Magdalene Laundry - Cork 

The place certainly retains certain trapped energies.. A shiver ran up my spine more than once whilst videoing.

Im not Catholic (thank God) but if I were I would jump ship! Ive just finished reading Kathy O'Beirnes book 'Dont ever tell' ...And Im lost for words ! Bless all the girls and boys who suffered in such places and at the hands of those who were meant to protect them the most.. SHAME SHAME SHAME

I was so moved by this video. What an oxymoron, a religion which preaches love, faith, forgiveness - and this, hell on earth, abuse and neglect. I cannot imagine what those walls have seen, but it breaks my heart.

My mother was brought up half her life in madgalene laundry in cork and it doses not bare thinking about what theese poor girls went through words fail me may god bless each and every one of them.

Mark I was in there from 76-79.I was there when the lads were painting The Muppets in the playroom.The wallpaper on the landing was also there in my day.I used to love flying down the stairs,the room at top of the landing was a tv room and kitchen/diner.Sad to see the old playground has gone,many a fun day out there.It wasn't all bad at the good shepherds but I count myself lucky...Was also down in Passage West at Mount St.Josphes 81-84 and back again in 85,they were proper backward/deranged nuns down there,was a tough wee town in the early 80's with some good folk.I was also there for the infamous flood whilst serving mass at St.Marys 83?...Paddy.London...

I love this video. I've just watched the film "The Magdalene sisters" and i just had to find some stuff thats related to the film. I thought your video was amazing, and showed some people, like myself, who can't go to Ireland to see such things. Thanks for uploading it! 5 stars***** :)

Knowing the history behind this place, and places like it, seeing the ruins, and the music in the background. It's all very sad.

Thankyou for your comment, this place certainly evokes strong emotions.

Rest Peacefully all the Magdelene Girls & Women x x x

nice work mate, so well done, music compliments this big style, very proud of you son ;)

i remember as a 14 year old going into the convent on my way to fitzgeralds park to talk to the girls on the front lawn we would get so far before one of the devils would start shouting to get out i dident know what really was the reason why those poor misfourtunate girls were there for, so so sad and on my own doorstep as well, what good is any compensation to them women only they might get a small bit of happiness from it again so so sad

my mother and three of my aunts were sent there when my grandfather died everytime i see a nun i get shivers down my back proper evil bastards they were

love these old building its such a shame letting them rot. Thanks for sharring. :-)

I was amazed that the last laundry closed in 1996 i wonder if the slavery and beatings were still common then, really is dispicable.

I know what you mean. I'm reading Mary Raftery's "Suffer The Little Children" and I can't put it down!! Those poor little kids, what the hell did they do to deserve such horror?? The catholic church says they're doing the Lord's work, but they're doing the devil's deeds!! This is why I'm not into organized religion! I'll make sure to see Magadalen Sisters ASAP when I finish the book!

Thank you, glad you liked it.

Hi Mary there is an excellent group on the net called justice for the Magdalens.. Many people who were resident in these places are members. A good place to start your research. Mark.

Arghhh ... Clannad ... my ears my ears ;-). Yet another cool video dude ... also adds an extra dimension to your already superb pictures!

"The laundry building was among a number of buildings that were destroyed in that fire". How convenient

excellent video..ive so many pictures from outside but never been inside.an amazing building,and such tragic history attatched to it,is such a contrast...excellent upload ,really enjoyed watching it to be honest.....just a shame it was a building used for what it was and a building now forgotten after so many years of service..etc....

just watching this video makes me feel awful for them. I bet some jumped from those stair or atleast thought of it. Just watching in the different rooms and thinking about what could have taken place there. It's sad

Does any one know the approx year when this convent/laundry closed? So sad what went on in these places.

@MsMarycollins Hi mary my mother was also brought up half her life in this convent and i know how you feel you are not alone.

so haunting and sad.....

beautiful piece of music to accompany a brilliant video. if the walls could talk eh ?

I know it's history is mixed but it was some building for it time. I have to say that as my great great grandfather built it.

as far i know little nellie was a young girl who was very holy and died young because of illness she loved JESUS most of the older generation would know more maybe she was a young saint she is revered by a lot of local people for her holiness

i,m from cork and this is part of our past and i hope that the builting will stay we can learn from the mistakes don,t condemm these were the times sadly i believe in our church that jesus suffered with these people and i am tired of catholic bashers we were persecuted by so called protestants

I've been inside this place several times- during both the daytime and nighttime. I captured some decent photos. I also managed to find a big board with a brutally sadistic poem printed on it: "Bothar An Ghort' ('The Famine Road'). Presumably, this poem was used for 'educational instruction'.. My friends and I experienced something unexplainable simultaneously whilst standing against a wall in a room on the western side, that appears to have been a kitchen of some sort once upon a time..

i second that motion!

And these lovely, holy 'Sisters of Charity' dont want to give to those who were enslaved in these places.

hi i really liked ur videos, this building is really creepy. i visited High Park laundry the other day, and the whole time i was there i felt really uneasy. the music u selected, is very nice.

