Little Drifters: Kathleen’s Story

One night Mammy said she’d had enough and marched off towards the village to find Daddy and bring him home. We waited up, listening for the sound of my mother and father returning – it was late by the time we went to sleep and they still weren’t back. The next morning they were both there and Mammy didn’t say anything to us about what happened. Instead, she went out with my daddy the next night and they stayed out all night again. This happened night after night as Claire and Bridget were left, struggling to look after us, as well as the babies, Libby and Lucy.

‘Mammy, why are you leaving the children with us so much?’ Claire complained one night as Mammy put on her coat to accompany our father to the village again.

‘It’s not fair on us having to miss school to look after your babies. If this carries on, Mammy, I swear I’ll leave! I am not going to be looking after your babies while you pop them out year after year. I want a better life than this. You don’t even leave us with anything to eat. What kind of mother are you? Now you’re both irresponsible parents – how is this going to make our lives better?’

Mammy didn’t say much. She just went on with her work but we were all waiting for an answer.

We couldn’t understand it – why did Mammy leave us? It was hard enough with Daddy out drunk every night.

Then one day, as my father was preparing himself to go to the farm, he shouted at Claire to put the reins on the new mare that he had bought at the last fair. Claire had done this many times and thought nothing of it but today the young mare was in a skittish temper.

As she tried to fit the reins over her head, the mare got snappy and bit Claire’s face. Claire let out a sharp scream and pulled away, running back to my shocked father, crying in pain, both her palms covering her face. We could see blood streaming out the side of one hand. The next thing I knew, Daddy picked up a hammer and dashed across to the mare, bringing it down, smack, straight on top of her head. The horse came crashing down to the ground like a sack of potatoes. She was out stone cold. I was stunned at what my father had done. I thought he had killed the mare.

Meanwhile, Mammy started tending to Claire’s wound. The horse had severed the right side of her nostril from her face. Blood dripped everywhere as Mammy helped her to get on the cart so they could take her to the hospital. A few minutes later I was relieved to see the mare stagger to her feet, a little groggy, but otherwise no worse for her bash about the head.

Later, Claire returned with stitches to her nose, covered with a patch. And Daddy was so stressed by the whole episode that he stayed the night at the pub. Claire, horrified at having her nose half bitten off, was in such shock and pain she vented angrily at my mother.

‘I’m going to be left with a massive scar now. I hate this life. I’m not going to do this any more. I’m going off to get myself a job. I don’t care. I can’t watch any more what you and Daddy are doing to all of us.’

Mammy could say nothing to calm Claire down. And the more she tried, the more Claire ranted and screamed at her.

Bridget held Claire tight, trying hard to console her: ‘Hush now, Claire. You’re upset.’

‘No, Bridget!’ Claire wept. ‘I’m going. I’m really going. I’ve had enough of this miserable life.’

‘Now, now, Claire. Mammy needs you. You just can’t get up and go. Daddy won’t allow it. Besides, you’ll be better soon and it’ll all be forgotten.’

‘Forgotten? How can I forget all that’s happened to us? They don’t care. Why should they care if I leave? The only thing that’s stopping me is the children.’

They hugged each other now and all us young ones rushed to offer our comfort, burying ourselves in our elder sisters’ embrace.

Later, when Claire had calmed down we all decided to take a walk. My mother, Claire, Bridget, Tara and myself talked and joked about, and we teased each other as we walked. We were not far from the river when we saw our father about to cross the bridge from the other side. The bridge itself was only wide enough to allow a cart to pass through, and on either side, about a foot thick, there stood a three-foot-tall stone wall. We saw Daddy staggering towards us, so drunk he could hardly keep himself upright.

‘Look at that old fool!’ Mammy scoffed. ‘Your father’s as drunk as a skunk! He can’t even keep himself up. Mind, he’ll fall over the bridge if he’s not careful.’

I worried in that moment that my mother was right. He was veering uncontrollably from one side to the other.

‘Daddy! Daddy!’ I called out.

Daddy saw us, stopped walking and smiled wonkily. He looked like he was just going to sit down for a quick rest, backing himself into the wall on the bridge. But he went too far and toppled over backwards into the river. We heard a loud splash as my father hit the water.

