County: Dublin Site name: New Childrens Hospital, St. James's Campus, South Circular Road, Dublin 8
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 16E0595
Author: Thaddeus Breen & Níall Garahy; Shanarc Archaeology Ltd.
Site type: Urban, burial ground
Period/Dating: —
ITM: E 713723m, N 733426m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.338834, -6.292335
Archaeological monitoring, testing and excavation were conducted at St. James’s Hospital, Dublin 8, between 13 December 2016 and 8 February 2017.
Human remains were found during archaeological monitoring of works associated with a proposed Vacuum Insulated Evaporator (VIE) compound to the rear of St. James's Hospital. This was between Hospital 5 and the former line of the Grand Canal, to the south of the original Workhouse buildings. These works constituted a temporary replacement for the existing medical gas installation on the site of the new Children's Hospital.
The proposed works comprised a linear trench, 1.2m wide, to accommodate a pipeline carrying medical gases from a specialised above-ground storage vessel (VIE), which was to be seated on a concrete surface plinth, to the main St. James hospital buildings and smaller cuttings, measuring 1.2m x 1.2m x 1.2m, to accommodate access chambers for existing service ducts.
The presence of human remains, found during the archaeological monitoring of cuttings to accommodate the service access chambers, together with a reference in historical records, indicated that an area within the proposed VIE development site was the probable location of a paupers' burial plot attached to the South Dublin Union workhouse, dating from c. 1850 to c. 1870.
On foot of this and due to the nature of proposed works in this area, a programme of archaeological test excavations was designed and undertaken along the length of the proposed pipeline trench to determine the presence/absence of any further inhumation burials, establish the probable extent of the burial ground and determine the impact of the proposed development on any extant remains. This archaeological investigation, comprising 4 test trenches, identified the presence of 3 burials and established that a 21.5m section of the trench pipeline lay within the burial ground.
In order to mitigate the impact of the proposed works a programme of archaeological excavation and preservation in situ, where feasible, was undertaken. In total 7 articulated burials were identified. It was possible to preserve 6 of these in situ. One burial, with associated coffin nails, was excavated.
The trench pipeline falling outside the 21.5m section was also archaeologically monitored. No features of archaeological were identified during this monitoring.
Unit 39a, Hebron Business Park, Hebron Road, Kilkenny
