However, when the mourners arrived at the churchyard, they found that the gates had been locked to the gathered congregation. In Killarney, John attached the coffin containing Peggy’s body to the roof of his car and drove her back to their native village, to be mourned by her community. Near the doorway of the third hospital, she finally gave birth to her daughter. The two continued to Killarney, another 20 miles away, Peggy now writhing in agony in the back of the car. There, she was once again refused admission. Panicked, John Guerin drove Peggy along a further 16 mile stretch of poor roads to the next hospital in Tralee. Peggy had become pregnant outside of marriage and was not deemed ‘respectable’ enough to give birth alongside married women. However, when they arrived, the nun overseeing the premises refused them entrance. When the birth became complicated, a neighboring hackney driver, John Guerin, rushed Peggy to get medical assistance in Listowel. Peggy’s local hospital was less than four miles away from her rural home in Listowel where, with the aid of her mother and a midwife, she had gone into labour. She had spent the hours before traversing a web of dark, unsurfaced roads in the West of Ireland, in the pangs of childbirth. On 10 February 1946, a young woman named Peggy McCarthy struggled toward the entrance of a hospital in Killarney, Co. In this guest post, Sarah O’Brien reflects on the role of oral history within a culture of storytelling through the lens of Ireland’s difficult past involving pregnancy outside of marriage, showing how oral narratives coupled with artistic practices have returned dignity and voice to those who have been silenced by the state. Art, Oral History and Ireland’s Mother and Baby Homes
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