‘Oh my lord!’ Mammy shouted. ‘What did I tell you? That flipping eejit just fell over the bridge!’

We all ran down the bank of the river to see what had happened to our father. Though the river was only about waist height Daddy was struggling to get his head out of the water, and every time he got up he fell down again as the river swept him off his feet. I watched anxiously as Mammy, Claire and Bridget waded into the river to rescue him. Mammy managed to catch hold of him and we all helped drag him to the bank. Claire took hold of one side of our drenched father and Bridget the other as they helped him home, all the while my father rambling on and on about the mare, not even realising he’d nearly drowned. We laughed about it the next day but Claire was quiet. The horse bite had been the final straw for her. Now a change was coming – the family I’d known and loved all my life was about to break apart.

Chapter 5

Needles and Haystacks

Claire had had enough of our hard life, and though just 15 and 16, she and Bridget decided to strike out on their own. The Legion of Mary charity helped them get nursing apprenticeships in Dublin, and just a few weeks after the horse’s bite they both left. Daddy couldn’t believe it – he was terribly fond of them both, but especially Claire. We all cried when they had to go – we loved our older sisters so much, they had brought us up and cared for us for so long. I didn’t know it then but I wasn’t to see Claire again for another ten years. Now we were left alone and, when Mammy was gone, it fell to me and Tara to look after the little babies. We did our best but it wasn’t easy – we were just five and six ourselves. One time Lucy found a bottle of medicine and drank it all. She was limp and floppy by the time Mammy got back and rushed her to hospital but luckily she survived.

One day, not long after Bridget and Claire left, a car pulled up by the wagons. Four people got out – a worker from the Legion of Mary whom we knew, a man that looked like a doctor and two others.

From what we could make out, they were chatting to my mother about the ‘im-you-nice-ay-shun’ of the children.

‘We’ve been looking to do it for a long while now,’ they were telling Mammy. ‘But we kept missing you. Every time we came to find you you’d moved on.’

We all listened curiously, not having a clue what they were going on about. Mammy went into the wagon and brought out Lucy. We saw the doctor open a large black case then a pull out a giant needle.

He attached a little vial of liquid to the top, tapped the needle then sunk the whole thing into Lucy’s chubby little leg. Poor Lucy screamed her little heart out but the doctor just went on with his work, pulling out another vial now and asking Mammy to bring Libby.

Just then the penny dropped and Brian, Tara, Colin and myself realised that we were next! Brian was out of the back window of the wagon like a shot of lightning and Tara, Colin and myself scrambled out quickly behind. We knew we had to get as far away as possible from that gigantic needle so we scattered all about the place. The folks from the Legion of Mary saw what we were doing then and shouted at my brothers: ‘Quick! Catch them!’

Aidan and Liam set off in pursuit but, try as they might, they couldn’t catch us because they were laughing so much. We darted in and out of the campsite, Mammy shouting at us to come back, Liam and Aidan dodging and weaving about, trying to pin us down. Eventually I felt Aidan’s firm grip on my leg and I fell face down into the dirt.

‘No, Aidan! Don’t let them do that to me!’ I begged, bucking and kicking at my brother.

I could hear Brian a way off, shouting and swearing his head off: ‘Let go of me, you feckin’ bastard!’

Someone else had hold of Tara.

‘Mammy!’ she screeched, petrified. ‘Save us, Mammy!’

But Mammy just looked on, unconcerned, now holding two bawling infants. Our brothers dragged us back to the doctor and I was trembling with terror as I saw the needle and felt it prick my leg. The pain seared up the side of my thigh and I cried out, terrified, until I felt my brother’s grip loosen and the doctor, having completed his task, moved on to the next one.

The next day Tara, Colin, Brian and myself resolved to get as far away from camp as possible. We didn’t want any more nasty surprises.

