Don't suffer in silence

On the 40th anniversary of the rollout of the ban on corporal punishment in Irish schools I’m sharing my experience of physical abuse and my recovery in the hope of helping others realise that it's never too late to avail of the help that's available

Post published 24/7/2023

I was a student from 1978 to 1982 in St Kieran’s College, Kilkenny. As a 12 year old I was quite young going into first year. Based on my academic record I was an average enough student, my high point was reaching 8th in the A stream in Third Year. Throughout primary school I had struggled with dyslexia (my dad used to remind me that as a four year old I spelt Cat as Tac), dyscalculia and, something I only discovered a couple of years ago amongst my mother's papers after her passing (as I outlined in my TEDx Talk) I had been diagnosed as a child with Asperger's Syndrome without ever being told. 

One thing Saint Kieran's College as an institution gave me was a strong study ethic, something that helped ovecome my learning difficulties and stood me in good stead throughout my career. I was class representative for my fellow students in third year. In one of Ireland's best hurling schools I didn't play hurling but I played drums in our year’s heavy metal band ‘Hades’.

During my years at Saint Kierans the Headmaster was Father Seamus McEvoy. He joined the staff of St Kieran’s College in 1960, he was appointed as Headmaster of the secondary school in 1975 until his appointment to Lisdowney as parish priest in August 1983. He retired from his parish work in Seir Kieran in July 2020. He was a tall, well built man, looking at this photo of him standing beside the 6 foot tall (Source - Wikipedia) hurling legend Eddie Kerr he is at least the same height as Eddie despite being 75 years old in that shot.

During my four years there Father McEvoy (who was known colloquially amongst the pupils as Bandy) was to inflict a number of instances of physical abuse on me, the impact of which are with me to this day both physically and psychologically.

Due to my father moving jobs, I left Saint Kieran’s in summer 1982 to do my leaving cert in Dublin, the year in which corporal punishment was officially abolished in all national and secondary schools through the School Attendance Act. This was an important step forward in child protection which came after growing public and professional disapproval of physical punishment as a means of maintaining discipline in schools. Critics argued that it was inhumane, harmful to children's development, and an ineffective means of discipline. Furthermore, it was pointed out that such punishment instils fear rather than understanding, and therefore it was not conducive to a healthy learning environment.

I can certainly relate to that. As part of my therapy work in 2023 I outlined in drawings how the child I was then, experienced each incident. I found this process healing. 

I share these drawings below in the hope that they may be helpful to others seeking to therapeutically address the impact of trauma from their lives. 

1983 was a significant year for pupils at Saint Kieran’s. 

• It marked the bicentenary of St. Kieran's College in Kilkenny, one of the Country's oldest Catholic schools for boys. 

• In that year the ban on corporal punishment became widely observed in practice in schools across the country.  

• In August of that year Father McEvoy moved from his role as Headmaster of Saint Kieran's College to parish work.

There were a number of triggers that brought my experiences of physical abuse back to me as if they were yesterday. One of my St. Kieran’s classmates started organising a 40th Reunion for our class, this led to contacts with lads that I hadn’t spoken with in decades. As this reunion planning started gaining momentum I sat listening over lunch one day to coverage of the historical abuse case of boys at Blackrock College on RTE's Joe Duffy show. It aired on 9th November 2022. It started me thinking that maybe what I had experienced at the hands of our Headmaster was a form of abuse. 

Certainly I knew something wasn't right with me. It's strange how my experiences of Father McEvoy had in one way remained dormant in my mind but at the same time have been constantly on my mind over the past decades. Back in 1998 I had submitted a radio play to RTE entitled 'A Family Man', I uploaded it here a couple of years ago. Elements of it are fiction (I wasn't married at that time nor did I have a son in 1998), others real life, my grandfather's antics and the beatings from Father McEvoy. When I read it now what really stands out for me is the inability in my mind to resolve the contradiction of a man of God and Headmaster of the oldest Catholic school in Ireland engaging in such violence against the boys in his care. The main character in the play captures this contradiction when, during a beating, he is forced to repeat in the style of a catechism 'Respect authority! Admire those that beat you. Love those that hurt you'. 

Throughout my life after Saint Kieran’s I had experienced disproportionate and unpredictable reactions to certain situations (termed triggers). For example shortly after hearing the coverage of the Blackrock College abuse on the radio I had a meeting with my solicitor. As she stood leaning over my shoulder explaining some point of law to me, I started feeling very anxious, a reaction that was completely unconnected to the situation I was in but, as it turned out as I unpicked it in therapy, directly related to the trauma I had experienced as a school boy observing the unmerciful beating of a classmate Peter Burns. I also found myself unaccountably drawn back to the institution over the years, not really understanding why I went into the school and walked the corridors in 2009 and again in 2017. Some part of me felt unable to move on.

