A long long time ago in 1988 this country had a very different attitude to paedophilia. Michael Jackson took a 13 year old boy to the Grammys, Jimmy Saville and Gary Glitter were fixing it for kids and inviting kids into their gang respectively, Rolf Harris sang about two little boys and my boarding school was run exclusively by ageing bachelors who chose to live with young boys instead of wives, partners and families. I’m not saying they were all paedophiles because with the benefit of hindsight I think two were probably not. One was far too senile to remember what he was doing long enough to get hold of one of us. I remember we were once twenty minutes (the point where questions became permissible) into a Latin class before someone pointed out we were meant to be learning French. The other was the only female we ever saw. Matron. Sort of maternal and with a huge temper but probably not a paedophile. She looked and acted like Kathy Bates in Misery. Her facial expression changed horribly when she informed me that I had the same first name as her ex-husband. Fortunately first names were forbidden as they could remind us who we were on the outside but 11 year old me was smart enough to keep my distance from her to avoid waking up strapped to the bed with a block between my feet.
These two were fine. Mad but not paedophiles. The rest however, were. Most did nothing illegal (then) about it. Of those that did, couple got caught, one’s in prison but none of them were you know….not paedophiles. Now for the avoidance of doubt, we are only talking about the boarding staff. The teachers who went home to their wives, families and kids were not paedophiles (hooray!). We were safe during the day. It was the after the sun went down that you had to keep moving because they mostly came at night….mostly. We’d watch the day staff drive off at 7pm, look at each other and decide who was going to take the first watch.
Just to reiterate most of the child enthusiasts never acted on their very obvious desires beyond holding their gaze far longer than necessary in showers, changing rooms and dormitories and to my knowledge no teacher ever crossed the line. However the line was drawn in a very different place in the 80s to now. One teacher for example had a standard punishment of making boys change into various different school uniforms (games kit, suit, choir etc) in front of him. He insisted on being present throughout otherwise presumably we wouldn’t learn anything from the correction. Another always seemed to have a blond boy on his lap while watching TV. Maybe he was just being paternal? To exclusively blond boys ideally under the age of 10. Anyway these examples, the senile French teacher who though he taught Latin and the maternal yet mental matron determined to punish small boys for the sins of her ex husband were problems but not the problem. That was the chaplain.
Now as some of you who went home to their parents after school rather than holding the massive privilege of being locked in with the paedophiles may not be aware, prep schools had a chaplain. A priest who taught RE, performed all the chapel services and acted as an avuncular figure, responsible for our spiritual guidance and development. Massive paedophile. Again, no evidence of him acting on his urges but these urges were on full view as he walked around the school like Augustus Gloop entering the chocolate room. Being an atheist from a very young age and not being a particularly attractive child served me well and my dealings were him were sparce. This was why I was surprised when having passed by him in a corridor I heard him shout my name. Surname obviously. I quickly scanned through my most recent crimes in my head and could only think of my incredulity at the existence of God and not wanting to have sex with adult men as anything that could affect him. I was wrong. There was a third. It was the book I was holding. The book was Jaws. The book and I were called over. I was told to leave. The book stayed with the chaplain and no explanation was given for our separation. I was vexed. I was at a good bit.
Hooper had gone in the cage. Cage had gone in the water. Hooper was in the water. Shark’s in the water. Our Shark. Farewell and adieu to you …I have no idea how the rest of that song goes because the paedophile had my book.
Later I was summonsed to his room. Der num. Der num. De den de den de den de den…..
(Just to point out nothing bad happens to me – in case you were getting worried. Oh and I got to finish the book but we’ll come back to that)
I didn’t think I was going to get the book back so wasn’t sure what success looked like in this meeting but I had little choice so showed up and retreated to beyond arms reach after knocking on the door.
He explained at some length that it was his duty to God, the headmaster and our parents to look after us and as such wanted to protect me from the harm some of the adult themes in the book could do to me. It was a book about a fish but resisting the temptation to argue that it didn’t condone slavery, human sacrifice and the murdering of homosexuals like a book he frequently quoted from, I got the fuck out of there. Two days later he was arrested.
Turns out the cleaner of his vast family mansion that he chose not to live in because there were no young boys there had discovered what at the time was a record breaking stash of child pornography. Given this was pre-internet this meant a literal library. We are talking shelves and shelves in a room she had previously not known existed! Last scene in Raiders of the lost Ark but with child porn rather than arks.
She called the police and they thought even though this is 1988 we should probably do something about that paedophile teacher in a boys boarding school and arrested him and took away his pornography and as it turns out, one copy of Jaws.
Just to reiterate a man of God had castigated an 11 year old for reading an “adult” novel while being in possession of a vast library of pornography starring 11 year olds. Weapons grade hypocrisy I think you’ll agree – on we go.
So there we were all queued up outside the chapel and the chaplain was down the nick probably doing his best “I thought they were 18 – it’s hard to tell with Thai boys. Are you sure they are that young? I’m shocked. I’m a man of the cloth don’t you know”.
Anyway they didn’t buy it. He got charged, defrocked, fired and eventually sent to prison. The last point made an older me question whether pornography was the worst of his crimes to actually get him to serve time in 1988 but there was no implication any boys of the school were involved. A point the school was desperate to impress upon the parents.
This story obviously provokes a lot of questions the most pressing of which is, did I get my book back. Turns out it had been on quite an exciting journey of its own having been returned to the school by the police as it had been collected in error with some other things and had my name in it.
So what’s the morale of this story beyond close the beaches sooner? Months later I received a letter from the convicted paedophile, presumably from prison. There were some general pleasantries ignoring the massive elephant in the room of his incarceration followed by him asking if my book had made it back. Turns out it was in his coat and he was wearing his coat when he “had to leave the school” (did you see an elephant? What elephant) and he “didn’t come back” and neither did the coat but he’d asked if it could be taken from is coat and sent back.
My parents weren’t particularly happy with me being written to by a convicted paedophile (even though I’d lived four doors down from him for the last four years) and raised hell at the school.
Turned out he was released after serving his time but just couldn’t help himself and was caught with more child porn this time on his person at customs (from Thailand no doubt) and got sent back to jail.
He’s gonna need a bigger coat.
Diaries of Boarding School 