Being imprisoned in a cruel Magdalene laundry left me with 'no soul'
It is hard to imagine how Maureen Sullivan rebuilt her life after enduring devastating trauma as a child. Following the death of her father, she was raped repeatedly by her stepdad, and when she spoke out about what happened after four years of abuse, she was incarcerated.
Maureen, now 73, was one of the youngest girls to enter the Magdalene Laundries – institutions run primarily by Catholic religious orders where so-called 'fallen women' were sent. Inmates, often young and vulnerable, were forced to work in harsh conditions, usually doing laundry for local businesses, the church, or the state.
Maureen was sent to the Magdalene Laundry at St Mary's Convent, New Ross, County Wexford, where she was forced to work long hours scrubbing floors and washing clothes, and denied an education. She was ostensibly put there for her own safety, but the experience proved to be the final nail in the coffin of her childhood, which had already been devastated.
Speaking from her home in Carlow, Ireland, about the abuse she suffered at the hands of her stepfather Marty, she tells Metro: 'I was so full of fear, it felt like my body was burning. It's a very horrible way to feel. And I couldn't understand what was happening to me, couldn't put a name to it. He was pure evil.'
He warned Maureen that if she told anyone what was happening, nobody would believe her. 'It's what paedophiles do. They will groom a child and call them a liar. If you say that you are hurting, or something has happened, they will say: 'Sure, don't mind her. She's a liar.''
So the little girl kept it inside, all the while enduring pains in her hips and abdomen and cramping so bad she would vomit. It went on for years until one day, at the age of 12, a teacher approached Maureen and took her into her office for a private chat.
'She said: 'Maureen, you really look pale and unwell, and I'm concerned about you. I know something is wrong.' She had a lovely box of Black Magic chocolates and gave me a few. I'd never seen lovely sweets like them before, and I started talking,' Maureen remembers.
The Priest was called and a letter given to her mother. It was decided that she was to go immediately to live at the convent at New Ross. Relieved to have escaped Marty, she thought she was going to get an education and come home at weekends, but when she arrived, Maureen realised life was to be very different.
As a survivor of sexual abuse, she was kept away from other children. 'Because I could 'corrupt' their little minds', she remembers. 'How cruel is that? I wasn't able to talk to them or play with them. I was stripped of everything a child should have and was left with nothing.'
Instead, there was hard labour and long days. Maureen was woken at 6am and began the day by washing, polishing and shining corridors, windows and doors. She would then attend mass, have breakfast and go on to spend the day working in the Laundry. At 5pm she would have tea and then attend 'recreation'.
'Recreation was making rosary beads and sweaters for Lourdes, Rome and holy places across the world,' she remembers. 'There was no such thing as recreation. We would do that until bed at 8 o'clock. We'd be exhausted. They didn't need to worry about us talking or whispering to one another, we didn't have the energy.
'You'd then go to sleep and have nightmares about whether you'd got it right. It was horrible; no play time, no sitting and having a chat… It just didn't happen,' she adds.
Maureen would work five days a week, and the weekends would be spent cleaning the church or the nuns' apartments. Her hands were left sore and burnt from the soul-destroying work and she was given a new name; Frances.
'You were left with no soul. You had nothing. It was very cruel,' she remembers. 'It felt as bad as the original abuse I'd suffered. I was thinking – 'why did I tell my teacher? Why did I open my mouth?' Isn't that sad?'
Maureen's presence in the laundry was kept secret from the outside world; if inspectors or other visitors arrived, she was put in a tunnel to hide. Once, aged 14, she was locked in for hours and forgotten about. She became hysterical and it took her days to get over the traumatic incident.
After two years, the young girl was transferred to another laundry in Athy, County Kildare and then to a school for blind people in Dublin.
'My education was taken from me, my hair was cut, I was used as a child slave. I was trafficked from laundry to laundry and my name was changed,' she remembers starkly. 'It really damaged me for years. I should have been enjoying life in my early years, but I didn't. It was worse than prison, because we had no rights.
'After that, I didn't cope very well. I never thought anything of myself, it destroyed all the enjoyment I should have had. I never celebrated a birthday or anything about my life. I couldn't warm to or trust anybody. It was horrendous what was done to me.'
Maureen left as soon as she could, aged 16, and took the boat to London with her brother Patrick where the pair decided to build a new life.
They slept in Argyll Square, Kings Cross, with no sleeping bag, pillow or money to their name. When, after two months they found the Irish Centre in Camden Town, they were given a room.
Without an education, Maureen was limited to jobs in laundries and restaurants.
'I was getting more and more depressed and getting flashbacks. Memories of my stepfather, of what he did. Memories of the laundry and the way I was treated. Of sleeping in a park and how anything could have happened to me,' she explains.
She married soon after she arrived in London andhad two children, but Maureen admits she was miserable. Just 19 when she had her daughter, she was so full of 'fear and confusion' she struggled to parent. Her son came 15 years later.
By the time she was 34, Maureen made an attempt on her life and ended up in hospital, where, for the first time, she started receiving therapy. She has had counselling every week ever since and has slowly managed to rebuild her life.
Her mother, who had ten children by Marty, left him shortly after her daughter was incarcerated, but when Maureen was in her thirties she learned her stepfather was terminally ill and he'd asked for her to come and see him.
'I went into the hospital room in private, because I didn't want to hurt his other children. It wasn't their fault,' remembers Maureen. 'I told him I couldn't forgive him for what he did. He replied: 'Oh, you were a silly little girl. I was only getting you ready for the outside world.' Imagine saying that? It's sick. I told him: 'I hope you rot in hell' and left the room.
