Cahersiveen, Ireland — At the edge of an Irish village lies a cemetery nestled between lush hills and the craggy shores of the Atlantic. Under an umbrella of iridescent clouds, Catherine Cournane makes her way toward the back plots.
She meanders past the grave of her mother, two brothers and a cousin. She visits them often here in Cahersiveen’s Holy Cross Graveyard. But on this day, she is here for someone else.
Baby John.
It has been two days since Catherine last tended his grave and at the headstone, she sees fresh chrysanthemums. Their yellow and orange petals have weathered the pelting rain and wind. Catherine wonders who left them there.
Other babies are buried at Holy Cross and their loved ones look after them. But Baby John has no one.
So, Catherine took on the task of looking after the grave. She felt compelled to make sure Baby John rested in peace. He deserved that, Catherine thought, after the ugliness that had surrounded him.She was in high school when Baby John died 34 years ago and she had helped carry his tiny casket to the graveyard. She was there when hundreds of schoolchildren stopped off to pay their respects with prayer after school. She joined the children when they burst into spontaneous song at the infant’s grave.
In Ireland, it wasn’t unusual for a community to gather around a loss of their own. But Baby John’s funeral was different.
Catherine did not know who the baby’s parents were. No one did. Still, no one does.
His three-day-old body had been found on a rocky stretch of beach on the outskirts of town. He had been strangled and stabbed 28 times.
But what Catherine does know is this: A baby was laid to rest on a spring day more than three decades ago and nothing would ever be the same again.
The sordid saga that unfolded would shake Catherine, her community and her country. And it would force Ireland to confront the bitter truth on how it treated its women.
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