More than 50 pupils claim physical abuse at school

Brothers Anthony and Eamonn McNamara have said they were left traumatised by their experiences at school

More than 50 former pupils of a Merseyside school have now alleged they suffered serious physical abuse at the hands of their teachers.

Four former students of the establishment previously known as St Mary’s College and the Mount Prep School, in Crosby, are taking civil action against the Congregation of Christian Brothers, which ran the school.

Brothers Anthony and Eamonn McNamara have said they were traumatised by their experiences at St Mary's College in the 1950s and 1960s.

The Congregation of Christian Brothers has said it "sincerely regrets" any alleged abuse.

The school - which is now under different management - has said it would co-operate with any police investigation.

The brothers spoke out after North West Tonight revealed the Congregation of Christian Brothers is facing legal action.

Eamonn attended the private school, now known as St Mary's College and St Mary's Preparatory School, in the 1950s.

He alleges he was hit over the head with a metal pole during one beating at the school.

His brother, Anthony, said the accounts he has subsequently had heard from other pupils "mirrored [his own] experience".

He described one teacher, known to pupils as Brother Brickley, who has since died, as "absolutely terrifying".

St Mary's College is now under different management

Anthony described him as "the worst human being that I've encountered".

"He should never, ever have been anywhere near a child.

"He resorted to hitting children - and this was not just kind of a tap with a ruler.

"This was a leather strap. He would hold your hands over the edge of a desk and he would whack them so badly that I would go home with wheals."

Anthony suffered a mental breakdown after leaving the school.

"I endured the most traumatic experiences that I've had in my life as a result of two of the Christian Brothers in particular," he said.

After university, he said he was determined to try to make sure no other child suffered as he did - going on to become a head teacher at a Catholic comprehensive school.

"I never wanted a child to experience anything like what I went through, and I think that has probably been the single biggest drive in my approach to school leadership," he said.

Eamonn also attended the school in the 1950s, and said he was regularly struck - or "strapped" - by teachers.

He claims Brother Ryan hit him around the head with a metal bar.

"He had a metal bar and he just hit me on the back of her head with it.

"It was terrible."

He said when he went home that evening his mother asked him if he had been fighting.

"I said, 'No, why?', and she said, 'Well, there's blood on your shirt'."

Of the 50 former pupils who have come forward with allegations of violence and abuse, 40 are intending to join the legal action against the Congregation of Christian Brothers, a religious order founded in Ireland in 1802 with a mission to educate Catholic boys.

St Mary’s College and Preparatory School was run by the Christian Brothers until 2006

Eamonn said he had spoken out "to get it off my chest".

"It's a bad period of my life. It shouldn't have happened," he said.

Anthony said he just wanted an apology.

"If the order said, 'Dear Anthony, We recognise the hurt you went through. This was absolutely unacceptable and we are genuinely sorry', that would do me."

'Harrowing picture'

Andrew Lord, a senior associate solicitor for Leigh Day, said: "It's a remarkable response that we've had since the last report.

"We've now taken accounts from over 40 former pupils and have messages from more," he said.

He said the accounts of physical abuse date from the 1960s to the 1990s and painted "quite a harrowing picture", with "some instances of alleged sexual abuse".

Corporal punishment was legal in private schools until 1998, but the legal action is on the basis the violence was excessive and unjustified.

The Congregation of Christian Brothers said it "sincerely regrets any and all forms of abuse that may have been committed on anyone who attended St Mary's or The Mount".

'Sympathy and support'

A St Mary’s College spokesperson said: "Any former pupils whose experience of life at St. Mary’s between the 1950s and the early 1990s was not a positive one have our sympathy and support.

"However, because the alleged events date from well before 2006, when the management of St. Mary’s was transferred from the Christian Brothers to a new, separate charitable trust, it is very difficult for those of us who run the college today to make any informed comment, although we would of course give officers any assistance they might need if a police investigation ensues.

"Staff who worked at the school during the period in question have long since left and in many cases may no longer be alive, and in the intervening period the culture of the college has changed beyond all recognition - as it has in schools in general over the past half a century or so."