It was the Monday afternoon of the last week before Christmas break in the late 1970s.
By tradition, although not formally linked to any church, we had an annual advent service at the local Catholic Church, St Mary’s, which was only a stone’s throw from the school gates.
The whole school would attend, the first years at the front and sixth formers at the back.
Some of the singing was OK, but most of us still found it a chore as it was the same each year.
Three of us were together in a row; Mary and Trish, like me, would rather have been anywhere else.
We had to leave our bags in school to pick up after the service, but Mary realised she had a pen in her coat pocket.
She opened the hymn book stored on the shelf in front of her and drew noughts and crosses frame at the bottom of one the pages, then she put a nought in one corner. A
h, noughts and crosses!
And so the game began.
The priest droned on.
We had another carol, which was a blessed relief, and then we went back to the game.
Whilst the organ was blaring, we did not hear the soft squeak of the wooden doors 20 yards behind us, nor the quiet footsteps of a nun who had just entered.
We were all more interested in the game.
Suddenly, a hand landed firmly on Trish’s and my shoulders simultaneously.
Our heads shot around, as did Mary who was sitting between us, to see the nun glaring through her small glasses with a look that made ice run through our veins.
“How dare you!” was all she said at first.
“We will deal with this after the service.
Do not even think about leaving!” she hissed, seemingly without even moving her lips.
‘Crikey, we’re in for it! All three of us,’ was instantly thought by all of us.
Defacing church property was one thing, getting caught red-handed was something else.
Ten minutes later, the service ended and most of the pupils left.
The nun watched us like a hawk and went to speak to our Miss B, who was shaking hands with Father M.
A few seconds later, both of them snapped their heads around to look directly at us.
Miss B looked like she was about to blow a fuse.
Father M looked angry and the nun was gesturing to imitate writing and a book.
Miss B beckoned to us and we slowly rose from the pew and slowly walked down towards the altar.
“What on earth were you three thinking? Sister C tells us you have defaced a hymn book with a stupid game of noughts and crosses.
Please tell me she has made a mistake somehow, girls,” demanded Miss B.
We all three looked at our feet and shuffled in a most guilty way.
“No Miss,” I finally acted as spokesperson.
“I am afraid Sister C is quite correct,” I said, close to tears, partly for the guilt of what we had done, but also for what I expected to happen next.
“I am sorry, Father, we were distracted (I avoided bored) and, well, it just happened.”
“The book and pen just appeared like a Holy Miracle, did it?” said Father M.
“No, you wilfully defaced a hymn book in the sight of The Lord and tried to lie your way out of it, girl.
Miss B, I believe these girls have earned themselves a severe punishment which I hope you will see to, on my behalf,” he continued.
“I thoroughly agree, Father. These girls do certainly need to be disciplined, but,” Miss B said glaring at each of us in turn.
“I think it would be far more appropriate if you were to administer whatever punishment you see fit, as it was the Church’s property that was damaged, and it happened in your domain, not mine.”
Father M, to be fair, was a fairly good-looking chap, probably in his mid to late 30s, but he looked like a bunny in a car headlights at the suggestion Miss B had just presented to him, and he blushed and sweated immediately.
I actually felt sorry for the man.
Fancy asking a young celibate man of God to choose how to punish three naughty schoolgirls.
I was actually shocked at Miss B’s lack of tact for once.
After a few seconds, I think the penny dropped with Sister C and Miss B simultaneously.
“Oh, I am sorry Father. What was I thinking of?” Miss B said, sounding for the first time I could ever recall, genuinely flustered.
“That is alright, Miss B,” Father Michael replied. “I just do not think it is, err, appropriate, for a man of, err, the cloth to…”
“You are, of course, quite right, Father M,” Sister Charlotte said in full agreement.
“The very thought of it. However, if the Father would give his consent, I would be very happy to act in his stead.
As a female, I have no issues with punishing these girls, if you agree, Father?”
“That would be very kind of you, Sister,” Father Michael said with more than an air of relief in his voice.
“Excellent, Sister,” Miss B interjected. “But I would appreciate it, Father, if you were to at least witness these three girls receiving their punishments.”
“If you think that really necessary, Miss B.”
“I do indeed, Father. I do indeed,” she repeated for effect. “Shall we go through to the vestry, Sister?”
With that, the line of six went through a hidden secret door below the organ pipes and into a small, thankfully quite warm, vestry.
Sparsely furnished with a small table, four chairs, a coat stand and a large row of hooks on the wall, and two inbuilt cupboards, the room would best be described as functional.
