William Gorry was born partially sighted to Catherine and John Gorry in Ballyowen, Co.
Offaly.
The couple had 13 children and two of William’s brothers were disabled.
In 1975, William’s mother Catherine left them and William and his four younger siblings were taken to the industrial school at Mount Carmel in Moate, Co. Westmeath by a social worker.
The school was run by the Catholic nuns of the Sisters of Mercy and was set up to care for orphaned or abandoned children.
However, at the school, the children were treated like a slave and would do backbreaking work, scrubbing floors, would do laundries, and would be physically and emotionally abused.
William would take care of his little brother Thomas, who had brittle bone disease, would feed him, would bath him, and put him to bed.
He was also doing backbreaking work up to 12 hours a day.
William said: “The tears, the upset of my brothers and sisters, the thought of my father being upset and being lonely was all too much for me.”
He told that the head nun severely abused him as she would bang his head against the wall if he would not clean her office properly.
He said: “I was told that I was useless, stupid, blind and hopeless, nobody would love or want me. I was constantly humiliated.”
After seven months, William was sent to a staff member’s room for putting up Christmas decorations.
When the man spilled a soft drink over William’s trousers, he asked him to remove his clothes.
William told: “He told me to take my clothes off and he would wash me down and then he started fondling me, before masturbating me.”
“Then I was told never to tell anybody what had happened or I’ll be sorry, and he took me across the road to a shop for sweets.”
William was sexually assaulted countless times at the school.
Once a trainee staff member raped him while in another incident, two priests abused William and his disabled brother Thomas the whole weekend.
William said: “There was kissing, fondling, sucking and penetration, things that I still find very difficult to talk about. We could see each other’s suffering and pain, while they took turns to abuse both of us a few times over the weekend.”
When Thomas was 12-year-old, he was taken to Lourdes by the local charity the Order of Malta on a disabled children trip and he never returned.
William was told his brother died but later it turned out he didn’t die.
William said: “It is now 37 years and it has been eating me up the whole time. I have cried so much wondering what happened to my loving brother. Was Thomas given away or sold?”
William was one of 30,000 children placed in 50 of Ireland’s industrial schools where children were being abused mentally and physically.
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