Letter of Introduction

Grainger stood impassively in front of the headmaster’s desk. He was a sixth-former but had only arrived at the school a few days previously and already this was his second appearance on the carpet. He might be a new boy but he already had the measure of St Tom’s. He knew without a shred of doubt what was going to happen and equally he knew there wasn’t a darned thing he could do to alter matters. They must take their course and he would not stand in the headmaster’s way.

The headmaster read the handwritten letter in his hands carefully. He had read it several times before but the sheer weight of its contents continued to disturb him. His initial regret at allowing Grainger to join the school in his final year of studies and with the term already underway had not changed.

He read the letter slowly and carefully.

 

15 October 1963

Dear Headmaster,

This letter serves to introduce Albert Grainger. Although Grainger was a senior boy at our school, he lacked the necessary maturity and team spirit to be made a prefect. His childish behaviour which manifested itself in many ways, including the use of peashooters, catapults and bows and arrows, was such that we resolved to ‘reduce him to the ranks’ and treat him as a junior boy. To this end we put him back into short trousers and withdrew senior privileges. You might wish to consider keeping with this arrangement.

Grainger is a cheeky boy who does not believe the school rules apply to him. He is disrespectful to masters and this often displays itself in his use of ‘dumb insolence.’ We have had to take him down a peg or two on numerous occasions by administering corporal punishment.

We believe Grainger to be academically bright, but he is inattentive and disruptive in the schoolroom and often fails to complete prep. adequately. We have found that his ears are in his backside and often we have found it necessary to take him across our knee and spank him on his bare bottom in front of classmates. This serves two purposes: one, it bucks up his ideas and ensures at least some effort is made on his part; and two, it encourages the others in terms of their own good conduct.

His behaviour at other times leaves much to be desired. He is often out of dormitory after lights out and he regularly breaks bounds to go into the nearby town without permission.

He left our school with unfinished business. Mrs McGinty tells us that there is an unpaid bill of 2 s. 7 ½ d. at the tuck shop. On his last evening he left school premises without permission and visited the cinema which is itself out of bounds.

He played a dastardly trick on the school when he left. He deposited the head of a fish in a desk in his form room which lay there undetected for the entirety of the school holiday. When it was at last discovered it took many days for the janitor to get rid of the stench and a team of professional vermin exterminators had to be engaged to deal with the maggots. We have not seen Grainger since this regrettable incident and have been unable to deal with him in a suitable manner. We would deem it a courtesy if you punished him in the traditional manner at your earliest convenience.

I remain sir, as ever,

C. T. Pemberton-Smythe,

Housemaster

St. George’s School

 

The headmaster sighed, the sigh of the dead. He looked at the boy standing impassively before him. Boys at the school wore short trousers until they reached the age of fourteen, he admired the school matron for being able to locate a pair to fit this eighteen-year-old. Grainger was a tall, lanky boy but the grey, tailored short trousers fitted him very well, emphasising the shapes of his calves and thighs while also stressing the roundness of his buttocks which fitted snugly.

The headmaster had dealt with the unpaid bill the previous day. It was not his usual custom to take a boy – not even the smallest and most junior – across his knee for a spanking. Nor would it have entered his mind to do this while the boy had his trousers at his ankles and underpants at the knees. A bare-bottomed spanking was probably a little too ‘personal’ to be used for school discipline. It was, the headmaster supposed, right and proper for a father to take his errant son across his knee in this manner before spanking his bare bottom good and hard. It suited a ‘loving’ family situation but not the rather cold distant relationship that existed between headmaster and pupil.

So, Grainger had been spared the indignity of draping himself across the headmaster’s knee and instead had been required to present himself across the rather fine leather armchair that at the moment stood with its back to a corner of the study near a rather fine glass-topped coffee table and alongside a dark-brown cabinet made up of bookshelves, two drawers and a specially-designed narrow but tall cupboard that contained within it a selection of crook-handled canes of various weights and thicknesses.

Grainger had made an acquaintance with this collection and now the boy knew as sure as eggs was eggs he would do so again this afternoon. Twelve cuts across the seat of his school trousers delivered by a man with much experience of such things had been an awesome experience. Grainger was no stranger to corporal punishment as the letter from his former housemaster had made very clear, but he conceded readily that his new headmaster knocked Mr Pemberton-Smythe into a cocked hat when it came to delivering a sound beating. Grainger had been obliged to skip the evening meal being unable to sit at all (let alone comfortably) on the hard wooden benches in the refectory. The stripes were still clearly visible nearly twenty-four hours later and his buttocks remained tender to the touch.