'I felt nothing when he died.'
In 1995, Maureen moved back to Carlow to be with her mother and determined to help others like her, she started working as an advocate for laundry survivors. More Trending
She also joined Justice for Magdalenes, the group that helped bring about an apology from the Irish State, and has been involved in honouring the names of women of the laundries who were buried in unmarked graves.
Maureen helped unveil the the Journey Stone at the Little Museum of Dublin in 2022, to honour 'the great courage, integrity and dignity of the women' who had been in the laundries. The following year she published The Girl in the Tunnel about her experiences, in the hope that it would help other survivors of abuse.
Despite her initial parenting struggles, she and her children have grown very close. However, even now, people are trying to force Maureen into silence, she says.
'I was invited onto Oprah and somebody emailed to try and stop me going on. People say I make stuff up, that I'm a liar. Really nasty stuff. The latest rumour is that I am a bigamist,' she adds.'I don't know why they do it. I think they begrudge me speaking out, but I don't care. I will never stop talking about what happened to me and other survivors.'
'The Good Shepherd Sisters remain focused on providing whatever support they can to women and children who were in their care and continue to offer help and pastoral support wherever possible. We support victims and survivors in several ways.
The Congregation has made financial contributions to the Towards Healing support service since its inception almost 30 years ago. This means that any victim or survivor who requires support has access to a free, confidential, independent counselling service for as long as they need.
Many former residents and their family members remain in contact with and have good relations with individual Sisters. This is encouraged and acknowledged as an essential encounter in the healing process.
The Good Shepherd Sisters have co-operated fully with several historical inquiries, including detailed testimony from many of its members and by providing extensive files and documentation. We continue to engage with ongoing investigations.
We do not comment publicly on individual cases, but we strongly encourage anyone in need to contact us directly.'
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13 hours ago
- Metro
'Taking my rapist to court was worse than what he did to me'
When Danielle* was raped, it was by someone she knew. A few years on, she still finds it hard to say the word. It's no surprise given all she's been through – but the damage isn't just down to her attacker, she's also been left traumatised by the justice system. Danielle tells Metro that the day after her assault, she phoned the police only to be told by an officer: 'Do you really think it's a good idea to report this?' 'He explained to me what I was likely to experience and implied that I shouldn't bother. He terrified me,' she remembers. It took nine months for Danielle to find the strength to officially report her assault and another four years before the case went to trial – only for the defendant to be found not guilty. Waiting years for a rape case to go to court only to see the person who assaulted you get off isn't unusual in the UK. Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) statistics reveal that of the 68,000 rapes reported to police in England and Wales in the year ending 2023, only 5% resulted in a charge. Of that figure, just 2.9% ended in a conviction. No one, simple reason explains such low conviction rates; but ongoing beliefs in rape myths and the huge burden placed on victims to supply evidence certainly helps to create barriers and prevent rape survivors from rarely get justice. According to the 2021 London Rape Review, 65% of rape cases result in the victim eventually withdrawing from the process. 'Throughout my whole case, the person who gathered the evidence was me,' explains Danielle, who is in her thirties. 'For example, I'd spoken to helplines the day after the rape, but the detective said they had tried to gain the transcripts and it wasn't possible. It took a lot of time, but I managed to get the transcripts myself.' 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'By providing better support for victims and shifting our focus to the perpetrator's behaviour, we are starting to rebuild trust and confidence, and we are seeing a steep increase in arrests and charges. 'If you have been a victim of rape or sexual assault, I urge you to come forward and report this to the police. Your report will be treated sensitively, and we will listen and investigate with respect and empathy. We work closely with Sexual Assault Referral Centres (SARCs) and Independent Sexual Violence Advisors (ISVAs) and we would urge anyone who is not comfortable with going to the police to use these independent specialist services instead.' APCC Joint Victims Leads, PCCs Clare Moody and Matthew Scott, said: 'It takes great courage to report a rape, so it is vital that victims and survivors of this terrifying and traumatising experience are placed front and centre of the criminal justice system. Far too few cases of rape make it to court and those that do can take years to reach trial, so the process must ensure victims are – and feel – listened to, informed, and treated with fairness and dignity if we are to encourage the reporting of sexual offences. 'Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs), elected to act as the public's voice in policing, are key to ensuring victims know and understand the support to which they are entitled, and to ensuring that the highest quality and consistent support is available. We provide vital services such as Independent Sexual Violence Advisers, therapy and counselling in order to help victims directly. 'As PCCs, we hold our Forces to account to make sure they are delivering their obligations under the Victims Code. We promote victims' rights and support them in challenging the system when things go wrong. 'PCCs fully support the government's pledge to halve violence against women and girls within a decade. In the meantime, it is critical victims of crime can access timely support as they cope with and recover from the trauma they have experienced and navigate their way through an unfamiliar and complex criminal justice system. We will continue to work with our partners to deliver the best outcomes for victims.' Do you have a story you'd like to share? Get in touch by emailing Share your views in the comments below. MORE: I asked my partner to choose the porn I watched for a week MORE: Married teacher posed as boy, 14, to get young girls to send him explicit photos MORE: The forgotten UK social networking site that wrecked and rekindled relationships
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18 hours ago
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Boy, 16, killed in 'hit and run' was walking 'to pick up a takeaway'
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19 hours ago
- Metro
James Argent's ex-girlfriend shares update on injuries after he pushed her
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