Public caning: an extract from ‘Farther from the Sun’.

Trevor made a performance out of being caned. Usually, caning was carried out in the privacy of the Head’s study but other certain staff were not averse to caning boys in front of a class. They seemed to delight in it. – An extract from Farther from the Sun by Opher Goodwin (whom we previously met here.)

Trevor had dark ginger hair that curled up at the back. He was big and he was surly. He had a reputation for thumping people. Teachers found him exceedingly uncooperative. He’d glare at them, snarl and refuse to comply. His aim seemed to be to stand out, disrupt every lesson and create confrontation. You could say that he liked to be noticed.

Trevor made a performance out of being caned. Usually, caning was carried out in the privacy of the Head’s study but other certain staff were not averse to caning boys in front of a class. They seemed to delight in it.

The cane was long and springy. It was usually made of willow, about half an inch thick with a curved handle at one end.

You were bent over a desk and whacked very hard on the backside. Some teachers used a standing swish but the more robust took a run at you from across the room and launched themselves at your arse with all the power they could muster. The prefects were entitled to cane students but were not allowed to apply more than three lashes. These canings were delivered at one of their Prefect Courts held, appropriately, under the school in the cellars.

Caning was very violent. When applied with full force, as a number of teachers were keen to do, the blow split the skin across your arse in a straight line. It usually didn’t bleed much but quickly formed into a hard ridge. Around this ridge, the bruise came out like a purple welt. Over the next week, this colouration slowly spread and made its way from mauve through brown to orange and then yellow (as any biologist might tell you – mapping the progress of the breakdown of haemoglobin), to finally fade away to leave you with just a faint scar. The blood trickled from the split skin but did not gush. The pain was excruciating and normally managed to elicit a cry out of even the most hardened recipient. If you had been caned you were officially given leave to stand during lessons for the rest of the day. After all, the teaching staff weren’t sadists. They knew that it was painful and made a special dispensation for those so afflicted. I know this all too well as the result of personal experience.

Trevor was a regular recipient of corporal punishment. As with a number of other hardened miscreants, it was no deterrent; to be caned was a badge of honour. He was seemingly impervious to pain. On one occasion I saw him intimidate our poetry teacher by thrusting his face into his and then smashing his hand into the door with such force that he not only transformed the thick panel into matchwood but also must have broken every bone in his hand. He then refused to go to the sick room and sat there in the English class grinning while his hand swelled up like a balloon.

On a number of occasions, he was publicly flogged. It was intended to be a warning to everyone, to deter others from following suit. Trevor made it into a show.

His name would be called in assembly. He’d stand up and look around smiling and defiant. He would swagger to the front nonchalantly, hands in pockets, taking time to sneer and mock as he went. He would slowly climb the stairs up to the stage, grin at the Headmaster, lean forward over the table, grip the sides with his hands, rest his head on the top looking towards the gathered masses and wink. It was worthy of an Oscar.

By this time the Head would be in a fury. He’d run and jump up, bringing the cane down with all his might. It would viciously swish and thwack. Trevor remained unmoved. His eyes never blinked. There was no involuntary yelp and no tears. It was repeated for the full six. Then Trevor would lazily rise, look around as if to ask ‘Is that it?’ and stroll back off the stage. He would then deliberately sit himself down without any tangible sign of discomfort. A bravura performance.

The amount of credibility Trevor gleaned from this was enormous. The last occasion they tried it he brought the house down with spontaneous cheers.

They didn’t do it again.

Extracted from Farther from the Sun by Opher Goodwin (Independently published, 2020). Available here.

Picture credit: Unknown

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