Mary no ones making fun of anybody take care and GOD BLESS

Just like all over the world people were put into asylums of one description or another, society turned its back and said "as long as its not me I don't care"

what music did you use for this? it's beautiful... i want to find it...

I have NO Respect for the Pope he knows about this and wont say sorry he either thinks that what happened was Right or is protecting the Church. This Man deserves no respect at all.

I am sorry for the experience of your great aunt. However, I am confident in my observations that modern Ireland is NOT a better place. The Church has given so much culture and definition to the world. There needs to be a clear understanding and division between the Church and those wrongdoers who hid behind the veneer of religion. Abusers must be brought to justice.

Thanks Andy...

Totally heart breaking

omg i was here St Anne's,good place😻😍

Appreciated Justin..

I want to have a wander round the old ml building....can someone tell me if its got security fencing and cctv and guards/dogs etc....or is their a hardback book with excellent photo footage of the building? or is the building owned by some straight laced heritage trust? Tell me....thanx.

Is it still like this? I live in cork and may go to look around

yes there was two laundries in cork l should know as l made visit my mum who spent twenty seven years there and my sister two years it just show your making comments and u know nothing please respect women alive and dead years ago all of lreland turned a blind eye stop making fun of people that cant defend themselfs if your a catholic go to church and pray for these poor women and count your lucky stars it wasnt your family it happened to

I don't wish to seem ignorant but who was 'Little Nellie'?

I was born in a mother & baby home in Cork, not sure if this is it, my twin died, I presume due to conditions. Burial place unknown.

interesting, I stumbled on this looking for a Morrissey song

I tried to come into the convent last June, but all the gates were closed. Does anyone know if its still possible to come close to the former convent? I saw it only from the City Gaol Museum, but I would love to visit the convent from nearby or, even better, to see the inside of the convent.

Irish Lullaby is on the Celtic Twilight Lullabies CD (as well as some other really great pieces). I'm going to have to find that Clannad piece:) It's lovely.

Went to Catholic school. Everyone was afraid of the nuns - with good reason.

my sister went there sadiy she took her life in her twentys and my mum was in saint vincent she die there it makes me sad

well sheila i am very much am awake and pratice my faith and receive the sacraments of the church i as a catholic believe in the teachings of our church i cannot answer for the sins of others i get tired of others christians bashing us for the sins of the past and those who abused the trust placed in them.Religion is also about forgiveness and we are all sinners how about praying for christian unity and yes i am serious about my faith

A knowledge of history is no mere diversion; without it, those fertile avenues of thought which have so often led to innovation and advance must be explored again, and without it the lesson of many a disastrous mistake which should have been learnt will be suffered once more..

How hard was it for you to get into the building? A few days ago I recorded some valuable footage of the High Park Magdalene Laundry in Drumcondra, Dublin. I had to hop over a wall to get on the grounds though, it's a construction site. I haven't uploaded it yet but I got a lot of footage of the outside, not much of the inside though. The building was so delapidated it would have been dangerous to go inside.

@THEGLASSOFMILK2 You are completely right. Unfortuneatly Ulster Bank bought the development and in the middle of making it all into apartment blocks....Upsetting or what? :(

@Dehzee How is this any different than saying to a german if you are german you should be ashamed (due to WWII &I ) and if you are English you should be ashamed (for what they put Ireland through) and if you are Spanish you should be ashamed (for civil war)...point is every place and religion throughout the world has a dark history that is shameful but you shouldn't condemn people based on their religious beliefs due to its forlorn history.

those poor girls.. if there was a god it should never forgive us for this.

what is the music with this video, please?

my American - Irish Catholic grandmother put me up for adoption in America, same sad story as all the others, with great regret this is my history.

NEVER TRUST THE CLERGY, NEVER.

..What happened to the music it used to have!

First, stealthpiccasso, I really appreciate your videos. I have learned a lot from them. Thank you. Second, for the people who are right now ragging on Catholics, remember that 'the white man' is also guilty of so much. Are you white? Is it alright for people to blame you for what 'the white man' has done? Don't blame all Catholics for the sin of some of them.

HOW MANY SOULS WERE TAKEN BY THE NUNS INNOCENT SOULS

Does anyone know the piece of music being played?

They should turn this and buildings like it into museums and shrines to be historical sites, like old prisons are now, to testify to the burdens they once placed on women and children, and the abuses of a Roman Catholic authority in Ireland. It is silly to let it go to disrepair, and criminal to sell it off as they have done to most of the sites, making them forgotten, disappeared. Something which never was permitted by the Jews of the Holocaust camps. This a type of Holocaust. needs history.

@bargeanimal Absolutely, assets should be seized and distributed to survivors.

I don't think cult is a strong enough word, because that's what it was. Horrific.

