2012:566 - NENAGH: Mid-Western Regional Hospital, Tipperary

An archaeological excavation and a programme of monitoring took place at the Mid-Western Regional Hospital, Nenagh, Co. Tipperary. The excavation, commissioned by the Health Service Executive, was undertaken following the discovery of human remains in the course of building works within the grounds of the hospital.

The Health Service Executive obtained planning permission to undertake re-development works at its hospital. Planning permission has been obtained to demolish an existing single storey building and a two-storey stair block and construct a new two-storey extension to the rear of the hospital. Further to building the extension there would be enabling works, temporary provisions and other ancillary works. However, no conditions were attached to the granted planning permission concerning archaeological requirements. The hospital, located on the outskirts of the town, was not within the confines of a recorded archaeological monument in the Record of Monuments and Places. However, cartographic records confirmed there was a Burial Ground to the rear of the hospital. This Burial Ground belonged to Nenagh Workhouse, which was built in the 1840s. The hospital built in the 1930s was on the site of Nenagh Workhouse and the Fever Hospital.

In the course of the digging of service trenches for the extension, human skeletal remains were uncovered by the building contractor. Works ceased at the location and the Gardaí were contacted. They removed the human remains (allegedly a young adult) and after further examination concluded that the remains were archaeological in nature. The immediate area where the remains were found were cordoned off as it appeared that remains from the same skeleton were still present at the location and required removal. The excavation of the service trenches continued outside of the cordoned off area and almost immediately a further burial and other human remains were uncovered c. 1.75m from the first burial. At this point a representative from the DOEHLG visited the site and gave instructions that the disturbed human remains were to be fully excavated and undisturbed remains were to be left in situ. A further instruction was that all other service excavations within the hospital grounds were to be carried out under archaeological supervision.

The remains identified represented two actual burials (Burials 1 and 2) and evidence that one or more other burials within the hospital grounds had been disturbed. The initial skeletal remains which necessitated the presence of the Garda represented a heavily truncated grave cut. No details of the excavation conducted by the Garda were available at the time of writing so it was unclear as to the size, orientation and shape of the grave cut. All that remained was a small portion of cut which was truncated by two service trenches. The second burial was found close to the first but at a much lower level (c. 0.96m). As this burial was relatively undisturbed it was possible to see its size, shape and orientation though, as it was beneath the level needed for the current building works it was decided that it should be preserved in situ. Other skeletal remains recovered were at first were thought to be within a grave cut similar to Burials 1 and 2 but upon excavation were seen to be within a shallow layer of building or demolition debris (this layer also produced post-medieval ceramic finds and a possible coin). It seems likely that this layer represented the earlier disturbance of burials, possibly during the demolition of the workhouse buildings and the subsequent construction of the hospital in the 1930's.

No other archaeological features were identified during the monitoring of other service trenches excavated in other parts of the hospital grounds. Many of these trenches showed up pre-existing services associated with the hospital’s current use. Generally the stratigraphy observed within all of these excavations was similar to the upper layer comprising of either tarmac or topsoil/sod, the middle layer representing modern building or demolition debris and the lowest layer representing the natural subsoil. It is with this middle layer which was found consistently throughout the monitoring phase that parallels can be drawn with similar layers found covering Burial 1 and in the case of layer actually containing disturbed human bone.

The fact that no further burials were found during monitoring suggests that the two burials identified, along with other skeletal remains, may represent only the edge of a small burial ground which was concentrated in the north-east corner of the hospital grounds. It seems probable that these burials may represent the pre-famine burial ground within the workhouse grounds. Looking at the location of the burials on the 1st edition OS map for Nenagh (which was completed before the famine) it seems that the north-east corner of the workhouse grounds were clear of buildings and may have been an ideal place for a small number of burial plots, especially for the first few years of the workhouse’s occupation. The 2nd edition OS map showed a number of small buildings located in the north-eastern part of the workhouse grounds which presumably covered the earlier burials, especially as most workhouse graves would have been unmarked. The map also showed the 1847 graveyard (which was set up due to the increasing mortality rates at the workhouse) with clear boundaries set out to the east of the main grounds. It seems possible that in the years following the Famine many of these earlier burials were forgotten about and it is also possible that later buildings were deliberately placed over the graves as they may have been seen as particularly infectious.