by C S Kenny
After around twenty minutes of him doing just about everything but beg me to retract what I had said, he came up with what was probably his best shot. He pointed out that in my current situation I was facing a sentence of Borstal Training. I was facing an armful of charges so I had to give him that one.
He then said if I was continuing with my story about Aunty Val because I didn’t want to lose face with my peers, the chances were I would not be seeing them for a long time anyway. I admitted to myself, though not to him, there was an element of truth in that too. He finished by telling me I was the only one with the power to make this all go away. If I cared in the slightest about what would happen to Aunty Val then I should end it now.
I would like to say that I decided to retract my statement in order to prevent any more heart ache for Aunty Val. That’s what I would like to say, however knowing the way my mind worked, I was probably just sick of the sight of social workers and tired of all the questioning. I signed a form which he had brought with him. As I write this I have a copy of that form in front of me which came with all my records, though any other reference to the Brunswick affair (Oh that’s shocking) is conspicuous by its absence.
So why have I written about it now? Well, had she been a male member of staff and I a girl in care, I think peoples attitude to the whole thing would be different. I also believe had I been a girl, the police would have been involved; in my case they too were conspicuously absent.
Even after all this time I have this inexplicable need for people to know I was not lying. I have also been honest about everything else so I don’t see why I should be any different about this. I have no doubt there will still be some people who think I have made it up, however now that I have put it down in print, I don’t care what they think.
I’m no longer a disturbed, delinquent, maladjusted, teenage boy that a social worker, or anyone else for that matter, can talk into retracting what I have stated occurred. If anyone wants to sue me....feel free. Financially I have nothing; you are more than welcome to half of it. Oh bugger it, it’s a nice day, I’m in a good mood, you can have all of it.
I found out after a while, when Aunty Val had said she was, “doing this to get her own back,” she was referring to her ex-husband. It turned out he had been the member of staff from Springfield who had run away with one of the girls. Which makes me think it wasn’t just Aunty Val shitting herself, the whole of Bradford Social Services, the ones in the know, must have been dreading the Newspapers getting hold of that one.
At the time, I didn’t know who the young girl was that her ex had an affair with. That was until years later when the young girl had become a grown woman and also my sister in law after marrying my youngest brother. No doubt some people will think I made that part up too.
On May 10th 1974 I was sentenced to three months Detention Centre.
Notice of Committal to Detention Centre 3 Months.
NOTES OF ANY INTERVIEW SUBSEQUENT TO SENTENCE:
No problems- suspect he expected Borstal Training so he seems quite happy.
Chapter 16
Well, well, well, who’da thunk it? I knew full well after writing this and showing it to family and friends there would be repercussions; I fully expected the shit to hit the fan. What I didn’t expect was for my family and friends to accept, without question, what I have said as being the truth. I had even sorted out all my Social Services files into chronological order in preparation for what I thought would be an onslaught of questions.
The questions I expected never came, what came was a realisation that more people care about me than I knew. There were apologies, some of them from people who had no need to apologise. There were more hugs and kisses than I’ve ever had in my life. There was anger, for once not aimed at me and on my part there was an overwhelming sense of relief. Relief because it feels as though all the guilt and shame, all of that shit, has left me and been returned to its rightful owners. Not only that, but the people I love and care about it appears do not think any worse of me.
It would be wrong to say everything has gone smoothly, it hasn’t. Some of my close family are extremely angry and I understand this. I have had more than forty years to get my head around it; they have only had a few months. I guess it makes it easier for them to understand why my behaviour was so off the wall. If they are having trouble dealing with the anger and frustration as mature adults imagine the trouble a young boy of nine would have dealing with that and more.
The only questions I have been asked are with regards to some of the people I have mentioned. Where do I start? Let’s start with Mr Beall, the Headmaster of the William Henry Smith School.
After writing the first six or seven chapters I plucked up the courage to show them to my wife, who incidentally was only aware of snippets of my childhood, (we met when I was 25). Once I had taken the kitchen knife and the car keys from her, calmed her down and convinced her that killing a certain someone was not the answer, she gave me her opinion. Feeling Sue was too close and that her opinion would be understandably biased and guarded, I showed it to Barbara, Sue’s sister.
Barbara had worked in a children’s home about five miles from where we live, it turned out that the boss of the home was Mr John Airth, the very chap who 41 years ago had spotted a little pee stain on my bed sheet. I arranged to meet him and it was he who informed me that Mr Beall had died five or six years ago.
