I Used to Get the Cane At School

The slipper and cane were used at both my schools. They both hurt but the cane was always regarded as more serious and significant. At junior school only the head used the cane but at my secondary other senior masters like the deputy head and heads of year could cane.

At junior school the head caned on the hands. I got it twice there, one stroke the first time and two on each had the other time. That really hurt! And it took a long time for me to hold out both hands but the head just carried on despite my tears.

At secondary school the cane was always on the bottom whoever gave it. I got it eight times there in all from first year to lower sixth.

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ArishMell · 70-79, M

Quite the rebel, were you? :-)

Or were your senior masters just cruel?

Caning on the hands can be dangerous because there is very little tissue over a lot of complicated, delicate structures; but perhaps teachers who used that did not know that - or did know but did not care.

I think my junior school headmaster did have a cane but in my four years there never heard of him more than threatening it, and that only once. I recall vaguely it was to a pair of rather nasty so-and-sos who had been baiting an elderly man just outside the school. I remember our form teacher in the Fourth Year there once smacking a boy's hand, with his own hand not a weapon, and saying he normally did not need do that more than once a year.

At grammar school (LEA, mixed, about 1100 pupils) I don't think I heard of more than two or three boys being caned. It was a rare last resort or for particularly serious offecnces. There may have been others, though the playground samizdat tended to spread gossip about only your own Year. I don't know what happened to any girls sent to the Deputy Head (a woman).