@celticlofts As long as they have control of the schools nothing will change.

then maybe u should know what used to happen in that place

@stealthpiccasso you have to remember that ireland was -and in some respects still is- highly religious. they had a strong community but were easily shunned if they didnt fit in. most of the time its was a priests suggestion to put the women there...and you didnt question a priest, their word was law. nobody outside really knew what it was like, all they knew was that these were fallen women who deserved to be punished

I watched the Magdalene Sisters and was not aware of these attrocities untill then. I cannot get my head round the fact it was the catholic church that let this happen. I am totally disgusted at it. Its no wonder our generation wants nothing to do with their religon. I think they should raise whats left of the place to the ground, the adults who were imprisoned there do not need a reminder of what they endured and neither do their families, they have their memories, thats enough.

Watch the movie, "The Magdalene Sisters." Ahhh - the good Catholic Church.

The whole building is scary. Obviously built to be a prison and not a pleasant place.

@Dehzee (Sorry ran out of space) and that were residents in industrial schools etc....were still devout Catholics right until their last breath and the many that still survive today are still devout Catholics and these are the people that have the perfect excuse to NOT remain faithful to this religion...Religion may be a choice that is true but some people really truly believe in this faith even the ones that have been through such hardship with it (such as the above).

@360crowley How many ghosts do they have I wonder.

i am happy to be baptised into the catholic faith and i will always defence those who attack JESUS CHRIST and his church obviously some here are ignorant of the truth and tell lies to this discredit others GOD BLESS to all

@amaranthos3 I agree!

Y'know he showed the gravestone of Little Nellie of God. She was over 4 years old when she died. She went into the Good Shepard Convent when she was two and she was very ill. She lived to see and speak to God in those two years because she loived him so. She was also responsible for bringing the age of Communion down from the age of 10/12. A year after she died, they removed her coffin from the public graveyard to the Convent graveyard. When they opened the coffin her body was incurrupt

Strong catholic society abused my mum who spent twenty seven years in the laundries and died there no one questioned religon its good people have views it has nothing to do with reglion its the people who worked for the church and nuns entered the order half of them came from poor familes and were abused them selfs l blame backward lreland it was the dark ages l must say it is shameful to slag someone of for poor spelling you are luckly to have had a good education

More torture brought to you in the name of religion. Sisters Of Mercy my ***

My grandmother was reared here. The outrage I hear here is wide of the mark and a bit too simplistic. If you an analysis of how the state transferred the responsibility of civilising it's population. Read Tom Inglis "Moral monopoly". Remember, those of you who attack the church that your mothers and fathers (as did mine) supported the church. Most still do. I think its a shame that this building has gone to ruin. It has a chance of redemption as a positive resource for the community.

I'm guessing you were meant to say not be proud of. I am not trying to get into an argument here. I studied this in University and wrote an entire thesis on the industrial school scandal and child neglect and Catholicism in Ireland. I totally get what you are saying I just think it is rather harsh to penalise EVERYONE due to the mistakes of a minority. If you have truly watched the documentaries and read the books you would know that the many people that went through these institutions.....(TBC)

Was the movie filmed on this actual location?

@broadleygreen If they did so much help for some people, why did they torture these?

@1980evie Are you joking? I'm sorry, but that I personally think that that would not be a very good idea. So many awful things happened on these sites; rapings, beatings, slavery...No, I think it would be best to build a memorial and a PROPER APOLOGY from the Church and the morons who let this...awful thing happen. Childhoods were stolen and if you were raped by a "Holy Priest" and told, you were automatically sent to an Asylum, from which you had to be lucky to get out.

more then likely he regards them as holy relics

@THEGLASSOFMILK2 The land should be sold and money given to survivors.

Clannad, Harry's Game and the Irish lullaby..

It still isn't.....what happened to young boys was kept a secret even longer!!!

Basically, this is true face of any religion, especially abrahamic, especially christianity, especially catholicism. Entitlement, power hunger, abuse, etc.

sorry then , i just read the first line and it pissed me off

Broadley green you must be crazy. The very fact that these atrocities were condoned in the first place is bad enough never mind the fact they were carried out on tens of thousands of women. they had no qualoty of life and the Catholic Church had knowledge of this and to this day is not releasing any information on the matter. Yes, the CC has done some good, but in light of the atrocities that have been revealed over the last few years, it will be tough to trust the CC again.

In that case, it is a really good thing that we are told to follow Christ and not other Christians. Keep that in mind.

this building should of been burnt down with every single nun in it !!!!

Who is to blame...? Sure the Catholic Church for openly stealing thousands of lives Before depositing many of them in unmarked graves. However, should we not also point an equally accusing finger in the direction of a society that condoned this behaviour by their lack of resistance. People knew where their daughters were going, there was no uprising to bring the Magdalen Laundries to a close.

Some look but do not see,,,,,,,,,,,I guess you are right. I am reminded of those who stood by and allowed Nazism to rise. Best wishes.

I wonder if the parents (mothers) knew exactlly whats going in those laundries to send your child there .parents are ae suppose to protect the kids didnt they love them or miss them no guilt no mercy they must have been made of stone like walls of the hell they daughters to live stone cold hell laundries

Hell House!!

its not its still all adbonded

This is another reason I love being Protestant.