‘Come on!’ Brian yelled when he spotted the hay barn we loved to play in. It was one of our favourite games – we liked to pile bales of hay one on top of the other so that eventually we had a hay tower all the way to the top of the barn. That day we’d just built our tower to the top and we were climbing down again – I was in front with Tara and Colin behind me. There was just a little ledge at each level so you had to go down carefully from one level to the next. But Colin was impatient and pushed me from behind before I could get down. I missed my footing and fell all the way from the top of the tower to the very bottom. On the way, my leg got caught between two bales and my body twisted round. I felt something snap then and a stinging sensation in my leg as I came to a stop at the bottom. The others followed quickly behind and jumped down to the ground before running out of the barn, hardly paying me any mind. I wanted to run after them but I was dazed from the fall and my leg was still stinging. I tried to ease myself off the ground but my leg refused to move. So instead I crawled out of the hay barn with my arms.

I’d just got myself out into the yard of the farm when Tara came running back.

‘Come on, come on, Kathleen,’ she urged. ‘What’s wrong with you? Get up and walk.’

‘Tara, I can’t feel my leg,’ I told her. ‘I can’t even move it.’

All I could feel was this dreadful stinging.

Then she looked down and let out an awful scream. I followed the path of her gaze down my leg and got the fright of my life. All along my ankle I could see my white bones sticking out.

‘Oh my God!’ I screamed. ‘I’m dying! I’m dying!’

Before that moment I had no idea I was seriously hurt, but now I went into shock. Tara did what she could – dragging me through the yard, out the gates and putting me onto the side of the road.

Then she went and got my mother. Mammy came and she started screaming too and that alerted the farmer. Just then Daddy pulled up in a van with two other people I’d not seen before.

‘Look at the child’s leg!’ she shrieked at him. ‘Look at it! It’s destroyed. Look at them bones sticking out. Get out of the van and pick her up!’ Mammy’s screams were more terrifying than anything else – I couldn’t even cry because she was going so mad. But Daddy didn’t say a word. There she was, ripping her hair out, and he just drove off. So the famer put me in his car and drove me to the hospital, Mammy still ranting and raving.

Everything seemed to happen in a blur. We got to the hospital but they told us they couldn’t fix up my leg because they didn’t deal with broken bones. Instead, they put Mammy and me in an ambulance and drove us to another hospital. Here, they cut off my sock and shoe and said to Mammy that they were sorry but they would have to amputate my leg because I’d been too long without blood circulating.

Mammy turned on them fiercely: ‘There’s no way you’re taking that child’s leg! No way!’

So the doctors went away and when they came back they told us we were very lucky because it just so happened that a surgeon from America was visiting and he was a bone specialist. And he was going to try and save my leg.

‘Mammy, am I going to die?’ I asked her as they prepared me for surgery. I really didn’t know what was happening but judging by my mother’s hysterical reactions I reckoned it must be pretty terrible.

‘No, baby,’ she said, though her eyes didn’t look so sure. ‘They just have to put you to sleep for a bit so they can fix your leg back on again.’

‘You will stay, Mammy?’ I begged her. ‘You will stay until I wake up?’

‘Of course, baby. I’ll stay with you.’

I felt reassured at least that Mammy would be there when I woke up and she held my hands as they led me on a trolley into the theatre.

The last thing I saw were the bright fluorescent lights overhead, racing past. Mammy’s worried eyes. And then I was gone.

I came round in a dark ward, lit only by a few dim bedside lights. There were other beds all around me but everyone seemed asleep, except a couple of nurses going about their business in hushed tones.

I looked down to see my whole leg was encased in a hard white material, all the way from my toes to my hip. And Mammy was nowhere to be seen.

I had to stay in hospital for two whole months and I cried the whole time I was there, thinking nobody was ever going to come back and get me. There were other children in the ward too but they all had visitors – nobody ever came to visit me. For the first few weeks I was confined to bed, unable to walk, but as my leg healed I was given crutches to get me back on my feet. I couldn’t use them so I ended up sliding across the floor on my bottom to get around. I knew that if nobody was coming for me I’d have to make my own way home, so once I was out of bed I tried everything I could to escape. Each time the nurses’ backs were turned I was down on the floor and out the door. It drove them mental. Eventually they put me in a room on my own, and tied my hands and legs down to stop me escaping. I cried my heart out then.

