Chapter 7 — Record of abuse (male witnesses)

Physical abuse

A small number of Schools were reported to have had boxing clubs. Nine (9) witnesses reported being abused in the context of boxing activities, including being pitted against older, stronger residents as a punishment. One witness reported that he was ordered by a Brother to join the boxing club, but he refused as he had no interest in boxing. The witness reported that for a week afterwards he was taken from his bed each night and beaten with a strap by the same Brother. He eventually agreed to join the club and was forced to spar with other residents who were more experienced, he was repeatedly beaten in the ring. The witness believed these beatings in the boxing ring stopped when a lay staff member threatened to go to the gardaí. Witnesses also reported being made to box in the ring as a punishment for fighting amongst themselves: If you were caught fighting you were made ...(by Br X)... to put on gloves and fight the other boy involved. It could be you were picked on by a bigger boy in the first place, who then got permission to beat you properly.

Other witness reports regarding boxing included being made to fight regardless of fear, being forced to participate in a boxing competition for the entertainment of visiting Brothers and being forced to fight naked.

One hundred and forty eight (148) witnesses made 197 reports of being physically abused in the context of work, including being hit, kicked, punched and beaten. Farm work, trade shops and kitchens were the most frequently reported areas of work associated with physical abuse, particularly among those discharged before 1980. Witnesses reported that particularly harsh religious and lay staff were in charge of work in these areas in a number of Schools. The conditions under which residents were at times required to work were also reported as abusive in certain Schools. Witnesses stated that the relative seclusion of work areas from the main thoroughfare of activity in the Schools further increased the risk of abuse – for example kitchens and farm sheds where residents were often reported to have worked in isolation with a single staff member.

There were 97 reports of being physically abused while working on the farms, in the farmyards, tending farm animals and in the fields attached to the Schools. There were a further 19 reports of being abused while working on the bogs. Witnesses described physically punishing work such as picking and breaking stones, cutting turf, pulling beet by hand from the ground, turning hay by hand, pulling trees from the ground, cutting timber and manually compacting silage. In addition to being abused while they worked, witnesses also described physically punishing work: They used to get the tractor to cut the grass, to save the hay. They used to get a line of us along one end of the field and bend over and physically scrape all the grass with our hands.... Named lay ancillary worker... used to be there with a big stick and if you stood up you got a smack of it across the back of the head or the back. We used to have to pull the trees and the stumps up out of the ground with chains and move big rocks with a chain. Your hands would be blue.... • Br ...X... I learned to hate, he was the most evil .... Any dirty job I would get it, he took a dislike to me. I always got the job of staying up when the little piglets would be born, up all night. One day the sow had lain on top of the piglets and some of them were dead. That man he was evil, you’d think I had shot somebody the hiding he gave me. ... I was horse whipped with the leather, beaten to a pulp ... crying and screaming and wet myself ... when he stopped he said “now pull up your trousers and go and feed those pigs”. • I couldn’t lift the buckets ...(working on the farm).... He, Br ...X... had a big long stick, he was whipping you across the legs, across the arse like he would a cow. I couldn’t lift the buckets. • One time when I was learning how to milk, the cow put her hoof in the bucket and Br ...X... lifted me by the ears, the skin come off under his nails, and threw me on the ground,. He gave me a few digs and boxed me in the ribs, just hit you anywhere he liked. The next morning I fell off the stool and the same thing happened again, my ears were bleeding.

There were 41 reports of being physically abused while working in the kitchens, mainly those attached to the Schools where food for the residents was prepared and served. Eleven (11) reports were from one School and almost all referred to one particular Brother. There were nine reports from a second School where the kitchen was also the domain of a Brother reported to be particularly harsh. Witnesses reported being abused in many ways, including being beaten, having their heads plunged into sinks of water, locked into fridges, and deliberately scalded as punishments for dropping crockery, saucepans of food, taking food, not working quickly enough, and burning food. He Br ...X... used to run the kitchen, he had this habit of waving his big leather strap ... and any time he felt like it he would just hit you. You would get a couple of clatters for no particular reason. ... He was wired to the moon.

There were 26 witness reports of physical abuse in the weaving, tailoring, shoemaking, darning and painting workshops. They reported that these areas were under the charge of staff, most of whom were lay ancillary workers, who in some instances punched, kicked and beat and threw objects at residents. Physical abuse in this context was mainly reported to occur in relation to specific work tasks.

Many other reports of physical abuse in work contexts included: working in the laundries, infirmaries, making Rosary beads and other religious objects, chopping sticks, carrying turf and coal, emptying latrines, cleaning boots and shoes, scrubbing and polishing floors, building, cleaning toilets and pulling grass. My job at one time was to hand out clean laundry to other boys. One day I remember one boy did not get clean underwear for some reason and Br ...X... got 2 boys to hold me across the bed. He pulled down my pants and beat me across the bare backside with his leather strap. I got 10 to 15 lashes from him for this incident.