I have found it hard to write openly about my experiences. The culture of the time was that it was almost 'unmanly' to complain about the beatings, but I do so in the hope that I may help others who struggled like I did. 

These were things I didn't talk to my parents about at the time when they were happening (apart from the damage to my jaw which I hid for at least 2 weeks until the pain was impossible to hide from my mother) as that 'wasn't the done thing' at that time. Here is a summary of the physical abuse I experienced during the time Father McEvoy was my headmaster.

Beating 1 - No escape from a beating by Father McEvoy

 At the end of the class we boys went about our business as if nothing had happened. No class mate came over to speak to me about the beating that had just taken place. It was our way of coping with random acts of violence that we had no control over, a form of denial as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

The long term impact of that beating is that I jump whenever I perceive someone looking in a window at me, it could be in an office, home or a shop. I also get unaccountably anxious  in everyday settings whenever I encounter a bunch of keys left down on a counter top, work desk, kitchen table etc. Also an anxiety around seating arrangements at social events/celebratory dinners/cinema seats, I am very uncomfortable sitting wedged inside a group where my room to move is restricted in any way, a feeling that I can't escape if I need to.

Beating 3 - The despair of queuing up for a beating by Father McEvoy

I will share another incident where I narrowly avoided a beating. It was coming up to Christmas and on the last night of supervised study my class of third years organised a water bomb fight against the second years in the two storey changing room facilities at the back of the school facing onto the College’s playing pitches during the break. We, i.e. the third years, were upstairs throwing the water bombs down. 

"I was one of the first students to reach the door that evening, Father McEvoy whipped me across the face with the leather strap because I showed no emotion to getting it across the hands". 

Vinny Corcoran (with permission)

The long term effect on me of witnessing this beating is a fear of authority figures, particularly when they are in close proximity to me.  This incident affected me a lot because, despite feeling that what was happening was wrong, due to fear of what might happen I was powerless to intervene to help my fellow classmate. The violence of the assault made me fearful for my own safety in the school as part of me knew it could just as likely be me next time. To this date the incident, the large figure, out of control, dragging and standing over and repeatedly hitting the much smaller figure, can be triggered by completely unrelated situations like being in my solicitor's office, bringing feelings of anxiety to me in unrelated situations where people are standing over me.  My mind plays tricks on me, visualising authority figures suddenly climbing over their desk and making for me to assault me, I have to shake my head to bring myself back to the reality of where I am. Equally if a boss told me 'I need to see you in my office at 3:00 p.m.'  I would spend the intervening time imagining the worst!

The norm of Denial

My recollection is that none of the group of us classmates observing went over to Peter after the beating that had just taken place. If I was to try and explain the then norm, it was as if by commiserating with a fellow student we were patronising them in some way. The understanding was that it was the norm to hide the impact of the beating and any attempt at commiseration by classmates went against the norm of denial, denial that it hurt, denial that it was humiliating and denial that it wasn't normal to experience that level of violence. As boys, a studied indifference to it was our way of coping with random acts of violence that we had no control over, a form of denial as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

 One day I was sent out of the class by a female teacher for 'messing'. Always on the alert, I spotted in the distance Father McEvoy commencing his prowl of the school corridors. I couldn't face a beating, I left outside the classroom door to make it look like I was leaving the classroom to go to the toilets. When I came back at the end of class the teacher asked me why I hadn't stayed standing outside the door and I told her I couldn't face Father McEvoy, she nodded and made no further comment.

Certainly the teacher taking the class during Beating 2 above made no attempt to assert their control of the classroom that Father McEvoy had barged into. It reminded me of a passage in James Joyce's 'Portrait of the Artist' to quote 'We glimpse the hierarchical nature of relationships among teachers as Stephen realises that Father Arnall is not going to stand up to Father Dolan, even though he had excused Joyce. '

The cumulative effect of the above incidents are the lifelong marks Father McEvoy left on me, cracking of my jaw and a permanent ache, and a series of triggers that include a hypervigilance when encountering bunches of keys left down anywhere and anxiety around meetings, closed doors and shrieks in confined spaces.

As I worked my way through therapy in 2023 I came to understand that these experiences have made me unable to easily understand and express my feelings with the following two specific long term impacts on me. 

1.  As I mentioned above the un-written rule amongst students when being beaten was to never show any emotion, no matter how severe the beatings. If you removed your hand or put your arm up to defend your head then you could be further beaten or, if you fought back, expelled. Therefore you had to cooperate in your own beating thereby overriding the natural human desire to defend yourself or your friends. It took a lot of mental effort and involved separating the mind and body. I think it is called 'disassociation' by psychologists. 