Though, really, I didn’t have any reason to complain. In fact it was quite nice in the hospital. We had regular meals, new clothes and the doctor who fixed my leg even bought me a doll, a bribe to try and stop me escaping. I enjoyed playing with the other children on the wards. We’d all be putting bandages on ourselves and each other and there was even a school where we did lessons. They tried to teach me things but I couldn’t learn. I’d never been to school or been made to sit and listen to anything before in my life. I didn’t have the patience for it. All I wanted was to go home. I was missing everyone so much.

Every day I asked the ward nurses: ‘Are they going to come back and get me today? When is my Mammy and Daddy coming for me?’

But no one could answer my questions. I really thought they were never coming back.

One of the nurses had the idea of letting me sit and chat to the older folk in the next ward and that seemed to calm me down. So every day they sent me to the old people where I’d pass a pleasant couple of hours telling them all about Tara, Colin and Brian and all the things we liked to do. Eventually, one day the nice doctor who had fixed my leg came to me and said: ‘You’re going home today, Kathleen.’

I was so excited! My leg was still in plaster but now I’d learned how to use the crutches and I could get about quite well. I said goodbye to all the friends I’d made in my ward and also the old people’s ward, who seemed a little sad I was leaving, but happy for me when I told them over and over: ‘I’m going home. I’m going home!’

The hospital took me back in an ambulance and I asked the nurse in the front to let me know when she spotted our wagons.

Suddenly, she announced: ‘I can’t see any wagons, Kathleen, but I do see a pretty cottage.’

I was confused. We came to a halt and the nurse opened the back door of the ambulance in front of a long drive leading up to a large house in the middle of a skinny lane. The nurse helped me out the back and that’s when I saw my Mammy, Daddy and all my siblings emerging from the front door. A house! We had a new house!

Tara ran the quickest and she was upon me in a flash, cuddling me and kissing me all over.

‘Oh, Kathleen! We thought you were dead! We kept asking Mammy when you were coming home and she always said “soon” but then you never came so we honestly thought you were dead!’

‘I missed you!’ I said. ‘I missed all of you’s!’

Tara seemed fascinated with my leg, now encased in plaster, and she watched, intrigued, as I used the crutches to help me hobble up the drive.

‘We’ve got a house!’ she said proudly. ‘Look, a proper house! Come inside, I want to show you around!’

As I came to the doorway, Daddy knelt down to wrap me in a loving embrace, tears welling up from the sight of me. The others cuddled me too. Mammy was now holding a new little baby who screamed away in her arms.

‘Now just you be careful with that thing,’ she called, pointing to my plaster cast, as Tara led me inside the new house. ‘You mind them stairs!’

There were no hugs or kisses from her. Nothing. I didn’t even stop to ask why nobody had come to visit me in the hospital.

I was just happy and grateful to be reunited with my family. And in a house again. That was just grand!

Chapter 6

A New Home

‘Come on! Come on!’ Tara was breathless with excitement. She couldn’t wait to show me around our new home. I shuffled in through the big old-fashioned door with the latch and immediately I could see we had a large open parlour with a fire in the middle.

‘This here is our room,’ Tara beamed proudly, swinging open the door of a room on the ground floor to reveal two beds and a pile of clothes on the floor. I was pleased to see my dresses among them.

‘Let’s go upstairs!’ she shouted. But I was still on crutches and I looked at the steep stairs up to the second floor.

‘I can’t climb that,’ I told her, nodding towards my leg, still in plaster from my hip to my toes.

‘That’s okay – Aidan and Liam will carry you,’ she said, undeterred, yelling for the older brothers to pick me up so I could see upstairs. There was a second room for Mammy and Daddy and the little ones. And next to the bed I saw a brand new cot in the corner.

‘That’s for the new baby,’ Tara said authoritatively. ‘He’s called Riley. Oh, Kathleen, you’re going to love him! He’s just the most beautiful thing in the world!’

Afterwards, Tara showed me the outdoors – we had two acres to the front of the house with sheds all around the walls.

‘That’s for the dogs,’ explained Tara. Now Daddy had been busy while I was away, breeding pups, and the sheds were full of yapping dogs as well as Nellie our greyhound, an Alsatian and a little white terrier.

