Chapter 15 — Daingean

Physical abuse

On 16th April 1970, Mr Berry, the Secretary General of the Department of Justice, sent a letter to the Secretary General of the Department of Education. He stated that Mr Crowe had reluctantly signed the ‘Report of the Committee on Reformatory and Industrial Schools’ on 13th April 1970. He then gave Mr Crowe’s reasons for his reservations in signing the report: To sign a report which made no reference to the situation about punishment in Daingean would, in the absence of evidence that the practice had ceased, be to appear to acquiesce in a practice which is indefensible and for the continuance of which the Minister for Justice could not avoid some official responsibility arising out of his having registered Daingean as a suitable place of detention under the Children Acts. On the other hand, to make any reference, however oblique, to this particular method of punishment in Daingean would be likely to lead to a disclosure of the situation and, in this way, to cause a grave public scandal. When the problem was explained by telephone to your Department, it appeared that the request of the Committee about punishment had been overlooked. It was confirmed that punishment of this kind is contrary to the policy of the Minister for Education and an assurance was given that – subject of course to any limitation there may be on the Minister’s powers – action would be taken to stop it in Daingean. In view of this, Mr. Mac Conchradha signed the Report. The Minister is also concerned lest a similar method of punishment may exist in other schools to which children and young persons are sent by the courts and he would be glad if your Department would take whatever steps are open to it to ensure that this is not the case.

The Department of Education replied to the above by letter on 30th April 1970. The letter stated: following on the letter from the Chairman of the Committee of the 14 June, 1968, the Inspector of Reformatory and Industrial Schools had a discussion with the Resident Manager, Rev. [Luca] O.M.I., at which the manager was told that the boys should not be undressed for corporal punishment and that the aim of the management should be to phase out corporal punishment in the institution. At a special meeting with Fr. [Luca] on 21 April, 1970, the manager stated firmly that boys were no longer undressed for corporal punishment and that corporal punishment was being phased out in Daingean ... The omission of reference to the Inspector’s discussion with Father [Luca] from the letter to District Justice Kennedy of 22 May, 1969, is a matter for regret ...

The letter then added: There is one further point to which it is felt reference should be made. Father [Luca] took grave exception to the last sentence of Mr. MacConchradha’s account of his visit to Daingean in which it is alleged that the Manager considered corporal punishment to be more humiliating when administered on the naked body. Father [Luca] has no recollection of making such a remark, the theory of which he asserts is neither in his philosophy nor in his character, nor would he have answered any question by a member of the Committee “in a matter of fact manner” on such an important occasion.

This argument over what had been said became a matter of some lengthy controversy, including letters in the press in attempts to elucidate the matter.

Fr Luca gave evidence before the Investigation Committee on 1st June 2005. He recalled the Kennedy Committee’s visit to Daingean, and said that it was a very bad day for them to arrive as it was Ash Wednesday. The Secretary of the Committee did not come with the others on the visit. He made them as welcome as he could and he did know the reason for their visit. He remembered that he got two days’ notice of their visit and they did not just ‘... land on the doorstep unannounced ...’.

His intention was to be open and forthright with them. He was anxious that the Kennedy Committee would bring about the changes they had been looking for. He recalled that previous committees had visited and nothing had ever happened as a result. Their reports just gathered dust. He saw the visit as an opportunity to lay all his cards on the table and let them know everything. He had no intention of gilding the lily or giving a false impression. He recalled going into a fair amount of detail about the various departments of the School. He said the Committee members had accepted that the Oblates were trying to bring about certain changes, but they also pointed out all the cracks, and they thought the Oblates were not doing everything right.

