This week, after 12 years of campaigning, I finally got to see Warwick School admit, after years of denial, that historic abuse had taken place and it made a full apology to we victims in a letter sent to thousands of current parents and former pupils. Having been cold shouldered by certain former teachers and pupils for my efforts I slept well that night. But, on reflection, this not a time to let up because there is still unfinished business.
The sadistic old bastard who physically abused me twice but terrified me for almost a year, Geoffrey Eve has been banned from the school for several years after my early complaints. His numerous victims who contacted me, and who I encouraged to contact the school, all received a private apology from the School last year. But events are so long ago and Warwick, conveniently, lost all the records, that would show how it protected and covered up for him, so there can be no legal action taken. And Warwick has not named Eve. He is a very old man (97) but I’d like his family, friends and neighbours to know what a sadistic bastard he was, making the lives of numerous small boys, including an eleven year old me, an utter misery. I doubt that will ever happen and Eve will be allowed to die in peace.
As I flagged up earlier this week, the far bigger scandal of historic sexual abuse has not been dealt with in full. The CPS is, after two years, still sitting on a file about one paedophile teacher. Six Warwick pupils gave statements about the abuse they suffered at his hands. One killed himself earlier this year. The CPS still dithers. When it decides, one way or another, I will be able to name this nonce and shall do so.
And then there is the music teacher who I attempted to doorstep earlier this year and who was interviewed by the police under caution in 2018 about allegations made by one OW. The Old Bill opted not to prosecute as this man is fairly old and in very poor health and it was 1 vs 1. But back in 2019 I spoke to another victim who, totally wrongly but understandably, feels too ashamed to give formal evidence though the Old Bill is aware of him.
After my first piece on the music teacher a third OW contacted me and he has reported abuse he suffered to the Police. Yesterday, after the Warwick letter went out another OW contacted me. He is an incredibly respectable chap, one of the OW stars of his generation. I trust him 100% and he will be going to the Police this weekend. So, the Police will, within hours, be aware of four men who all claim to have been victims of the music teacher. Just how many does it need to re-open the case?
The music teacher was at Warwick for more than a decade. Paedophiles cannot help themselves so, I am afraid that there will almost certainly be many more OWs with stories to tell. Now that OWs have an admission from Warwick that abuse did happen, I’d hope more former pupils will come forward and maybe this time the Old Bill will act. You do have to ask: just how many victims are needed to come forward before the case is re-opened? In an era of #MeToo surely 4 is enough?
The real scandal here is that whilst this teacher was at Warwick (in the 1990s and early 2000s) a mother of a boy complained about his inappropriate sexual behaviour towards her son. Warwick did nothing. When, a few years later, he took early retirement, Warwick gave him glowing references so he went to Scarborough to earn a living giving private piano lessons, mostly to little boys and girls, in his own home. I really cannot bear to think about that. Warwick School has an awful lot of questions to answer.
You may say that a man is innocent until proven otherwise and that I should not name him. But wholly independent testimony from four boys in different years at Warwick convinces me that the music teacher was up to something. You may say that he is a frail old man who lives in a dingy end of terrace house in Scarborough and needs a carer to help him get up, go to bed etc and he should be allowed to die in peace. I have considered that, but then I have had his victims talk to me through floods of tears about a man whose actions have scarred their lives. They are the victims for who I feel sympathy, not their abuser.
One victim stated that while he was abused by the music teacher in, of all places the Chapel, he was aware that another master was watching what was going on. I know that there were a number of paedophile teachers at Warwick. All should be exposed.
By naming this alleged paedophile as Charles Watmough, as I do now, I hope this article will be shared among OWs who may not be the sort of rugger hearties keen to stay on the school mailing list, the sort of folks who like me, have been left with every reason to have a lifelong hatred of Britain’s third oldest school. And perhaps that will encourage other victims to step forward and give a statement to the Warwickshire Fuzz just forcing it to act
As Alex Renton has detailed in his superb programmes on public school sexual abuse, the kids all knew or had an idea something was wrong. What Watmough is alleged to have done was not a secret. If at least some of the boys knew, how on earth did the teachers have no bloody idea? Of course, they did it is just that too many of them were abusers of one sort or another themselves, and nobody at all dared speak up. I know of many good teachers at Warwick but the atmosphere and culture at that ghastly place at that time stopped them doing anything then. Those decent men and women are, I know, supportive of something being done now.
I am told by someone who is aware of the man whose file the CPS is dithering about “I recently attended a reunion for those that left in 1993 when Mr Watmough and Mr Eve were openly discussed.”
What needs to happen now? More OWs who were victims of paedophile masters at Warwick, such as Charles Watmough, need to come forward now that Warwick is publicly confirming that they are not alone. I urge other victims to contact the school but also me ([email protected]) so that I can try and hold both Warwick School and, more importantly, Warwickshire Police to account if nothing happens.