Warning over graveyard dig
BONES EXPOSED AT BALLYHACK CEMETERY AS WORK TAKES PLACE TO CLEAR LAND NEAR FAMILY PLOT
AN investigation is under way after a massive fresh grave – described by one local as a ‘construction site – was opened on an historic cemetery, despite the person who organised the dig being told to stop after human bones were exposed.
A local resident arrived at the cemetery – which is about to be listed as a heritage site – early on Tuesday morning and found a large site being dug up by workmen. Hip, arm and leg bones, and a skull – believed to be belonging to children – were exposed during the works at the plot which measures some five pallets in length and three pallets in width.
Local resident Martin Foley (71), said he is preparing the plot for when he is laid to rest there.
A warning letter has been sent to Mr Foley from Wexford County Council and the Monuments section of the Department of Heritage is now involved.
New Ross district director Eamonn Hore said that an elderly local resident believed it was a pauper’s graveyard and he was preparing a plot for himself for when he passes.
‘He thought “no one owns this” but it doesn’t work that way. It’s a first for me in all my years. We stopped whatever work was going on until we got some handle as to who needed to get involved.’
Mr Hore said it appears Mr Foley did not contact anyone about his plans and works are continuing.
A local resident said: ‘It’s like John B Keane’s play, The Field.’
‘The way the bones were scattered all over on the grounds was disgraceful. The bones are small and look like children’s, which is very disturbing.’
WORK is continuing on a large grave plot in Ballyhack Cemetery despite the person who organised the dig being told to stop after human remains were exposed.
A local resident arrived at the graveyard – which is about to be listed as a heritage site – early on Tuesday morning and found a large site being dug up by workmen. The resident alerted the parish priest. It’s believed hip, arm and leg bones, and a skull, were exposed during the works at the plot which measures some five pallets in length and three pallets in width.
Gardaí were contacted and the HSE were alerted, along with Wexford County Council and local resident Martin Foley (71), who lives less than 500 metres from the graveyard, was contacted.
Speaking to this newspaper from his yard, Mr Foley said the entire incident was ‘much ado about nothing’. He said: ‘I talked to the council and they said it’s not their problem. That’s a pauper’s graveyard, you know what that means. I was extending the family plot. I’m doing it for myself.’
Mr Foley said he has all his family buried there. ‘I have four brothers buried up there. One of them died in infancy and the others died ages 20, 17 and 26 from Muscular Dystrophy.’
He said his father and mother are also buried in the graveyard.
He had a few men work on the plot over a number of days, insisting that he was within his rights to expand the family grave. ‘I was cleaning it up because it was real rough underneath. I don’t know if people were after backfilling it. There were no [marked] graves there. The ground was after being filled and there was an odd bit of a bone in it. The graveyard is over 500 years old,’ he said.
Mr Foley was called over to the site on Tuesday. ‘An engineer from Wexford County Council looked at it. He rang another engineer who told him they had nothing to do with it. The guards came and said they are finished with it. There was no malicious damage done. An old headstone was damaged but that will be repaired. It shouldn’t have been.
‘I certainly had no intention of digging up any grave or anything. The intention was only to peel off the top of the soil.’
When asked if he would do things differently had he another opportunity, Mr Foley said he’d tell the workers to stop if they saw a bone. ‘We are maintaining it and when it is done it’ll be tidied up and if a bone is found it will be buried beside it. There are new plots in there. A first cousin drowned ten years ago and he’s there and his brother has a plot too, so there are people taking plots up there anywhere they can get them.’
New Ross district director Eamonn Hore said a warning letter has been sent to Mr Foley and the Monuments section of the Department of Heritage is now involved. He said Wexford County Council was alerted to the situation on Tuesday and was surprised to be informed on Friday that works were continuing on site. ‘We have an interest in everything in Co Wexford and although we don’t own the graveyard in Ballyhack, there is a historic context and there are guidelines from the Heritage Council in how to deal with them. There is a protocol for digging.’
He said that an elderly local resident believed it was a pauper’s graveyard and he was preparing a plot for himself for when he passes.
‘He thought “no one owns this” but it doesn’t work that way. It’s a first for me in all my years. We stopped whatever work was going on until we got some handle as to who needed to get involved.’
Mr Hore said it appears Mr Foley did not contact the Department, the local priest or the council about his plans.
‘ There is an old church there that was listed under the National Monuments Act; you do need to seek permission [for works] within the curtilage of a national monument. Your instinct alone would tell you there’s a right way and a wrong way of doing this.’
‘Graveyards deserve respect.
Everything around a burial is always an emotive matter. I don’t want to say anything to get people’s emotions enflamed but there is a certain way of doing things, in my opinion,’ said Mr Hore.
The first recorded burial in the graveyard was that of a monk back in 1650.
Unusually, Ballyhack Cemetery was never owned by anyone despite two churches, a Protestant and a Catholic church, being built nearby.
According to local tradition, nobody can be refused burial in Ballyhack. The cemetery contains the remains of 29 men drowned after the ill-fated Alfred D Snow ship was lost in the ‘graveyard of a thousand ships’ off the Wexford coast on January 4, 1888. People who travelled to Ballyhack during the Famine in order to emigrate are also buried there.
Superintendent John McDonald said the garda involvement in the case is over. ‘A man was asked to do something on behalf of the owner of a grave. During the course of doing what he was asked to do, it transpired that human remains were dug up.’
Supt McDonald said as far as he knows there was no marked grave on the particular plot.
‘ They were excavating at a deep depth. The man involved was trying to extended a family plot. It was never the intention that anything of any consequence would occur to anyone else. The workers couldn’t have known that this was something to be encountered; the remains of someone buried there for a long period of time. You would appreciate in any situation like that, that it becomes upsetting [for people] when someone’s remains are disturbed.’
A local resident said the incident has caused serious upset in the area, particularly among older residents. ‘ Things calmed down significantly when it was discovered who had requested the works but the works are still ongoing today and blocklayers are on site.’
The resident said: ‘It’s not a pauper’s graveyard; there are four priests buried there. It’s predominantly Catholic and anyone who entrusted their bereaved to be buried there were entrusting them to the Catholic Church and they would be afforded the privilege and dignity of being allowed to rest in peace. It’s like (John B Keane play) The Field. There is a tradition in Ballyhack people claim a plot that is marked in full knowledge that the graveyard is full. When bones are found they are wrapped in cloth and put back respectfully but this is a major construction operation putting in a concrete foundation and a block on the flat.
‘ They have dug down five or six feet and are building up rising walls to ground level; it’s highly unusual. Normally you’d go down one and a half foot and there would be an iron support. This is constructing four graves in line with four other graves that are already belonging to the family. No one would say anything if it was one person making provision for a plot for himself.
‘ The way the bones were scattered all over on the grounds was disgraceful. It’s reckless desecration, (if not deliberate desecration). It’s a pity he didn’t stop when he realised what was going on. The bones are small and look like children’s which is very disturbing. I am flabbergasted by the lack of response from our local leaders: religious and political.’