What is recorded here

Killeen Graveyard is a vanished childrens burial ground in County Laois, remembered as the Burying Meadow rather than an ordinary churchyard. Carrigan wrote that small rude head-stones marked unbaptised children, while a rough freestone font and Mass Pit lay one field north. The old wooden church disappeared entirely, leaving only wet marshy land and the memory of infants excluded from adult rites.

Unlocated graveyard reused as a childrens burial ground within townland described by Carrigan as a graveyard known as the 'Burying Meadow' which was the burial place of unbaptised children. In the field to the N of the graveyard there was a font (LA011-011) located beside the 'Mass Pit'. No visible surface remains. Situated on wet marshy land. According to Carrigan 'The old church (LA011-021003-) in the townland of Killeen has disappeared as completely as those of Srahane and Mounthall, being probably also, like them, built of wood. Its site is still pointed out on a small, low ridge, in the "Burying Meadow". In the graveyard there are many small, rude head-stones, marking the graves of unbaptized children, who alone have been buried here in the memory of the oldest residents. Killeen "Mass Pit" is one field north of the graveyard. Beside the pit lies the holy water font (LA011-011) of the old church, a piece of rough freestone with a round artificial hollow 9 in. wide and 3 in. deep' (Carrigan 1905, vol. 2, 151). Compiled by: Caimin O'Brien Date of upload: 17 December 2007

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