The cane illustrated is the one given to me when I taught at Stockingford Boys, School, Nuneaton in 1951. I was advised by the head to use it in the first lesson to establish my standards of discipline, which I did. Three boys in the back row were called up front and sacrificed on the alter of corporal punishment. I threw up in the school yard and never used the cane again in my 35 year career as teacher and headmaster.
While a Bablake pupil in Lincoln in 1941, Seaborne gave me a licking for a long forgotten "crime" and I am reminded of similar circumstances during a ritualistic caning at Hinckley Grammar School two years later. It is not for nothing that when I announced to my physics teacher that I was to become teacher, he observed; "A poacher makes the best gamekeeper. You should do well"
How I became a legend

It was a relaxed, long walk to Spring-heel Jack the Headmaster and his green baize, sound-proof office door but I knew the way and, after all, locking a French teacher and her class in a room was not a capital offence. The Assistant Head's pudgy finger (well-known by the senior girls) beckoned me in and I assumed the familiar stance in front of the big oak desk. Upright, feet apart, head erect, hands joined behind my back -just a nice balance between respect for authority and self-confidence.

The crime book was opened and the charge read. I pleaded guilty and waited for the order to assume the next position. In front of the cupboard containing bamboo canes of various thick-nesses was a leather armchair and I knelt down burying my head into its familiar smell and touch. As my jacket was lifted clear and my buttocks checked for padding, I heard the swish of canes being tested for suitability. Swish! Swish! Swish! He was choosing like a swordsman testing a rapier for weight and balance.

A hand descended on my neck and I braced myself. In the pause that followed came the mantra refined and repeated for generations designed both to ease the conscience of the giver and to establish a sense of submission in the receiver.

"Do you agree that the punishment you are about to receive is justified?"

"Yes. Sir."

The pressure on my neck increased. I tensed and down it came. A thousand red-hot needles. Then, as if anesthetized, the pain ceased. They came in threes; I tensed again. Swish! Needles! Relief. Swish! Needles! Relief.

Tradition had it that Spring-heal Jack would give six of the best if the crime warranted, but not this time surely? I was wrong. Three more. By this time the pain had ceased and I thought not of the punishment but the return to the classroom where my upper-lip would have to be stiff, my smile fixed and my sitting in the chair be fast and firm. After all, I was a boy.

I tried to rise after the sixth but was held down. I was about to establish a new record. A legend; the boy who received nine strokes of the cane. My name would be spoken in hushed tones for generations to come. "Do you remember Charlie Cook? On May the 1st. 1943 he had nine of the best." "Get away!"
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