Cyril suffered sexual abuse in children’s homes in the years following World War II
All names and identifying details have been changed.
Participants have given us permission to share their experiences.
Cyril grew up in a large family. His father had mental health problems after the war and Cyril knows that he was taken into care at the age of one, as were two of his sisters, each to different places.
In the late 1940s he was sent to a children’s home. From there many children were migrated to Australia. Cyril only just escaped this fate as his father refused to give permission for his son to be sent abroad.
Cyril remembers the children being sent from the home to the hymn ‘Bless this house, lord we pray.’ He can’t bear to hear that hymn to this day; he has heard what happened to the children in Australia.
When a new master took over the running of the home, Cyril and the other children were regularly subjected to humiliation and severe physical punishment for any infringement – being late, walking on the grass, asking questions. It was in the children’s home that Cyril also suffered sexual abuse.
Cyril thinks the master got sexual pleasure from beating the boys. His daughter seemed to take pleasure from watching the beatings and would encourage her father to hit the children more. On one occasion, after Cyril ran away, he was beaten so badly that he could not attend school until he had recovered.
Cyril believes the parents of another child who attended the home and suffered similar abuse made a complaint to the police; the case was taken to court, but the master was found not guilty. None of the boys was asked what was happening, but the master was moved to run a borstal.
Following this, Cyril was to live in a home with a couple who he says treated him like a slave and caned him if he made any mistakes with his task. He was there for about six years and although he had some family in the local area, he was not allowed to see them. The wife would accuse Cyril of ‘playing with himself’ and watch the boys as they showered.
When he was around 16 years old Cyril was moved again, to another home in the area. The master was always drunk and would beat the children. By this time Cyril was working but the master took all the money he was earning. Unable to stand another harsh regime, Cyril left and became homeless.
Remarkably, Cyril turned his life around and worked as a local councillor to help others. He says it has not been easy, but he continues to try and give back to the local community. Deprived of seeing his family for many decades, he recently began to track down his siblings and discovered that he has many brothers and sisters. He is now back in touch with them.
Cyril would like it to be much easier for survivors to access their historic care records. When he appointed a solicitor to obtain his own records all he received was a couple of pages listing the homes he had been placed in. One of the places was missing and Cyril thinks this was deliberate. He would like to see the perpetrators who abused him brought to justice.