Three (3) witnesses reported being physically abused when sent out to work for local farmers and others while resident in the Schools.

In addition to the forms of abuse described above, witnesses reported that staff at times employed certain practices that intensified the experience of being abused. The most frequently reported were flogging, delayed punishment and being beaten by more than one person.

The Committee heard evidence from 78 witnesses in relation to 13 Schools that they were stripped, and severely beaten. Forty seven (47) of those witnesses from nine Schools reported being beaten in public. These beatings were most commonly reported to have been with a leather strap, sometimes a cane, and administered by more than one staff member on the naked back and buttocks. The beatings were described as ‘fiercely brutal’ and ‘unmerciful’ and were frequently referred to as floggings, and were associated with particular staff members. Eleven (11) witnesses from one School reported being beaten naked. In another School, 14 witnesses reported being flogged, 12 of whom were naked or partially clothed. Twelve (12) witnesses from two other Schools gave accounts of being beaten naked themselves or witnessing co-residents being severely beaten while naked.

These beatings and floggings were reported to have taken place most often in the recreation yards, the boot rooms, the refectories and the stairwells. Witnesses described at times being made to bend over desks, stairs, benches, vaulting horses or to bend over with their fingers under their toes to be beaten on their bare back and buttocks. Forty eight (48) witnesses reported that they were beaten or kicked to the ground and that the beating frequently continued while they were on the ground. Witnesses commenting on the public floggings said that some residents ‘couldn’t stand at the end’ and recalled, ‘the beating went on until they ... (Brothers)... were exhausted’. They had what they called the public floggings, where you would be brought out in the middle of the ...(yard).... If they wanted to make a real example of you they would have all the other lads there and you would have to kneel down. I was flogged by 4 of them ...(Brothers)... one time. ... I was lashed.... They used to flog you at night time, you would be bruised all over, you would be sore at night, you wet the bed.

Witnesses reported being flogged and severely beaten for many reasons, including: disclosing or reporting abuse, absconding, speaking to visiting girls, riding a visitor’s bike, refusing to clear blocked toilets, taking food, fighting, delay in lining up, not washing properly or having torn clothes. When I was there 3 blokes ...named co-residents... they ran away and when they were brought back, they were flogged, on one of these vaulting horses. We were all there. Br ...X... said “I’m going to make an example of these boys”, and one by one they came out, no trousers on them ... naked from their waist down, each one individually over the vaulting horse, he flogged them. Well you could see their backsides going red blue, red blue, the whole School watching.

Twenty three (23) witnesses described injuries to their genitalia as a result of being kicked or flogged. Eighteen (18) witnesses described being hosed with cold water or having cold water thrown on them prior to, or in the course of a severe beating. A witness gave the following account of a severe beating when he was found in the company of co-residents who had been talking to some girls visiting their brothers in the School: Br ...X... met the boys coming up from talking to the girls, he sent them down to the washroom, he told me to go too, but I wasn’t with them. He told the 3 of us to get into bathing togs. He went out and got the leather strap, like the cut-throat razor, he came in, took off his coat and his collar and I never in all my life seen anything like what he done. He started beating us, saying we were talking to the girls ... he took off his shirt ... he didn’t beat me so much as the others. One of the lads started soiling themselves, he beat them so much, grabbing himself saying, “I’ll give ye girls”, rubbing himself. One of the lads was in bits, they were in a terrible state.

Witnesses reported being filled with terror as religious staff appeared to lose control when they were administering physical beatings or floggings. It was reported that such beatings frequently resulted in injury or, in 22 reported instances, rendered the resident unconscious. Eight (8) of the 22 witnesses reported that they passed out while being beaten and woke up in bed unable to move. There were 36 accounts of witnesses being unable to sit or lie on their back for some days after being beaten, and a further 28 accounts of being unable to walk following a beating or flogging. I remember another boy who would not cry. I remember one day he got 50 slaps on one hand and then 50 on the other and then another 50. This Brother got so mad that he ...(co-resident)... would not cry. He, Br ...X... kicked the legs from under him and kicked him to the ground and kicked him until he went unconscious. He was just lying there with his eyes staring up to the sky.

Eleven (11) witnesses reported that the flogging or beating they received was so severe that they thought they were going to be killed. Five (5) witnesses from two Schools reported that named co-residents were never seen again following a severe beating. I remember this one Brother. The boys would be crying in the morning going into class. He’d start with sums, always an awkward division. I remember one boy in the class ...named co-resident.... He was asked a question this time, he made the awful mistake of saying he knew the answer but couldn’t get the answer out, and with that this Br ...X... went absolutely berserk.... The brutality of that man, he hit him everywhere, with the leather. He ...(co-resident)... was trying to avoid being hit. I never saw him ...(co-resident)... again. I often did think about him, whether he went blind or not, I don’t know. I never saw him again.