I met Mr Airth in order to make sure I had my facts correct, this was also the reason why I subscribed to a few web sites regarding children’s homes. On one such site I was contacted by a solicitor who asked if he could call and see me regarding my time at William Henry Smith. I had no problem with that and to be honest I was intrigued to find out what he wanted. At the meeting the solicitor was interested in the treatment I received at the school.
It turned out there was an investigation going on with regard to historical abuse. As far as I am aware there are thirty or so people who claim they were mistreated as residents, dating back as far as the sixties. That investigation, at the time of writing this, is still on-going.
Though I didn’t need to be told this anyway, the solicitor also pointed out that Aunty Val’s actions were totally illegal. I also didn’t need to be told that it would be my word against hers, I have always known that.
The very nature of the offence meant I had no witnesses. The solicitor looked into it and asked for records to be made available to him and surprise surprise, there are no records. No records of me making an allegation and no records of Val ever having had an allegation made against her. I find it incredible that there would be no records whatsoever of such a serious allegation. In fact they have done a lovely job of cleaning the whole messy thing up, well, apart from sending me a copy of my retraction, a retraction to an allegation that apparently was never made.
I will grant you that it doesn’t prove I’m telling the truth, it would not stand up in a court of law, but in my eyes it does prove that something is not right, something is being hidden, though not by me.
Now we come to, ‘The Bastard.’
The further I got with this writing, the braver I became with regards to whom it was shown. My wife was first (cabbage looking I maybe), then my sister in law and then close friends. Eventually I let the people who I believed would be the most affected by it have a read, i.e. my mum and my two brothers.
All three were understandably upset and angry, my youngest brother Andy in particular. I don’t mean that to sound as though my mum and Paul were not as affected, they were, but Andy felt as though he had to do something. He decided to run off a few more copies and then distributed them amongst Derek’s family. He even made sure Derek received a copy. After a few days Derek called Andy, apparently he was, “in bits,” his words not mine. He also said he could not remember anything regarding the events I had written about.
There are times when you can make a judgement, not by what is said but by what is not said. There was no screaming and shouting about a denial,
there was no call to his solicitor or the police saying he wants something done about me spreading lies about him. No, just, “I don’t remember.” I guess the last thing he wants is the police starting an investigation, especially as simply by writing this, two more people have confided in me that he did the same to them. I have a sneaking suspicion the police could find a few more.
One of his other victims I know of is not yet, mentally, in a place where he could deal with the facts coming out, I fully understand and appreciate this. The other has stated her reasons for not yet going to the police but has said she will at a given time. That may sound a little cryptic but I understand where she is coming from and I respect her decision. I have waited more than forty years to find the courage to do this so I guess I can wait a little longer to see him get his comeuppance. Besides, and I don’t know if people will think me a bit sick but, I get a good feeling knowing he is walking around, “In bits,” with his family now knowing what he is and also waiting for that inevitable knock on the door.
One other person I have been asked about is Mr Fishbourne. Well I still Google him now and then, he’s still doing very well for himself . . . and that’s all you are getting.
Then there’s me.
Well I moved 120 miles away from Bradford in 1975 and came down to Telford in Shropshire. There were a couple of reasons for this, one was that my biological father lived here and had offered to give me a home after I had finished Borstal Training. It seemed a good way to try and get, ‘back into the fold,’ as it were.
The year before, I had been released from Detention Centre and as I was still under a care order, I had to report to a social worker on the day of my release. For some reason the social worker had no idea I was being released and therefore had nowhere for me to live. In his wisdom he decided it might be a good idea to ask my mum and Philip if they could take me in. I did tell him it was probably not one of the best ideas he had ever had but he insisted it was worth a try.
Mum and Philip ran The Bentley’s Arms Pub on Great Horton Road and the truth is we never even got through the door. Philip told the social worker there was no bed for me there and then proceeded to tell him just what he thought of the Social Services and their ability to look after a child in their care. I have to say he put it far more eloquently than I ever could, all I could come up with when I looked at the social worker was, “You’re fucking clueless.”
Though I knew I was never going to be allowed back into the family home and though I didn’t really want to be there anyway, there was still a stab of disappointment in my gut when it was clearly spelt out to me. I have a feeling it was more disappointment in myself, a long overdue realisation that I really had completely and utterly fucked up. Not wanting to feel that way again I jumped at the chance when my dad offered to let me move in with him.
