Sir, - I was born in Limerick in 1940. Because of a broken and violent home background, and also because my father died and my mother had left home, I was out of control and sent to St Joseph's Industrial School in Glin, Co Limerick in 1951, just before my 11th birthday. I hated every minute of the five years that I spent there, but I do not feel bitter because of my experiences.
Oh yes, there were a few nasty Brothers and I had a few bad experiences and was constantly hungry, but on the whole I feel that my time there was very positive and that I owe most of what I achieved in my life to being in Glin. If I had not been sent there I feel I would have turned into a criminal, because that was my ambition before I was sent to Glin.
I was treated much worse in my own home than I was in Glin and although I was subjected to what I would now see as sexually inappropriate behaviour, by one particular Brother only, I was certainly never sexually abused.
Discipline was very strict and you answered back at your peril. I learnt a trade, tailoring, which stood me in good stead later in life and I eventually used my Glin education to get out of labouring and became a qualified psychiatric charge nurse, learning a lot about my own behaviour and other people's. I acquired a great interest in sport and physical fitness and ran in the London Marathon seven times, meeting many famous sports personalities.
I did not like being in Glin, because I wanted to be at home, but I got on fairly well with most of the Brothers, because I made my mind up, after running away in the first weeks, that I had no choice but to co-operate, purely through fear of the consequences of not doing what I was told. I still feel inadequate and insecure in many ways, but I blame my parents for that. Looking at the situation from the Brothers' point of view, it must have been very difficult looking after other people's children, often boys, who were not wanted by their own parents.
I personally owe a great debt to the Brothers from Glin and a day does not go by without me thinking of the place. I have been regularly in touch with one of the Brothers, who now lives in Cork, and I plan to go and visit him in the next couple of weeks to try and understand what it was like from the Brothers' point of view and to help me write the last chapter in my book. It is about my life in Limerick and Glin and my experiences up to the present time.
I will soon be looking for a publisher. I have called it Are You Lonesome Tonight? The book is over 120,000 words long and is sad, funny, full of hope and a love story and about some success in my life. I like to think it might inspire some people as well as make them laugh and cry. I have been happily married since 1965 with two children and feel that I have been very lucky and fortunate in my life, due partly to the influence of the Brothers from Glin. I have a very positive approach to life and am not bitter about my industrial school experiences, but sad that I was sent there in the first place. - Yours, etc., Ray O' Donoghue,
Church Road, Worcester Park, Surrey, England.