Chapter 10 — Carriglea

Introduction

The school was situated about 1½ miles south west of Dun Laoghaire at Kill of the Grange. The property was bordered by what is now Kill Avenue, Rochestown Avenue and the former site of Dun Laoghaire Golf Course.

When the Christian Brothers purchased the property, it comprised a mansion house and 40 acres of land. By 1896 the purchase of a nearby farm increased the lands to 60 acres. In 1946 the property was extended further with the purchase of land originally intended for the construction of a secondary school, the building of which did not commence until the late 1950s. This additional land was utilised to extend the farm, thereby increasing the acreage to 115.

The mansion was used as the Brothers’ residence, and an L-shaped, two-storey building was erected to the rear to accommodate the boys. This building consisted of a dining room, kitchen and classrooms on the ground floor, and two dormitories above that accommodated approximately 130 to 140 beds each.

The Rules and Regulations for the Certified Industrial Schools in Saorstát Éireann, which were approved by the Minister for Education, were signed by the Resident Manager of Carriglea on 23rd January 1933.

Initially, Carriglea was certified for 260 pupils, later reduced to 150, a figure lower than anticipated by the Christian Brothers. Over subsequent years, they sought to increase the certification limit and, by 1925, they had succeeded in increasing this figure to 250, with a further increase of 10 places in 1944 bringing the final certification limit to 260.

The average number of pupils in the School over the period of this investigation was 225, and ranged from a high of 260, in 1939 and 1945, to a low of 180 in 1952. Carriglea was a large institution, comparable with Letterfrack and bigger than Tralee, Salthill or Glin. The large numbers led to problems of overcrowding in the School during the 1930s.

As stated above, Carriglea was envisaged as being ‘Artane on a small scale’. However, for much of the period under review, it was a far cry from its highly regimented and disciplined sister school on the north side of the city.

The documents show Carriglea to have been an unruly, chaotic and disorganised place from 1936 until 1945. Discipline was lacking, and sexual activity among the boys was widespread. The Visitation Reports for those years corroborate this fact. The conditions that led to such indiscipline and unruliness,were mainly attributable to weak, uninterested staff, poor control of the boys, and a lack of recreational or occupational activities for them. Few boys were engaged in any trades training, which left over 200 of them unoccupied for large parts of the afternoon. The situation was addressed to some extent in 1945, with the assignment of new Brothers to the School, but the regime introduced by these Brothers created its own problems.

The chronic mismanagement was exemplified by the number of Brothers who passed through Carriglea from 1935 until 1954. This 19-year period saw 65 different Brothers pass through the Institution. A boy arriving in Carriglea in 1945 at seven years of age, and leaving in 1954 at the age of 16, would have had 40 different Brothers caring for him during that time, most of whom stayed for two years or less. It would have been impossible for these boys to form any lasting bond with Brothers who came and went so frequently, and this would have had a serious impact on their sense of security and safety. The Brothers who stayed longer than two years were there in the post-1945 period, when discipline and management had improved.

Carriglea officially closed on 30th June 1954. Numbers in all of the industrial schools run by the Christian Brothers were steadily declining, a fact which had a corresponding impact on the income of the schools. The Provincial Council decided to close one of its industrial schools, and at the same time implement a policy of segregation, whereby delinquent boys would be segregated from non-delinquents. It was decided to close Carriglea and use the building as a juniorate for the training of Christian Brothers. June 1954. Numbers in all of the industrial schools run by the Christian Brothers were steadily declining, a fact which had a corresponding impact on the income of the schools. The Provincial Council decided to close one of its industrial schools, and at the same time implement a policy of segregation, whereby delinquent boys would be segregated from non-delinquents. It was decided to close Carriglea and use the building as a juniorate for the training of Christian Brothers.

In 1954, there were 176 boys resident in Carriglea. They were transferred to other industrial schools as follows: 122 boys were transferred to Artane, eight went to Upton, seven to Greenmount, 20 to Tralee, and 19 to Glin. These transfers took place on 21st June 1954.1

At the same time as the decision to close Carriglea was made, the decision was also made to confine admissions to Letterfrack to boys convicted of offences that would incur imprisonment if committed by an adult. This decision is discussed in full in the Letterfrack chapter. It met with strong opposition from the Department of Education, the Department of Justice and members of the Judiciary. The objections all focused on the unsuitability of Letterfrack because of its isolation and distance from Dublin, from where most of these children came. The Christian Brothers were adamant, however, and Letterfrack was designated in 1954 as the Christian Brothers’ industrial school for all convicted children under 14.

Clearly, it would have been a better decision for the children in care to close Letterfrack and keep Carriglea open. There was no record of such a suggestion being put to the Provincialate by either the relevant Departments or by District Judges. The fact that the Brothers owned the schools meant they were entitled to do what they liked with their own property. Irrespective of whether the property had been donated2 for a particular purpose, or had been purchased through fund-raising, once the legal title was vested in the Congregation, the Department of Education was powerless to influence the decision.

The accounts in Carriglea were not well kept for much of the period because the Brothers’ house accounts and the Institution accounts were not maintained separately until the mid-1940s. Instead, the various items of income and expenditure for the Institution and the Brothers’ residence were maintained in the one account. The poor state of book-keeping was criticised by Congregation Visitors, one of whom remarked in 1940: Should a Government Auditor ever come to audit the Carriglea Accounts there would not only be confusion but a very bad showing up of our methods of keeping Accounts.

A few Visitation Reports looked in detail at the issue of finance and, from them, some important information may be gleaned.