Horrors Behind St Claire’s Convent

A Memory of Pantasaph.

My elderly mother recently passed away. On a return journey from Wales my partner and I called to the convent for a look around. As a child my mother was a resident of the orphanage between the ages of 5 and 16 between the 1930s and 1940s due to her parents dying. During my mother’s life she mentioned snippets about the convent including that she was given bread and dripping for breakfast and on arrival, all of her hair was cut off. The nuns also made her and other orphans stand at the bottom of their beds and hold their underwear up to see whether they were soiled. If they had wet the bed, they were punished. My mother was given no education and could only ever spell her name when she left the convent. I believe she was neglected of physical contact and was not allowed to speak to other orphans. As an adult, she rarely spoke about her experience at the convent, I expect this is a result of the traumatic time she spent there. I was horrified to recently read other comments of similar mistreatment stories - as her only son, I found these discoveries to be very disturbing.