Fr Luca said the members of the Committee went around the School, inspected buildings, spoke to staff and then afterwards had a meeting with him. He was asked to comment on the second memorandum prepared by Mr Crowe, and he made the following points: (1)He agreed that one particular member of the staff to whom he assigned disciplinary duties administered corporal punishment. He did not remember telling them but he agreed ‘it must be so’. (2)He remembered the Prefect carrying a strap but did not know if the other Brothers carried one. He did not think it was a common thing for them all to have straps. (3)He could not remember telling the Committee members that boys were called out of the dormitories after they had retired and that they were punished on one of the stairway landings ‘... because my own perception of what had happened was that they were brought to the washroom which was a room at the bottom of the stairs. I didn’t know about it being done on the stairs’. (4)It was news to him to hear that evidence was given that boys described punishments on the stairs. He stated that he did not know this occurred. (5)When asked if it was the case, therefore, that he could not have told the Kennedy Committee members what was recorded in the memorandum, he stated, ‘I was certainly stretching things a bit if I were to say that and I don’t think I did’. (6)He did not remember saying how the punishment was applied to the buttocks, or what the boys wore when this occurred: ‘Honestly I don’t remember saying it. I am not doubting Mr. MacConchradha’s word but I can’t remember it’. (7)When asked to comment on the now infamous remark about boys being stripped naked for punishments as it would be more humiliating that way, he stated: I certainly don’t remember. Another thing I would say it would be totally a contradiction of what my own philosophy was about, the treatment of the boys. To say a thing like that, I don’t think it’s something that I would have said. (8)Fr Luca concluded by agreeing that, in his dealing with this topic over the years, including in the newspapers, at all times he had said, including today, that he had no recollection of saying that.

Fr Luca then recalled his meeting in April 1970 in the Department of Education with Mr McDevitt, the Department’s Inspector, when Mr McDevitt said, ‘Father, did you know that you could be prosecuted for administering punishment‘. He again confirmed that he took the message, and the following morning called in his staff and told them, ‘From now on no more corporal punishment because you could be liable to answer for it in the courts‘.

What becomes apparent from the Crowe controversy is that change was forced upon the Department of Education by the correspondence that followed the visit of the Kennedy Committee. Circulars generated by the Department of Education on the rules and regulations for the administration of corporal punishment produced little change, but the criticism by the Kennedy Committee, an independent body, did eventually enforce change. Two years after their visit, the traditional ‘floggings’ of Daingean came to an end.

In their Opening Statement, the Oblates stated that, following a request from the Department of Education to cease the practice of removing clothing when administering corporal punishment, Fr Luca took steps to phase out corporal punishment altogether. This was some 13 years before it was forbidden by law in schools in Ireland. They further stated that it gave rise to a grave disciplinary problem in the School.

It is clear, from the following accounts of riots in Daingean, that the School had grave disciplinary problems long before the phasing-out of corporal punishment.

Fr Luca did not fear censure about the practice of floggings in Daingean. This practice was well known to the Department of Education and had not attracted criticism in the past. He was clearly unprepared for the revulsion of the Department of Justice representative to it. There was no reason for Fr Luca to be anything other than ‘matter of fact’ about it, as it was accepted by Dr McCabe as early as 1953. The investigation into Br Enrico, as outlined above, shows a regime in which Brothers other than the Prefect administered severe corporal punishment. Only the intervention of the Kennedy Committee brought about the end of floggings in Daingean after two years of correspondence. It is hard to reconcile this with the stated position of Fr Luca, that he abhorred the practice of flogging and resolved to do away with it when he became Resident Manager.

There were three riots in Daingean, recorded in the documents furnished, that occurred during the relevant period. The two principal riots occurred in 1956 and 1958. Both of these riots were largely brought under control by the authorities within the School, and charges were successfully brought against the ringleaders. There was a third, earlier, less well-documented riot, which is referred to in the extensive Garda Report on the 1956 riot.

The first riot occurred in Daingean on 13th April 1956. The next day, Fr Salvador,19 the Resident Manager, wrote to Mr Sugrue20 of the Department of Education: We had some trouble yesterday which could have had very serious results if the organised disturbance or mutiny as the boys called it, had not been nipped in the bud. The display of dangerous weapons they concealed on their persons was formidable, including slashers, an axe and all kinds of iron bars. They smashed a number of windows and intended doing more widespread damage. I have sent on the names of the ringleaders. These I had to have taken over by the Guards. They include [a boy] who came here last month, just a few days before his 17th birthday. He and the other four are as far as I can see and judge beyond the reach of the best efforts of a reform school.

The alleged ringleaders were handed over to the Gardaí on 13th April 1956. They were to be charged ‘with having taken part in an organised disturbance’.