1,173 entries for Abuse Events

Another witness, there in the early 1950s, described getting a ‘flogging’, or ‘stripes on your arse’. He told the Committee the Brother would get the boy to drop his pants and bend over the bed to be punished: The first time it happened to me he had to show you sometimes to put your hand over your penis, your private – just in case the strap did go around you it would hurt you, it would catch you there.

One complainant was able to distinguish between the ordinary corporal punishment he received at home from that administered in Daingean: My dad sometimes smacked us, gave us a clout of a belt, a whack across the arse. What I got [in Daingean] was I got a searing pain, I will never forget it in all my life, never. The first of it was the shock. It was shock first of all. Then the second one I got and it wasn’t across my buttocks, it wasn’t across my buttocks, it was right between my buttocks with this strap. I don’t know where they got these straps from but it was specially designed for this, it wasn’t a belt. When they say you got a strap, it wasn’t a like a trouser strap, it was a specially made strap. It was very thick and it was about that length (indicating) and it was shaped for gripping with the hand for hitting you with. The way they used to hit you was they used to hit you between the buttocks and pull it up (indicating). The reason he had the other Brother there was to stop you going forward. He used to put his foot on the back of your shoulder, on the back of your neck and your shoulders. He would put his foot there and hold you so that when you got hit with the strap you couldn’t jump forward with the belt. That strap sometimes, they were expert with it, if he wanted that could come around and hit you in the testicles. If ever you got hit in the testicles, that gives you cramp in your stomach, you double up, you couldn’t even move. I passed out.

Floggings were mainly but not exclusively administered at night-time in the washroom. A witness described the impact of being beaten in the yard in front of the other boys: When you are being beaten and you are feeling pain your torment is excruciating. “I will get you, you F– ing so and so, I will come back for you”; that’s the train of thought. And then it stays with you for months at a time. It will haunt you.

The open and frank discussion between the Oblates and the Department of Education throughout the 1940s and 1950s, on the way in which flogging was administered, revealed indifference by the Department to a flagrant breach of the rules. Flogging was administered in Daingean in a cruel, sadistic and excessive manner designed to maximise the terror of all the boys. It was used in Daingean for a wide range of offences, including those which even at the time would have been considered trivial. The pain caused by the punishment was intense, and victims graphically described to the Committee the physical impact on their bodies. Bruising and scars remained long after the beating was administered. Fr Luca’s stated revulsion to the practice of flogging was contradictory. It was within his power as Manager to put a stop to it and he chose not to do so. The Oblates did not condemn the practice of flogging in their Submission to the Investigation Committee. They contended that it was used only for a breach of the school rules and was administered by the Prefect. They did, however, acknowledge that punishment for absconding was ‘over severe’ but not abusive.

One complainant gave an account of his first day in Daingean, when he got ‘clattered’ unfairly: The first day I got there we were saying the rosary ... when you are brought up to the dormitory, you put on your nightshirt, you stand at your bed, the whole dormitory stands by their beds and [Brother] would stay down in the middle. It was an L shaped dormitory ... he said the rosary and you answered the rosary to him. You kneel at your bed. I fell asleep, I dozed off. I was woke up with a clatter on the back of the head ... He made me stand for a long time after the lads went to bed for falling asleep at the rosary. That was the first day I was actually down there.

A witness described how his name was put down to play Gaelic football but, because he could not play it, he never went out: ‘About a half an hour later the Brother came into the playground and he had a hurling stick and he beat me with he hurling stick ... On my head’. He also indicated that he was hit on the lip with the hurling stick and he ‘... carried the scar for nearly 50 years’.

The same man described another occasion when he was talking in the washroom, ‘... and from nowhere he came behind me and gave me the flat of his hand right across my ear ... It was full force ... I was just thrown across ... a few feet’. This left him with a buzzing or ringing in his ear to this day.

Another complainant made light of many of the blows he had received by saying, ‘I got smacks on the hand and things like that, nothing to cry about ... It was probably something I deserved ...’. He described one beating that he felt was very unfair. He explained: I was having a friendly argument with [Brother], we would always contradict him about football and various things. We were arguing one afternoon ... about soccer. We just contradicted one another. Before I knew it ... [another Brother] ... grabbed me by the shoulders, back of the hair and turned me round and gave me one or two unmerciful thumps in the stomach. I was doubled over. I was sick for a week afterwards or more. [Brother] explained to him about what happened, we were only arguing about football and said “apologise to the man” but he said something under his breath and walked out the same way he came in. That was it.

One complainant gave an account of being kneed in the groin by a Brother: It was just before we said the Angelus. We were in our ranks ready to go to the refectory ... It was about the beginning of the prayers and I was speaking to someone else next to me and then he come up and got me talking. He got so angry and just kneed me ... He just came up with his knee ... There was a couple of fellows held me up ... I was in pain ... I couldn’t eat or couldn’t drink or anything. Shortly after that I was taken away in a car.

Another witness recounted an incident by the handball alley: ‘I was playing handball one day in the alley and the ball got caught in the wire’. He said he had to jump up onto a shed to ‘hit the ball down’. A Brother saw him getting down off the shed and told him that he should have sought permission. The witness said that the Brother then ‘started punching me in the face’ which resulted in him receiving a black eye and a split lip.

A further witness told of another incident which took place in the yard where he ‘... and another chap were going to box over a game of handball’. The Brother on duty in the yard that day punched him on the side of the head. He said ‘I hit the ground and then he started kicking me and he said, “In future don’t start any trouble here”. I was made facing the wall for the rest of the period of the time that we were out on recreation’.

A boy who was suspected of stealing was dealt with summarily by a Brother when he was brought to Daingean by two Gardaí: I was met as I walked on the front lawn right near the office doors, I was met by a Prefect ... He looked a very religious, sincere man and a crucifix in his cassock down here and he had his hands behind his back ... I said, “Hello Father”. He said, “They are a nice pair of boots you are wearing, they must have cost a lot of money”. I said, “About three pounds 10 shillings”. I remember getting a clout to the side of my head, a punch to the side of my head ... It knocked me. It wasn’t a slap, it was a punch. My ear was turned blue for a couple of days after, maybe a week after. The two Gardaí was there standing watching. They were within six feet of him when he done this and I was knocked to the ground, I was knocked quite a distance away with the punch he hit me in the side of the head.

Another complainant told of a beating he received after an accident: there is one occasion where I was painting up a ladder. Now, I had to carry the paint in one hand, and the brush in my other hand and climb the ladder. I think I was about twelve foot high when I missed my footing and fell off the ladder ... I got an unmerciful beating for that ... there was no rhyme or reason to beat me for that.

He added: Now, how can you hit somebody if they fall off a ladder? The first normal reaction of anybody would be to go to their side and say “are you all right” not go and knock hell out of them.

Br Abran who appeared before the Committee talked about this policy of hitting children. He said that there were times when staff would have to administer punishment on an ad hoc basis: if there was a fight going on or some weapons being used or if somebody got head butted ... In many cases the boys preferred to be punished in those circumstances rather than be sent to the disciplinarian because they would be deprived of films which was more important in their life than ordinary things. I know that sounds weird, that was their mentality.