Miss B looked at the three of us and told us in no uncertain terms, “You should be thoroughly ashamed of yourselves.
I will leave your punishment to the Sister here to decide, but you will each get a letter to take home tomorrow to your parents telling them exactly what has happened today, what your punishment has been, and also asking them for money to pay for a new hymn book.
I hope you think well on your stupid actions.
They have put you in a bad light and cast a shadow on our over 100-year relationship with St Mary’s, for which Father, Sister, I am deeply, deeply, sorry.
Now, if you will, Sister, I think it is about time you made these three vandals sorry as well, Sister.”
“Indeed so, Miss B. The three of you, take your coats and your cardigans off, please, and hang them over there,” Sister Charlotte took charge and, whilst we put our clothes on the hooks as directed, we heard the scraping of a heavy chair on the solid stone floor, which could only mean one thing.
We turned around to see Sister C smoothing down her habit as she sat waiting on the chair, which was now in the centre of the room. “Alright, you first,” she said, pointing at Mary. “Come here.”
Mary stood by the nun’s side, awaiting her fate.
She did not have to wait long. Taking Mary by the arm, Sister C pulled Mary over her waiting lap and moved her a couple of times until she was happy with her placement.
This was clearly not her first time spanking naughty bottoms, I remember thinking.
Without delay, Sister C raised her right hand up to the height of her shoulder, and I noticed for the first time that her hands were not small and dainty, but large, almost paw-like and muscular, almost manly.
Whilst this was registering, the hand disappeared in a blur and thudded into Mary’s left buttock with an awfully loud smack.
“Oww!” came out of Mary’s mouth.
“Quiet girl!” Sister C said as the second spank landed on the opposite side of Mary’s bottom.
Again and again, the paw struck home.
Waves spread all-around poor Mary’s bottom, thighs and chest as each spank’s energy rippled out.
Her head bobbed in time with the rhythm of the spanking and soon tears flooded down her face.
She howled with each additional blow.
Sister C had probably spanked her 25 or 30 times before she finally stopped and let Mary get up.
Still crying freely, Mary hopped about as if on hot coals and was rubbing her sore bottom for all it was worth.
“Now you, girl!” said Sister C, pointing directly at me.
‘Oh well, at least I am not last,’ I thought, and rather than be pulled unceremoniously over the nun’s knee, I moved quickly enough to do it myself.
That was some price rescued in my book.
That lasted about 3 seconds, exactly the amount of time it took the nun to clamp me down with her left paw and apply the first colossal blow to my bottom.
“Jesus Christ” I blurted out and then instantly regretted it.
“Do not take the Lord’s name in vain, young lady!” scolded Sister C as the second spank landed directly on top of the first.
She’d done that on purpose, I thought. Spank, spank, spank.
Another spank every 5 seconds or so, moving around my already sore bottom, spreading the pain widely before covering the same ground again and again.
I was not counting, but I knew I must have had the same number of spanks as Mary already.
However, the Sister’s hand beat on regardless.
I remember glancing quickly at Father M, who had a strange expression, somewhere between ‘you poor soul’ and ‘that serves you right’.
I was really wishing he had elected to spank us now.
I suspect, although 100% more embarrassing for the three of us, it wouldn’t have hurt anywhere near this much.
Finally, Sister C stopped and I got shakily back to my feet, determined I was not going to give her the satisfaction of rubbing my bottom, which was absolutely on fire. I had managed not to cry either, which I think upset the nun. Good!
“Now, finally, you,” Sister C said to Trish who, like me, moved quickly to avoid being dragged over her knee.
She managed to plant her bottom in the right place, so I guess this was not Trish’s first spanking.
Again, a further avalanche of 20 or 30 spanks landed on her green school panties, her bottom and upper thighs quickly changing from almost pure white to dark pink in seconds.
Like me, she kept the tears back, not wishing to give her spanker any more reward than she was probably getting already from these three spanked young backsides.
Spanking finally over, Trish smoothed her skirt nonchalantly and stood emotionless next to me.
‘Good on you,’ I thought.
“Right, girls, get out of my sight.
Get back to school and collect your things, and come and see me tomorrow after classes to collect your letters,” Miss B instructed.
“Once again Father, Sister, I am so sorry for today’s events. I hope you both feel that the punishment fitted the crime.”
“Oh yes, very much so,” said Father M, somewhat flushed from what he had just witnessed.
We made our way home via school to retrieve our bags.
Trish and Mary knew they’d get a good telling-off when the letters arrived, but I knew I had to come clean.