It didn’t take long for me to settle into our new life and I was so pleased we were back in a house. Of a night me and Brian, Tara and Colin would all curl up together on one bed, as we were all used to doing, even though there were two beds in our room. And during the day we’d go out exploring the fields and woodlands, though at first I couldn’t go very far because of my plaster cast. I was bursting to get it off so I could climb trees again with the rest of them.

It should have been a wonderful new start for us but Daddy was still troubled. And still drinking. One day the Legion of Mary came round with a present – a brand new television set.

‘Ohh!’ we gasped in wonder as we ran our hands over the smooth wooden box.

I’d seen a television before in the hospital but I never imagined we could have one ourselves at home so it was a real surprise.

‘Let’s get this thing working now,’ said Liam, and he set to fiddling about with all the wires at the back. Tara and I jumped around him excitedly while he shooed us away.

‘Get back.’ He swatted at us good-naturedly. ‘Can’t you let a man get on with his work?’

He was still only 15 himself but in our eyes Liam was already fully grown, tall and strong, just like our Daddy.

Finally, he looked up at us, satisfied: ‘Okay now. I think we’re ready. Tara, press that large button at the bottom, will ya?’

Tara did as she was told and at that moment the screen flickered into life and we found ourselves staring at a row of black and white lines.

‘Okay, give me a minute,’ said Liam. ‘I’ll just have to tune it up.’

Between the blasts of white noise we could just about make out the sound of two men talking. Liam twiddled a dial just above the ‘On’ button and eventually an image flickered, disappeared then reappeared and stayed steady – we could see two people sat across from each other on chairs, talking. We all cheered loudly at his success.

‘What’s that feckin’ racket?’ Suddenly we heard Daddy’s angry shouts as he strode in the front door.

‘Daddy! Daddy!’ we all clamoured. ‘Look! We got a television!’

‘No we bloody don’t,’ he growled. ‘Not with that racket.’

And he crossed in front of us, ripped the television free from its wires and flung it straight through the window.

It came down in the garden with a loud crash. We jumped up to look out at the television set, all broken up and smashed on our garden.

That was it. We’d had a television for about two hours. Then it was gone. We hadn’t even managed to watch anything on it.

Daddy’s tempers seemed to be worse than ever in the new house and poor Mammy bore the brunt. There were times he got so mad with her he’d fight her like he would a man, slapping, hitting and throwing her about all over the place. For us it was frightening and we all tried to run out the house whenever we felt the threat of a violent outburst. Now Daddy had a new grievance – the baby.

‘That feckin’ child ain’t mine!’ he’d tell her whenever he heard Riley screaming out from his cot upstairs.

Mammy would sigh, pure exhausted with the constant fighting.

‘Of course he’s yours, Donal,’ she’d reply, just like she’d said a million times before this.

‘No, he’s not. That child ain’t mine. I know he’s not mine.’

During these moments we’d dodge and weave through their legs, hoping to reach the front door to escape out of the house before things could get any worse. If they were fighting near the front door we had no choice but to run upstairs and hide in their room instead, hoping Daddy wouldn’t come up while he was still mad. None of us really thought too hard about what Daddy was saying – we all knew the baby was his too. It was beyond our comprehension to imagine anything else. Daddy was sick, that was the trouble, and his paranoia told him all sorts of things that just weren’t true.

One day Daddy’s rage started early and went on all day long, gaining power and momentum every time he came in the house. There was nothing Mammy could say to calm him down, and by evening he’d already drunk himself into a storm of fury.

‘Why don’t you just admit it, woman?’ he bawled at her, sending plates and cups flying as he swept a heavy arm across the kitchen table.

‘Admit what?’ she yelled back, darting behind the table to get away from him. ‘I ain’t done nothing, Donal. It’s all in your bloody head. You’re just so …’

But she never got to finish her sentence. Daddy flew across the room and jumped on top of her, pushing her back onto the ground. He had his large hands around her neck now and his eyes were like a man possessed – frenzied and demonic. He was pushing hard onto her throat, putting all his weight onto his taut arms, and she was choking, gasping for breath while her eyes bulged with terror. We had been playing by the fire but when we saw them like that we all ran out the house, terrified.

‘He’s going to kill Mammy!’ I whimpered, as Tara and I clung tight to each other in one of the dog sheds in the garden, a place where we liked to hide to get away from their fights.