. The Howe’s are quick to reiterate that they only want the truth. They now hope that they can get permission to have baby Marion’s body exhumed in a last attempt to find out why she died, so they can finally put it behind them and get on with their lives. That these crimes against the most vulnerable in our society - our children - remained hidden for so long is, in itself, a crime; that the Howe family should be still forced to fight for the truth is an indictment of our society- government, religious and secular- as a whole. In this so-called era of accountability and openness their story is a harsh reminder that there are still many dark secrets lurking in the history of our state; secrets that it seems, will never come to light.
    Attached Files
    'Never look down on a person unless you're helping them up'.
    .

  • #2
    Oh my god im speechless

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    • #3
      Another damming indictment of institutional abuse,brutality and cover up by the church as a result of the death of a child that they were supposed to care for.Shame on the catholic church. It makes me wonder how many other deaths are they responsible for.
      I google because I'm not young enough to know everything.
      Nemo Mortalium Omnibus Horis Sapit

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      • #4
        my hope is that it is all over.....

        but i still have a little apprehension with the eu.....people who think they always know best......are always proven wrong.............

        marks my words.....some have already been proven right......
        Here Rex!!!...Here Rex!!!.....Wuff!!!....... Wuff!!!

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        • #5
          As far as I know they never did exhume the body of Marion. The sister of a friend of mine was married to Myles Howe..brother of Marion. They lived, ad some still do around the Bride St/Kevin St area. I believe one of Myles sons des those Horse and carriage tours about the Green. As it says in the excerpt from the book...the shadow always hung over all the family.

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          • #6
            I feel sick to my stomach after reading that,to think of the horror that little girl suffered at the hands of those beasts.She was probably missing her mammy,and crying for her,and one of those bitches attacked her,I don't even want to imagine the horror of her last two days.I believe a lot of children suffered and some were even killed.I can only imagine how guilty those poor parents felt for putting their baby in that hellhole.I guess it's it makes it okay to hand over twenty thousand pounds to pay for an 11 month baby to be tortured to death by members of the Catholic Church! Sickening,just plain sickening!
            Last edited by maire; 19-04-2012, 12:46 AM.

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            • #7
              In 1704 the Foundling hospital of Dublin was opened. No inquiry was made about the parents, and no money received. From 1,500 to 2,000 children were received annually. A large income was derived from a duty on coal and the produce of car licences. In 1822 an admission fee of £5 was charged on the parish from which the child came. This reduced the annual arrivals to about 500. In 1829 the select committee on the Irish miscellaneous estimates recommended that no further assistance should be given. The hospital had not preserved life or educated the foundlings. The mortality was nearly 4 in 5, and the total cost £10,000 a year. Accordingly in 1835 Lord Glenelg (then Irish Secretary) closed the institution.

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              • #8
                I hark back to this many times because as a 20 year old it has affected me from then and always will

                I was in kevins having had life saving surgery. the girl in the bed on one side of me was called Josephine. She had dark shortish hair and she had an evil dark scar through one of her eyebrows like she had been beaten badly


                She had had her appendics removed. She told me she was in a home for unmarried mothers in Dublin and the nuns were giving her baby boy away. I was angry, scared and found it so hard to believe

                England won the world cup and Josephine was in bits as was - her little boy was probably sold to those who had the money to buy a baby

                I told her to tell her mother and father but she said they knew and agreed it was right

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                • #9
                  Originally posted by Red Biddy View Post
                  I hark back to this many times because as a 20 year old it has affected me from then and always will

                  I was in kevins having had life saving surgery. the girl in the bed on one side of me was called Josephine. She had dark shortish hair and she had an evil dark scar through one of her eyebrows like she had been beaten badly


                  She had had her appendics removed. She told me she was in a home for unmarried mothers in Dublin and the nuns were giving her baby boy away. I was angry, scared and found it so hard to believe

                  England won the world cup and Josephine was in bits as was - her little boy was probably sold to those who had the money to buy a baby

                  I told her to tell her mother and father but she said they knew and agreed it was right

                  well. i hope the people who got nthe baby (maybe bought it) did not know that it was taken by force from it's mother......if the did, they were as bad as the system that allowed such a thing.....

                  maybe there is a lesson there, belatedly of course...

                  that freedom does not mean you can be told by others what is best for you....
                  and make laws that is on their side....

                  ireland produced many heroes in the past......but also an awful lot of arseholes........in the guise of patriots.........
                  Here Rex!!!...Here Rex!!!.....Wuff!!!....... Wuff!!!

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