Telford was meant to be a place where, because I knew nobody but my dad, and I had no so called friends to influence me, it was going to be a new start. It didn’t take me long to realise I didn’t need people to coax me into bad behaviour, I never had. I was, and always had been, quite capable of being a total arsehole all on my own.
As if to prove the point I continued screwing up for quite a while, though to his credit, my dad didn’t give up on me.
I went to prison for six months, then for 18 months and followed that up with a two year sentence. I have no intention of writing about the shit I got up to during those years, I’m more than ashamed of my behaviour and though the stories I could tell may be funny, I’m certain that the people who were affected by my idiocy would beg to differ.
The way I eventually turned the corner seems odd, maybe even a little corny but it worked for me and all it cost was fifty pence.
For most of my life up to that point I had been pretending. I would pretend to be a nut case when it suited me, I would pretend everything was fine when it quite clearly wasn’t, even pretending to be brave when in some situations I was actually a coward. However it worked, it got me through. So I figured why not pretend to be good? So that’s what I did. I can vividly remember the very first time I tried it.
I was 20 years of age and had found myself a job. On my way to work one morning I bought myself some tobacco and the shopkeeper gave me fifty pence too much in my change. I knew she had given me too much the instant she placed it in my hand but I just pocketed it and went off to work.
That fifty pence piece played on my mind all day so at the end of my shift I went back to the shop and explained to the shop owner that the girl had given me too much, I then handed back the fifty pence. The, “Thank you,” I received was welcomed but the look on the shop owners face was something I thought I recognised though wasn’t quite sure. It was the equivalent of meeting someone in the street, recognising their face but not remembering where you know them from, then it click’s, “Bloody hell Charlie, I haven’t seen you in what? . . . It must be 25 years.”
The look the shop owner gave me was one of pride; he looked as though he was proud of my actions. Now if you have managed to read this far then you can guess how many times in my 20 years I had seen that expression. The last ten minutes of my walk home was extremely enjoyable. I had a smile on my face, a warm feeling inside and I’m sure I had grown from six feet to six feet three.
The more I pretended to be a decent person the easier it became. Don’t get me wrong, I did mess up a couple of times. The worst cock up was when I was 25. I was a member of a Motorcycle Club and I was going through a divorce. At one of the Club meetings my soon to be ex-wife was also there with her boyfriend. Her boyfriend and I got into an argument and then one of his friends decided to join in. Had the two of them kicked the shit out of me that would have been an end to it. As far as I have ever been concerned if you get into a fight and you lose, you lose.
My mistake was reverting back to nut case mode and not letting them kick the shit out of me. I ended up in Court facing assault charges. Luckily for me, by the time I appeared in Court the police had done a thorough investigation and the charge was reduced to behaviour likely to cause a breach of the peace. I pleaded guilty and I was asked by the nice Judge fella not to do it again.
Since then, over what has been almost 30 years, I have had three points on my driving licence for doing forty in a thirty zone and I once had a fine for having no TV licence which, though wrong, turned out in my favour. I wrote a letter to the court explaining why I had forgotten to renew it and the fine I received was less than the cost of the TV licence, result.
Nowadays I very rarely have to pretend, I still have my demons as I’m sure everyone does. I still have my fears. I have just about mastered the art of keeping my mouth shut and though I may be financially challenged, I have a lot more than I and others ever thought I would have. All in all, after having a bit of a wobbly start in life, I think I’m OK.
I am now 52 years of age and married to a woman I love dearly. I have one awesome son, a motorcycle, and live on a small Council estate in Shropshire. As we sit here in our back garden the sun is at its glorious best. The back garden is tiny but it’s large enough to keep half a dozen chickens, one of which (Gladys) is fast asleep on my feet.
The local children are playing on a field not far away and I can hear them in the distance however it’s not a noise that is annoying, in fact it is somehow reassuring. My wife is sat about ten feet away from me wearing sunglasses and a sun hat. Our Jack Russell, Tanny, who couldn’t care less about the chickens, is asleep under Sue’s chair and for some reason has one paw floating in her water bowl.
Though Sue has a book on her lap I have a sneaking suspicion that she is nodding off; I will leave her be. There is an air of peace and quiet about the place, I am happy, content and apart from maybe living in a few acres in the countryside, I can honestly say I cannot think of anywhere else I would rather be. About bloody time as well.
THE END