County: Dublin Site name: Grangegorman Lower, Dublin 7
Sites and Monuments Record No.: N/A Licence number: 22E0944
Author: Paul Duffy
Site type: 18th/19th-century buildings and 19th century cemetery
Period/Dating: Modern (AD 1750-AD 2000)
ITM: E 714748m, N 735130m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 53.353919, -6.276334
IAC Archaeology carried out archaeological monitoring of Phase 2 geotechnical site investigations (SI) at the site of a mixed-used development located in Grangegorman, Dublin 7. This phase of works comprised the excavation of 11 geotechnical boreholes and one slit trench, to confirm the location of the water mains on site.
Phase 2 works followed on from Phase 1 of pre-planning site investigations (SI) which were carried out in December 2022 by Muireann Ní Cheallacháin under the initial iteration of Licence 22E0944. During this first phase of works a previously unrecorded mass burial pit was identified at the location of Trial Pit 106 (TP106), which may relate to the New House of Industry founded in 1773. Moreover, possible foundation elements of the North Dublin Union House of Industry and the Bedford Children’s Asylum were also identified during monitoring. As a result, a programme of testing was carried out in March 2023 in order to fully investigate the archaeological potential of the site (Ní Cheallacháin and Fairbrother 2023, Licence No. 22E0944 ext). Testing revealed further extension of limestone wall foundations of the North Union workhouse (19th century) as well as additional disarticulated human remains at the north-western and north-eastern extents of the development area. Additional testing has been carried out by Archaeology Plan under Licence No. 23E0252 near the site of the mass burial pit (TP106) in order to find the extent of the burial area. This has been reported on separately (Barry 2023).
This second phase of monitoring of SI works revealed one limestone wall during the excavation of BH523. The structure likely confirms the presence of a foundation wall of the 18th- and 19th-century North Union workhouse complex of buildings and yards. No further archaeological features were discovered during this phase of work. Nevertheless, the limestone wall together with all archaeological remains uncovered during Phase 1 of works, and during the subsequent testing, confirmed that the site has high archaeological potential due to the extended presence of the foundation walls of the 18th/19th-century buildings and of the 19th-century cemeterial area.
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