This divorcing and separation of feelings, the feelings of fear, physical and psychological hurt and anger (suppressing the natural desire to cry, show fear, run or avoid the blows) from one's experience of the frightening reality of what was happening to me, had a long term impact on my life and personal relationships.

2. Each time Father McEvoy assaulted me he was up close to me, right in my personal space. Aligned with the impact of disassociation this contributed to another impact on relationships caused by alarm responses at times where there is no threat (in fact the opposite, at times of kindness or affection!). 

Part of the brain's response to perceived threats automatically triggers a cascade of reactions in the body, primarily through the activation of the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis leading to a release of adrenaline, increased heart rate, elevated blood pressure and rapid breathing preparing the body for immediate action.  Perhaps it is connected to the fact that I have Aspergers Syndrome (a common feature of which is an overactive amygdala, the brain's 'fight or flight' organ) but for me an alarm response can be triggered in the most unrelated situations. A good friend could come into my close personal space, give me a hug and this would involuntarily trigger an alarm response in my brain with the unconscious message to my body that it is under attack!

Before the 40th Reunion came into view I had unconsciously adopted the view of many of my classmates, ‘ah sure it didn’t do us any harm’. I didn’t see the connection between the physical abuse and my triggers that affected my life in subtle, unpredictable ways. As one of my classmates said ‘everyone one of us got the leather strap from Father McEvoy  but then it was done with, it's the way it was then’. However in at least one of the calls I made a classmate (who received a severe beating all over his body with a leather strap) went on to tell me his is now an alcholic. I couldn't but feel the possibility of a connection between this and the extreme physical abuse he described to me as having suffered as a pupil at the hands of Father McEvoy.

Before my mother died of Motor Neurone Disease a couple of years ago I had committed to myself that for wherever period of my life I had left I would seek to live it with no regrets. As I listened to the Blackrock College boys experience on RTE's Joe Duffy show I decided that my experience at the hands of Father McEvoy was something I needed to resolve for myself.

Once or twice over the years I had chatted with my mother about what happened to me with Father McEvoy (who was known colloquially amongst the pupils as Bandy). She had said that after beating #1 above I was brought to our family GP due to the pain in my jaw and he referred me to the hospital for Xrays on it. I was also put on a course of antibiotics due to the pain I was experiencing weeks after I was punched. She said our GP was shocked by what had happened and felt it should be taken further.

Once the RTE Radio coverage got me thinking I decided to contact other classmates from the 1983 year to 'sanity check' my experience against that of other boys in my year. I asked 10 of them to describe their experience of Father McEvoy from a scale of 1. No negative experience 2. 'Standard' corporal punishment (i.e. slapped on the hands with leather strap) and 3. Physical abuse (i.e. punched in the face/head or hit over the head/in the face with leather strap).  

The results of my conversations with 10 of my classmates from the 1983 class were:

• Pupil #1 - Peter Burns (with permission) - Physical abuse described with his permission in 5 above "I felt like a child being beaten by a gigantic man . Powerless…terrified….incredulous.."

• Pupil #2 - Mick Quinn (with permission) - "Father McEvoy produced a leather, and proceeded to beat pupil X with it. He hit him everywhere but across the face with the leather. X jumped and turned, trying to block the blows from the leather. Father McEvoy struck him approximately 20 times and the assault went on for over a minute. I observed the assault with dread as I was next in queue for punishment from Father McEvoy."

• Pupil #3 - Vinny Corcoran (with permission) - Physical abuse - This boarder was repeatedly punched one night by Father McEvoy while lying in bed for listening to the radio after lights out. 

One other pupil shared his experience of physical abuse, 3 boys had received sometimes frequent 'standard' corporal punishment and 3 had no negative experience of Father McEvoy.

Here are the steps I have taken in the past twelve months:

1. I wrote a detailed letter to the President of St. Kieran’s College in December 2022 outlining the instances of physical abuse by Father McEvoy on me. I received a prompt acknowledgement from the President expressing his sadness at the contents of my letter, offering me the support of ‘Towards Healing’ counselling and that the college had informed the Garda Siochana, Tusla and the National Board for safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church in Ireland of my report. 

2. I submitted a Freedom of Information (FOI) request  to the HSE in respect of St Luke's Hospital seeking records of my XRay appointment - They were very helpful but unable to locate any records in that search.

3. I then submitted an FOI to the HSE in an attempt to make contact with our then family GP. He had retired but I wrote to the practice that his practice merged into and asked that they might pass a letter from me to him. He rang me back and after a couple of months of searching his records he found the relevant files. It included the GPs contemporaneous records below which detailed the punch to my jaw, the perpetrator and the school. It dated the assault around 7.10.1978, my thirteenth birthday was in December so I was 12 at the time of the assault by Father McEvoy, not 13 as the hospital record noted at the time. 

4.I made contact with the ‘One in Four’ support network who supported me and outlined the various steps and options available to me.

