Paul Connolly - Against All Odds

T HE M OST A MAZING T RUE- L IFE
S TORY Y OULL E VER R EAD

P AUL C ONNOLLY

To my best friend in childhood, Liam Carroll.
Rest in peace, mate.

And to all the other boys and girls
from St Leonards, many of whom are
also no longer with us.

Some names and locations have been
changed for legal reasons

This book could not have been written without the seeds of self-esteem planted in me by Mary Cuckney, when I was still a child; special thanks to Mary.

Ian Mecklenburgh, Trevor Schofield and Chris Clapshaw have long been good friends and have always provided me with fantastic support. Thank you, guys.

I would also like to thank Deirdre Nuttall, who provided me with a writing service throughout the production of this book, from start to finish, and without whose assistance I would never even have had anything to send to the publisher.

Above and beyond all, thanks to Jo Cole, my partner in life and the mother of my two wonderful sons, Harley and Archie.

I T HAD BEEN many years since I had seen any of the children who had grown up with me, who had been my sisters and brothers throughout my childhood and adolescence. When I left the childrens home at St Leonards, I promised myself that I would have nothing to do with them ever again; that the past was over and the future, such as it was, was in my own hands. I was sure that my only chance of living a good life would be to put the past behind me, even though that meant saying goodbye to some of the people I loved the most as well as the ones I hated more than words could even begin to express.

For people in my world, it was never good news when the police knocked on the door, and I had several good reasons to be anxious on this particular occasion. I knew them as soon as they turned up; police have a distinctive way of knocking that one becomes familiar with over the years. I peered out of the window at them to confirm my suspicions, but I didnt answer the door, hoping that they would just give up and go away quietly. I didnt think I had anything to answer for at present, in any case. I was used to avoiding contact with the police, usually with good reason.

They kept coming back, two female constables in plain clothes that did nothing to conceal the fact that they were police officers. Eventually, I decided that, if the police were really going to nick me, they would not have sent two women. The police knew me well and they knew that I would easily be able to take out two men, let alone a couple of girls, if I were so inclined.

I answered the door. I didnt open it all the way; I did not want to look too welcoming.

Whats up?

The women looked at me with a degree of sympathy. One of them smiled. She was a real stunner; a gorgeous young woman whose formal, tailored clothing did nothing to hide her shapely body. I relaxed a little. I may have even smiled.

Can we come in for a moment?

I suppose.

I stood aside and the two women walked in the door of the first home I had ever owned and paid for on my own.

You might want to sit down, one of them advised me. Weve got bad news, and you should prepare yourself for a shock.

Im fine.

I stayed standing. I dont like people telling me what to do, especially in my own home, even if they are pretty young women.

Its about St Leonards.

St Leonards? What about it?

St Leonards was the childrens home where I had grown up, in the part of East London that spills over into Essex. I had not been inside its doors for years, and I did my best to think about it as little as possible. Years before, I had decided that I was fucked up enough on my own; I didnt need to have to deal with the stress of being around or even thinking about other fucked-up people. Quite the reverse I needed to seek out the company of sane, normal people and focus as hard as I could on keeping things together for myself. That was the only way to sort my life out. I had cut all my ties with my past, my family and the childrens home where I had spent the worst years of my life. If you lie in shit, you smell of shit.

I didnt want to smell of shit.

What is it? I asked the police officer. I havent been to St Leonards for donkeys years. Whats all this got to do with me?

Paul, it has been brought to our attention that, of the eight children in your dorm, only two of you are still alive. She paused. The two women looked at me solicitously.

I sat down. I was only thirty-five. Surely that wasnt right. How could all those boys with whom I had grown up be dead? It didnt make sense. I waited for her explanation. It turned out that six of us had died, several by slow suicide in the form of heroin abuse, and at least two by faster means.

There have been complaints made of serious abuse, including sexual abuse, during the period when you were at St Leonards. A major investigation is ongoing, and we would like to talk to you. We are going to have to talk to everyone who grew up in St Leonards when you were there, but your name in particular has come up in some of the evidence we have been hearing. Apparently, you were a witness to the attempted rape of one of the other children

Tell me what happened to the other boys, I requested numbly.

The policewoman listed the names of the boys who had been like my brothers when I was growing up. One of my old friends, Mark Byrnes, had taken a dive into oblivion off Beachy Head. Youve got to be more than a little desperate to do something like that. Liam, who had been my very best friend throughout all the years of my childhood, had jumped on the tracks at Mile End Station and died under the wheels of a commuter train. What could be worse than that? What had happened to him that had made him so desperate? I wasnt even sure that I wanted to know.

He was schizophrenic apparently, the woman said of Liams death, as if that was a mitigating factor. As if that made it less awful.

Liam was dead. Liam. I felt sick. I wanted to hold my head in my hands and close my eyes but I just sat and stared at her as she continued: Weve started an investigation into the St Leonards childrens home, Operation Mapperton, to find out what went on there and why so few of you are still alive. We understand that you grew up in Wallis Cottage which was she checked her paperwork run by William Starling.

Starling. I had not heard that name for years. In an instant, I was reduced to the little boy who had been told every day, Youre rubbish. Youll never amount to anything. Look at you, you fucking retard. You Irish lowlife scum. Youre just a bloody Connolly, arent you? Prison fodder from the day you were born, you little shit. Who ever loved you? Nobody, thats who and nobody ever fucking will.

My parents were Irish, from the beautiful wilds of Connemara, on the windy Atlantic seaboard, on the most westerly coast of the European continental shelf. My father was the seventh son in a family of fourteen, and my mother, a trained midwife, was from a smaller family, also local. My father, Matthew, had grown up in a minuscule labourers cottage in the middle of nowhere in rural Galway, and had a lot of poverty to escape from. My mother, Mary, was from rather more affluent circumstances; her father owned a local pub, which meant that he was one of the wealthier people in the area. I dont think he was very impressed when his daughter married a boy from a rough cottage. My parents had already had six children together when, like so many Irish people in the late fifties and early sixties, they came to look for work in the East End of London. Now, Connemara is one of Irelands most loved tourist destinations, but back then it was a poor place, the rough stony ground challenging the local farmers to eke out a meagre living, and jobs and a good livelihood painfully difficult to come by.