Now, he watched impassively as the headmaster with more theatricality than was strictly necessary sighed once more and laid the letter on his desk. The headmaster once again thought angrily about the school governor who had insisted he take the wretched Grainger into his school as a favour to the governor’s friend (his mistress, the headmaster suspected but did not press the point).

But there was nothing he could do to alter the situation; he was stuck with Grainger for the rest of the school year and he ought to impress on the young man that he would brook no misbehaviour from him.  He had lectured Grainger until he was dry in the throat the previous day and there was little more to add this afternoon. It was better, the headmaster supposed, to get on with it and get the wretched boy out of his sight.

He rose from his chair and in a stately manner glided to the tall cupboard. Grainger watched with mounting concern as the headmaster found a key in his trouser pocket and opened the cupboard door. Grainger knew from painful experience what lay within. The telltale rattle of rattan against wood confirmed this. The headmaster turned to face the senior pupil and with more drama than was strictly necessary he swished a cane through the air, flexed it thoughtfully between his hands and then gave it another swipe.

Suddenly, the stripes on Grainger’s backside from yesterday’s caning reignited, involuntarily both hands caressed his backside. A caning on top of the one already suffered would be unbearable.  ‘I think you know what’s coming,’ the headmaster said without humour. ‘Stand by the coffee table.’ Grainger had been expecting to make another trip across the leather armchair and this unusual instruction confused him. He did not move. The headmaster swished the cane once more and to ensure there was no doubt in his instruction he pointed at the glass-topped table. ‘Stand there.’

Grainger’s legs would hardly obey him but he managed to shuffle cross the study so that he stood close to the coffee table. ‘Shorts, trousers down. Bend over.’ The instruction was cool and clear, Grainger’s face flushed and his heart beat rapidly. Another caning, he had expected but not this, not a beating on the bare.

The headmaster would never admit such a thing publicly but he rather enjoyed Grainger’s discomfort. He was angry that he had been saddled with the wretched boy and somewhat embarrassed that he had felt unable to refuse the school governor’s request. He would take his frustrations out on the boy himself.

An eighteen-year-old schoolboy feels a certain humiliation when he is caned on his backside by an older, powerful man. Grainger could testify to that. Now, he was required to heap humiliation upon humiliation and submit himself to the headmaster with his trousers and his underpants at his ankles. ‘B… b… b…’ he began to burble but he could not form a coherent sentence. He wanted to say something like he was sorry, he would promise to behave like an exemplary pupil in the months ahead. The headmaster would never even know that Grainger was a pupil at the school. He wanted to say something like that but only gurgles dribbled from his mouth.

Grainger could, at least in theory, refuse to accept this caning and walk from the study. An expulsion would certainly follow, even the school governor couldn’t argue against that. He could do this but Grainger had another cloud hanging over him. His father had already declared that if the boy did not buck up his ideas he would find himself disinherited from the family, there would be no financial support, he would have to make his own way in the world. He would live the life of a pauper.

The headmaster swished the cane, ‘I’m waiting, boy,’ he growled, his eyes narrowing and sweat forming on the collar of his shirt.

Later looking back on this moment Grainger could not remember how he managed to find the fortitude to unbuckle his belt and drop his trousers and how he edged his underpants down to his feet. He had a dim memory of leaning over the table, a hand at each side and seeing his own reflection peering back at him in the glass.

The headmaster watched him as he prepared. The cane marks on the teenager’s bottom were distinct. That did not deter him from his task. He stood a little to Grainger’s left, laid the cane on the fleshiest part of the cheeks, raised the cane to about shoulder length and whacked the cane home with some force. He silently delighted in the howl that then echoed around the study.

Five more cuts landed. The headmaster was not a monster, he could have ripped the boy’s bottom to shreds, leaving him bloodied. He did not do this, instead he raised another six welts to go with those from the previous day. Grainger’s bottom felt like it had been submerged in a bath of boiling water. It was alight and felt as if it had swollen to twice its natural size.

He could hardly breathe when he rose to his feet and he stumbled more than once as he reached down first for his underpants and then for his short trousers. Tears streamed down his face and his head pounded.

The headmaster, satisfied at a job well done, dismissed him curtly. Grainger hobbled down the passageway determined to be a more obedient and respectful pupil. The caning had served its purpose as a reminder of the importance of following the rules and upholding the values of St. Tom’s.

Picture credit: Sting Pictures

 

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Over the headmaster’s knee

The movie mogul

The boy on the train

 

 

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Traditional School Discipline

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More stories from Charles Hamilton II are on the MMSA website

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Charles Hamilton the Second

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