Home Is Where The Hurt Is

Colm Begley South Beach 18FEB17

n glorious days gone by, GG used to travel the world, interviewing all de big stars in London, LA, New York and even Tallaght.

Westbank Greystones

One-on-one sitdowns with people like Paul Newman, David Bowie, Beyonce, Scorsese, Richards, and literally thousands of others.

And rarely, if ever, did nerves come into it, with each and every interview approached with the simple mantra, Treat Celebrities As Equals, Not Inferiors.

So, why the hell is GG nervous this morning, even though we’re meeting a fellow Greystonian who couldn’t be friendlier or more relaxed?

Colm as a kid…

Well, for one, it took quite a long time, and effort, for Colm Begley to become this easy-going. Almost two decades, in fact.

And that’s because Colm Begley spent the first 16 years of his life in a Greystones orphanage called Westbank, home to 50-plus children who, in recent years, have come forward with two very different and opposing accounts of their childhoods there.

For some, it was a blissful upbringing, a true home, with its founder and sole proprietor, Adeline Mathers, the greatest mum an orphan could ever wish for.

Adeline ‘Auntie’ Mathers

For others, it was a living hell, where they were regularly beaten, often starved, and sadistically punished for the smallest indiscretions.

The latter included, reportedly, mysterious injections by Nurse Joyce – still resident there – whenever anyone wet the bed.

Followed by, on occasion, a tin bath wash in front of the entire home.

Having found Auntie’s tough love approach somewhat lacking in love but coming with truckloads of tough, Colm Begley belongs firmly in the latter camp, his claims of abuse joining the growing calls for justice after the story of possible abuse at Westbank first broke with a Sunday World story in 2010. The following year, and RTE’s Would You Believe? screened Auntie’s Family Secrets, on June 5th, 2011, with both sides of the divided house – which closed down in 1999 – given space to put forward their arguments.

Colm was just 10 weeks old when he was taken in to Westbank by the surrogate mother who liked to be called Auntie. A born-again Christian, Auntie was a firm believer – with all that implies. – and often renamed the new arrivals, giving many her own surname.

And so it was that, for almost the first 20 years of his life, Colm Begley believed his name was Robin Mathers.

It was back at the end of the 1940s that the Protestant Home For Orphan And Destitute Girls moved from its original Harold’s Cross HQ to, firstly, Kimberley House and then the Burnaby, before settling into its New Road premises in 1968. Now also taking in boys, Auntie’s refusal of funding from the state or from mainstream churches meant that Westbank was largely a law onto itself. Running with no real checks or balances, the fact that Westbank was a Protestant orphanage in a very Catholic Ireland meant that it could operate almost entirely off the radar.

It’s only now that people are shining a light inside the orphanage, with claims of sexual abuse, beatings, illegal adoptions, and cruelty. For some, like Colm, there’s a feeling of too little, too late, as they fight for justice, and recognition from the trustees of Westbank of the hurt and damage caused.

Arguing that Westbank took away both his pride and his identity, the fact that, in later years, Auntie refused to reveal Colm’s real name, or his family history, only added further hurt to injury.

Auntie knows best

This was all happening as many in the town held Adeline Mathers up as a shining light, with then Fine Gael councillor George Jones and St Laurence’s School principal Mrs Catherine Coveney both singing her praises in the RTE documentary. Auntie was even awarded the Greystones Person Of The Year 1995.

The hope for Colm and others who claim to have suffered greatly during their time in Greystones is that the government will give Protestant homes such as Westbank the same legal recognition given to similar Catholic homes. Indeed, with the passing of campaigner and former Westbank resident Victor Stevenson last year – who fought tirelessly to give a voice to those who suffered in religious-run homes and orphanages – Fianna Fáil’s spokesperson on Children & Youth Affairs, Anne Rabitte, called on the terms of reference of the Mother And Babies Home Commission to be re-examined to include the Westbank orphanage and other Protestant homes.

So, now maybe you can understand why GG was nervous talking to Colm Begley this morning. Which is why our questions are so stupidly stilted.

This man’s journey to adulthood was no Disney movie, and the fact that he’s a happy, smiling, friendly man today is testament to his incredible inner strength… 

Slowly, steadily, the wrongs of Westbank are being addressed, as this Irish Times report from November 17th 2021 shows.