I had seen what happened to other boys who screamed and
tried to avoid being struck. They were forced to lie across a bench, with one
boy holding down their head, and another their feet. Then, with the naked
posterior the highest part of them, the strap was applied. The sting of the
lash seemed more than a boy could bear and it seared his soul with bitterness.
Punishment had reached a fine point of cruelty in this
reformatory, which could better be called a deformatory. Standing at attention
on a line has been dropped by the Army as being too cruel, but at Boys Aid I
saw many a boy standing at attention until every muscle in his body ached. One
boy steed at attention until his legs went to sleep. He screamed with pain. The
guard jeered, Softy, booted him off the line and kicked him around the room
until the boy’s body was covered with bruises and so was his soul.
The cruelty was hard to take. The loneliness was worse. The
dormitory, about one hundred and fifty beds, was on the top floor. That’s an
awful lot of boys without moms or dads in one room! After lights out, I lay
there in the darkness listening. At first, it was quiet. All I could hear was
the steady breathing of some of the boys. Then, Jimmy, the boy in the bed next
to me, would sob with loneliness, and then Fredie, on the other side. Soon boys
all around me were sobbing. And me, too.
The guard on duty jerked Jimmy out of bed and made him stand
on the guard line in the cold until he stopped crying. Then with a threat to
the rest of us, Jimmy was ordered, Get back in bed and is quiet.
Mostly the sobbing stopped. We were too scared to cry.
Though oft times I could hear some guy heave a big sigh in his sleep. I’d lie
there while the fog clouded the window and the fog was no gloomier than my
soul. My hart, and the heart of plenty of the other guys, was crying silently,
aching for someone to put his arm around me. I’d pray the prayer Mom had taught
me, now I lay me down to sleep but it wasn’t much comfort. Soon I’d drift into
a troubled sleep. I wasn’t a bad guy in those days, just a kid with too much
energy and no dad to control and direct that energy. I wallowed in my own
misery and learned to hate everything about the Boys Aid, everything, that is
but one of the teachers.
I think her name was Miss Fishbaum. She was cute looking and
kind to all the boys. Only, I thought, she was nicer to me, and so, I fell in
love. She became the bright spot in my life. I determined that no one was going
to make her any trouble in the classroom. One of the boys did. When we went
into the yard at recess, I warned him to treat her right, and to prove my
point, I fought with him. The guard separated us, demanding, “Who started
this?”
I hung my head and said nothing. The other boy didn’t snitch
either. You tell me or the guard threatened.
I knew he meant the strap. By this time I knew there was no
justice in this place and decided to run away again, and not back to Mom!
My special pal at Boys Aid was Jimmy. He and I talked over
how unfair the place was and we made our plans. We took strong yellow soap and
held it tightly under our arm pits to the hospital ward, where at night the
watchman came around only about every three hours. The guards thought we were safe,
as they had taken away all our clothes but our shoes and given us sort of a
half-nightgown. But another buddy had stolen a couple pairs of jeans and
smuggled them in to us. After the lights went out, Jimmy and I waited until the
night watchman made his rounds, and then we were ready.
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