5.I made a detailed in person statement at the Garda Station in Kilkenny in respect of the assaults in March 2023.

I would like to say that from my first letter in December I was welcomed with open arms by the current school authorities, that all my correspondence and enquiries were dealt with promptly and I feel that my personal story and experience has been honoured by the current school’s authorities at Saint Kierans, in particular the current President, Rev Dr Dermot Ryan.

The above steps culminated in a meeting for four people in Saint Kieran’s in July 2023 of myself and:

• Rev Dr Dermot Ryan - President Saint Kieran’s College

• Kathleen Sherry - Director of Safeguarding at the Diocese of Ossory 

• My case officer from One in Four

I outlined my experiences with Father McEvoy. I said that I believed that it wasn’t the school as an institution that was the problem but more a personality problem, that of the 1975 - 83 headmaster who struck fear into the hearts of the boys in his care.  I had no experience of physical abuse from another member of staff at the college throughout my time as a pupil.

The President responded that he was deeply saddened by my experience.

After the above meeting I briefly walked the school corridors where the assaults took place. Then the President drove me to meet Father McEvoy.

I had written to Father McEvoy earlier in the year saying that in the spirit of peace and reconciliation I would very much welcome the earliest opportunity to discuss what had happened to me at a time and place that suited him. 

I was nervous about meeting him.  As I heard the click of his walking stick in the corridor approaching our meeting room I felt a pang of anxiety in the pit of my stomach, some unconscious part of the old student code kicked in prompting me to turn and  'warn' the President of Saint Kieran's sitting beside me with the hissed words 'he's coming!'. 

Once Father McEvoy had sat down opposite me I asked him if he was ok with my moving his walking stick to beside the door until the end of the meeting.  It was probably irrational but some part of me wasn't comfortable sitting within arms length of him and didn't want to take any chances in case what I had to say to him provoked his anger. I then thanked him for meeting me, something he voluntarily chose to do after receiving my letter. 

I outlined to him one by one the assaults he had inflicted on me using the above drawings. After this there was a discussion where Father McEvoy and I exchanged views on my experience of him. The man opposite me was composed and mentally alert, he debated a number of points with me to a level of detail that it was clear he was fully compos mentis. 

I felt it was right in our meeting to acknowledge that he'd had a hard life losing his mother when he was 13 and then being sent away to Saint Kieran’s as a boarder before training as a priest at Maynooth. He acknowledged this. He’d had a hard life in some ways but I said to him that this was no excuse for taking out what I had experienced as his rage on the boys in his care.

I explained to him that his pattern of spying through class windows, the punches to my jaw when no teacher was present while repeated slaps when a teacher was in the room as a witness (i.e. that he let himself go when there was no adult witness), the huge disparity in authority and physical size, the imbalance in power (he was the headmaster of the school) suggested to me that these actions were  cowardly on his part. I told him -

"You hurt me Father McEvoy, you hurt a lot of boys that were in your care. In my case that hurt has lasted a lifetime."

As our 30 minute meeting drew to a close he said he was sorry. I said I will accept that and as I shook his hand, a hand that as a clenched fist had caused me so much emotional damage, I felt a sense of completion, a sense that I had done the right thing by the 12 year old me who had been unable to stick up for himself. As the meeting ended I went over to the door and returned his walking stick to his chairside. 

I felt a lot of healing as I left the meeting and I woke up the next day feeling a weight off my shoulders!

I have spoken with some of my classmates and their sons have had very positive experiences at the school. One dad said to me that he had sent his two lads there and it was a totally different place for them. No violence whatsoever and they received a very good education. He said they are thirty plus now and never spoke badly of the place.

Equally my experience of dealing with the President and his colleagues was very positive. 

In terms of the larger issue of the duty of care that Saint Kieran's Board of Management owed to the boys in their care throughout the time that Father McEvoy was principal, I considered that the best way forward at that point was to focus on my personal experience with Father McEvoy.

What I can try to do for those other boys who suffered is to publicly share the  process I went through over the past 12 months which I see as a positive story, a story with a positive ending for me. I would also like to thank the current President for having used his good offices to bring the matter to what I feel is a successful conclusion. 

I feel it is a good example of dialogue resolving a historical case of physical abuse, it worked for me as I feel a weight off my shoulders since my meeting with Father McEvoy as I feel I have done the right thing by the 12 year old me!

Thanks to the Museum of Childhood for featuring my story - https://museumofchildhood.ie/40th-anniversary-of-ban-on-corporal-punishment/ 

Myself and Mick Quinn wrote an open letter  to Minister for Education in respect of the Scoping Inquiry into Historical Sexual Abuse in Schools run by religious orders in August 2023. To date I have received no acknolwdgement of our letter or response from the Department.