“In the 1950s ‘The rules were rigid, the discipline harsh. I was present when a 15-year-old boy… was caned on the bare buttocks by an 18-year-old… a nice bloke who I met years later… 6 strokes – so hard the skin split and bled. He had bruising for 6 weeks – His sin? – he rang home from the public phone. He remained bitter for decades.’

“Without enough adult supervision, the boarding-house prefects might develop ‘pet hates, always picking on the same kids’. This set up a pattern whereby boys became resentful and this subject to further caning for insubordination. An ordinary boy might be caned six or ten times, and some boys were caned dozens of times. For boys whose punishment at home up till then had been the odd slap, caning came as a shock. So did the physical sequelae. David Brand (1972) drew colour illustrations of his bruises as they bloomed and faded over several weeks.”