He looked back at me and smiled saying, "No son, he's a Christian Brother." The driver then said: "You'll be seeing quite a lot of those men my boy. So you'd better get used to the white collar, and the black."

Before I had time to settle into the draconian, militaristic system that was the Christian Brothers I had my first call a teacher nicknamed The Macker.

It was after lights out in dormo five, and I was asleep, my dreams pure as the crystal waters that flowed through the hills of Barnacullia where I spent seven years of a happy childhood with my foster mum.

I woke up to the menacing sound of the Macker's deep voice calling me.

He said: "Talking dirty in you sleep. Why were you lying on you stomach?"

I was really scared, staring up at that giant of a man. Through my sleepy blurred vision I could think of little else to say except: "I don't understand, sir." Nor did I know what he wanted.

The Macker leaned over me, drew back the bedclothes and pulled up my night-shirt, his beady eyes shifted beneath dark bushy brows, searching my nakedness.

He gave me a dry, cynical grin as he held my penis and testicles, feeling my penis like a toy.

His voice was low: "What is this for, boy? Tell me the truth now. Don't lie to me."

I was so scared, I wept as I replied: "I don't know sir. Honest."

I had never been asked such a thing, nor had I ever had my private parts fondled and spoken about in that way.

He said: "What do you do with it, boy?"

I gasped in shock: "I pass water with it, sir."

I thought that was the end of it, but I was mistaken - his pleasure derived from my lack of understanding.

When he spoke again he was fondling my penis: "Why were you talking dirty in your sleep, boy? Why do you lie flat on your stomach?"

He kept feeling me, groping me as I cried: "I don't know sir.

"You are hurting me, sir."

Another teacher, nicknamed The Bucko, appeared at the side of the bed, and I suddenly felt crowded by these two very tall men. Then the Bucko said: "The truth, you pup - or I will crucify you. Now tell me."

He pointed at my penis as the Macker pushed down my foreskin and the horrible abuse continued.

Later the Macker said in a low voice: "One day I will show you what it is really for, boy. Now lie down and go to sleep - and don't lie on your stomach, you get pleasure from that boy.

"I will see you in my room some night."

As they walked away, they took with them the child I had been, leaving me in fear and mental hell.

Some months later, toward the end of the first year, I stood facing the dreaded wall by the Brothers' room in dormo five, my two hands held high above my head.

I had committed the cardinal sin of losing my sacred school underpants, and my buttocks were on fire from the beating the Bucko had given me.

My arms ached so much I had to drop them to relieve the pain - but the Bucko said: "Keep them up. I will crucify you if you let them down again."

Some moments passed. Then the door of the Brothers' room opened and I head the voice, of the Macker - there was no mistaking the deep, gritty tone that so instilled fear in me.

He said: "Come in, boy. Take off the night-shirt. Lie down."

I did as he ordered. Naked, scared and very embarrassed, I lay flat on the bed, my eyes closed against the horror of whatever was to come.

I felt his body over me as he pulled me up against himself.

I lay as still as I could...

When the Macker had finished, he wiped the sweat from his brow and his voice was softer and his smile was filled with warmth.

The change in his attitude towards me was complete - as it would be on many such occasions after he had his way with me or one of my pals.

I turned 11 in 1953. We had just finished sports and it was time for the dreaded showers - dreaded because of the abuse we suffered.

A Brother - nicknamed Driller the Killer - stood on a wooden platform like an army officer and command-ed: "Division twelve to fourteen will shower first - by the left, quick march!"

We marched off as if we were going to be crucified.

I hated stripping off naked in my division and marching up the long freezing hall. We all hated it. we were scared because at any moment you might be flogged, stark naked, by the Macker or Driller the Killer, for some daft triviality or for no reason whatever - just being in the wrong place beside some wrongdoer, was enough.

And for some reason the showers ran from lukewarm to boiling hot to freezing cold which gave us every reason to fear the water as well.

On this particular Saturday, the Macker stood by the entrance to the showers, holding a broom handle, inspecting his naked soldiers as we marched inside.

I was so frightened of being beaten I didn't manage to get a bar of soap or a brush. I stood petrified beneath the water as the Macker came into inspect us.

When he came to me and stared down at me his voice was deep.

He stared at my nakedness and said: "Have you washed it?"

I blurted out: "Yes, sir."

"You liar, now bend over - spread your legs, you pup. Tip the floor."

I cried as he crashed the broom handle against my bottom.

"It's filthy you pup - your back passage, boy. You did not wash it."

I protested that I had, but that was not good enough for him.

The air was thick with fear and the sound of the boys screaming for help - Driller the Killer was doing his inspection on the opposite side of our cubicles.

Without warning, I felt myself being lifted off my feet. The Macker held me upside down and said: "I'll show you how to get dirt out, boy."

I screamed as he forced soap into my anus, twisting it. Then he pushed the broom handle inside me.

The pain was excruciating, worse than any pain I had endured since I arrived.

When he put me down he said, 'I never want to see you dirty again boy: "Report to me in my room after night prayers I've not done with you yet."

When the Macker had gone to inspect the next boy, I realised I couldn't straighten up without huge effort.

I stood there beneath the shower, wondering what would come next as boys cried out in pain around me - then I realised that our fear gave them a sense of power.

That fear took many shapes.

The only thing worse than my fear of the Saturday shower was my fear of the night.

The nightmares I had were awful.

At times I was so afraid to go out to the toilet, which was just several hundred paces away, that I simply wet my bed - only to face the humiliation of reporting this in the morning.

Then there was the humiliation of taking the soiled sheets to the laundry in front of the whole school, and marching around the centre lamppost on the parade ground as every division lined up at 6.40am.

If any bedwetter neglected to do this he was flogged the following night in the bootroom.

As the monitors shouted: "Left, right, left, lift 'em up or face the wall," the thundering sound of hobnailed boots echoed loudly through the frosty air.

The sound of morning time in Artane is engraved in my memory.

FEAR OF THE COLLAR

- My

terrifying

childhood

in Artane

Adapted by Caoimhe Young. Fear of the Collar, My Terrifying Childhood in Artane, by Patrick Touher is published by O'Brien Press. The paperback will be available in all good bookstores from September 25 priced pounds 8.66p.

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