Chapter 9 — Clifden

Physical abuse

A common thread running through the testimony of the complainants was that punishment was meted out indiscriminately and that this created an environment of fear. One witness, who was a resident for eight years from the early 1950s, stated: it didn’t really matter what you were beaten for, it was just one of those things, if they saw you there and you weren’t doing something then you got beaten for it.

Another witness, a resident for 12 years from the late 1950s, stated that they were punished: For nothing, just because they felt like it. If they were angry then they just took it out on you, sometimes you were an innocent victim just sitting there, or just playing and then they attacked you, it all depends on what moods they were in.

A witness, who was committed for just over a year in the early 1960s when she was 12 years old, remarked: Anybody got it, it didn’t make a difference. If you were just in the wrong place at the wrong time or if you were too slow to get your work down or if you didn’t get down the stairs quick enough or if you ran...Anywhere they could get you they would hit you. Mainly on the head. That was the sorest. They would hit you with the keys, that was sore.

Another witness, who was committed to Clifden before she was a year old and spent her entire childhood there during the 1960s and the 1970s, commented: I lived in, I think – I watched – I was punished, other kids were punished, I think it was being in an environment controlled in fear. I think I was very afraid of the nuns, very afraid of getting things wrong. I think I was constantly in that state of fear of being punished.

She added that when the anticipated punishment was actually delivered, it came almost as a relief.

A witness, who was committed to Clifden in the late 1950s, at the age of 11, and remained there until she was 16, recalled, on arrival with her sisters, being met by a lay worker. The children were told to take their clothes off for a bath. One of her younger sisters was reluctant to be parted from her favourite red boots. The witness tried to prevent the lay worker from taking the boots and she was punched around the head and told that she would not be permitted to back-answer in Clifden. She further alleged that this carer regularly hit her with a bunch of keys.

Another witness, who was in Clifden in the early 1960s when she was 12, described an incident in which she and a boy were confronted by a Sister one afternoon for coming back late. She asked them whether they had had intercourse but they did not understand what it meant. She made the boy pull down his trousers in front of the witness and she beat him with a cane. The witness refused to undergo the same humiliation and tried to escape. The nun pushed her through a glass door. Her hand went through the glass and she banged her chest hard against a brass knob in the door. The Sister proceeded to hit her on the back with a bamboo cane. She did not receive any medical treatment for her injuries. Her chest injury got progressively worse and, when she complained to the same Sister, she was beaten again. Eventually, another Sister discovered the extent of the injury and took her to a doctor. She was admitted to hospital for two and a half weeks. Her family were not informed that she was in hospital. The school record indicates that she was suffering from mastitis, as does a record signed by the GP on the day she was admitted to hospital.

A witness who spent her entire childhood in Clifden during the 1960s and 1970s, made several allegations of physical abuse by the Sisters. She stated that, when she was five, a friend blamed her for bringing a cup of water into the schoolroom, which was forbidden. She was punished by a Sister who hit her with a hand brush. She remembered a number of children who had run away being beaten with a cane by a Sister whom she specifically remembered, as she used to dye her hair in the Institution. This Sister gave evidence to the Investigation Committee and vehemently denied this allegation of abuse.

Sr Olivia,9 taught the children spelling, and the witness remembered not being able to spell the word ‘colour’. The Sister hit her with a hand brush four or five times. She said, ‘Sometimes when you cried that seemed to encourage them to hit more’. She recalled other occasions on which she was beaten by the same Sister, including an incident in which she was beaten for not being able to read a passage from the Bible.

This witness made allegations of physical abuse against Sr Olivia who denied them. Sr Olivia did confirm that her usual method of administering punishment was to slap children. She accepted that occasionally she thumped the children. She added that this did not happen often and she was not aggressive with the children, but accepted that some degree of force was involved and that she would always regret it afterwards. She stated that, if she felt that she had punished the children unfairly, she would talk to them about it afterwards. Sr Olivia did not recall ever speaking to this witness referred to above after a punishment.

Sr Olivia furnished an additional statement dealing with the allegations made against her. In this later statement, she accepted that she occasionally used a hand brush to punish children, whereas in her first statement she stated that she slapped children with her hand only. She explained that initially she was devastated by the allegations made and was confused. She did not want to implicate any other Sister, or indeed herself, by conceding that they used a hand brush to administer punishment. She went for counselling and came to terms with the fact that they had in fact used a hand brush for this purpose. As conditions improved in Clifden, this method of punishment was used less frequently.

She stated that there was no special place where children were sent for punishment. It could happen anywhere. She would resort to the hand brush for punishment when, for example, the Resident Manager was away. Sometimes, she had difficulty controlling children and, rather than face the possibility that the nuns in the convent would tell the Resident Manager, she used the hand brush to restore order. The Resident Manager also used the hand brush, but not as often as she had better control of the children.

Another respondent Sister, who taught the children from the early 1960s, gave evidence that discipline was maintained in the classroom by slapping the children. She used a flat stick called a ‘slapper’. If a child was very bold, she would administer two slaps to each hand. Former residents referred to being beaten, whereas she would describe the punishments as being slapped.

The Sister recalled an incident involving a complainant whom she would have regarded as her pet. One day, another Sister came to her with the girl and said that she had misbehaved. She slapped her twice. She felt that the complainant never forgave her for this punishment and their relationship was never the same again. The complainant had made allegations of serious abuse against a number of Sisters including this respondent.

Sr Elana,10 who taught in Scoil Mhuire from the mid-1950s, and after the amalgamation of the schools, admitted that she did punish children by slapping them on the hands with either a flat stick or a cane. In the late 1960s, she read a series of articles by Dr Cyril Daly published in the daily newspapers, advocating the abolition of corporal punishment. She accepted his views and did not engage in this practice after that.