Millfield boys suspended for thrashing boys’ naked bottoms with a cricket bat
Is this why so many top cricketers have been to public school: they’re taught them to keep their eye on the balls from an early age? To Millfield school in Somerset, where two pupils have been suspended, accused of hitting younger boys in the boarding houses about their bare bottoms with a cricket bat and a belt. Teachers no longer engage in six-o-the-best caning. But many were sad to see the practice go, including, as is alleged, some of the student body.
Erica Charles, a mother of three sons from Berkshire, has removed one of her sons, Tok, just a week after he started at Millfield this month. “If this was a teenager who beat another with a bat on the streets of London,” she says “he would be heading for borstal. These are not rituals wealthy boys have to go through in boarding schools to become men. These are damaging and violent experiences.”
And the beating?
Tok allegedly recorded the assault. The Sunday Times, which has heard the recording, says the lads were offered a “choice”: “two lashes on the [boxer] shorts” or “one on the bare backside”. Tok is worried about being seen as a grass. So he left, and his mum and dad spoke to the papers.
“The door was closed in each year-10 bedroom, and several boys from older years crowded into the room to watch. One of the victims said he couldn’t sleep until 2am and another woke up with blood on his sheets. It seems to have been some sort of ‘initiation’ ceremony into the boarding house. Out of 12 year 10s, we believe nine were whipped, with three new boys left out [Tok was one of them].”
According to the school’s website, Millfield “has gained an international reputation for sport”, including, as is alleged, some blood sports.
PS: The school’s response: ‘thank **** it’s not about the drugs and what really goes on.’ No, only joking:
PPS: As for the sporting element to this story, Millfield was created in 1935 by Jack Meyer, a former Somerset cricketer. In the school’s early says, legends has it that pupils were admitted if they could catch a cricket ball thrown at them from behind his desk. Millfield is a school more tuned to brawn than brains.
Posted: 16th, September 2018 | In: News Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