Mum had this rule, you see; get punished at school, get punished at home, so paying £2 or whatever towards the new book was the least of my worries.
Mum was home when I got in, so I thought it better to get it over with.
“Hi love, have a good day at school?
How did the service go?” mum asked as I entered the kitchen.
“What’s wrong, love?” she asked.
“Sit down, mum. I have something I need to tell you which is going to make you mad with me,” I said sadly.
“Go on, what have you gotten mixed up in now?” She said, reading me like a book.
“We got in trouble. Mary, Trish and I for playing noughts and crosses in a hymn book.
It was so boring. Mary got a pen out and started a game.
Then a nun caught us, dobbed us in to Miss B and the Father.
She asked the Father to spank us, but the nun did it instead.
It really hurt.
She had a hand as large as a man’s and it was more like a paw.
It hurt as bad as the slipper.
It was really bad, mum,” I said, trying to get some level of sympathy, but failing miserably.
“Is that it?” mum asked.
“Miss B is sending a letter home. We have to buy a new hymn book to replace the damaged one,” I added.
“What’s with the ‘we’?
That will come out of your pocket money, young lady,” which is what I expected to hear.
“Sorry, mum. I know what we did was bad, but we have been severely punished by Sister C.” I tried to make it sound like it was not a school spanking, therefore perhaps the rule did not apply.
“I know you are sorry, love, but you know the rule, spanked at school or in school time and you get another spanking at home.”
Mum left me in no doubt.
I hated that rule. I could accept a spanking for being naughty or stupid or whatever, but this was double jeopardy.
“I can spank you now and get it over with, but I realise your bottom will be sore from the Sister’s spanking.
Or, we can wait and I will spank you at bedtime. Your decision.”
She was right, my bum was still stinging, but I hated going to bed on a spanking.
“I suppose I’d rather get it out of the way, please, rather than going to bed with a very sore bottom,” I said dejectedly.
“I think that is a good choice, love.
Pop up to your room I will be up in a moment,”
Mum said without anger, just very matter-of-factly.
I slowly climbed the stairs and pushed my door too. e.
Then, I heard mum’s foot on the creaky third step and knew this bearable pain in my bum would soon be much worse again.
A gentle tap on the door, which then swung open as mum calmly walked in. Mum, bless her, never spanks when she is angry, only when calm and considered.
I forlornly looked at the carpet and then back up at mum.
I waited a couple of seconds, then asked her in a depressed tone, “How do you want me, mum?
Do you want me to put my pillows in the middle of the bed and bend over them for you?
Or should I bend across the side of the bed?
Or do you want me across your knee?”
I was actually hoping for over the knee.
The pillows are reserved for her hairbrush which was, fortunately, a very rare occurrence.
More commonly, I was asked to bend over the bed which signalled that her slipper was going to get an airing, but she did not have that with her.
Over her knee usually just meant a hand spanking, but occasionally I had been given a taste of her slipper in that position as well.
Mum pulled out the chair from my vanity table and sat down on it.
“I think over my knee will suffice as you are still sore from your earlier trip over the Sister’s knee.
I suspect this won’t be as hard, but something on top of what you had earlier. I can promise you it will smart, a lot!”
Dejectedly, I pulled my panties tight across my bottom and dutifully lowered my tummy into position.
Having been here so many times before, I knew the exact ‘sweet spot’ I needed to lay in so mum would be happy with the positioning of my bottom before she started. I lay there waiting for the spanking to begin.
Thankfully, she did not keep me waiting.
Her hand made contact after less than 10 seconds, which was a relief as there is nothing worse than laying there, waiting, expecting.
Spanks followed rapidly, perhaps every 3 or 4 seconds, and she was right, they did hurt much more than usual.
This time there was no point fighting the tears out of bravado, so I just let go and sobbed so hard my shoulders heaved up and down, but I still lay there and took my punishment.
“There,” mum said. “All done. You can get up now, love.”
She must have just been admiring her handy work.
“Get changed, and wash your face. Dinner will be ready in half an hour,” she said as she gave me a loving hug.”
“Thank you, mum,” was all I could say.
After dinner, I told mum I was going to finish some homework but soon just got ready for bed and laid on my side, not my back.
The next day, Trish and Mary asked if I had got another spanking and, of course, I told them I had, over mum’s knee.
They, like me, thought it very unfair but there wasn’t much I could do about the rule.
After the last lesson, we went inline into Miss B’s office and collected our sealed letters. I
gave mine to mum when I got home.