One of Britain’s greatest military commanders, Viscount Slim, has been accused of molesting children at a school for underprivileged youths while serving as the Queen’s representative in Australia.
Bob Stevens, a claimant in a lawsuit against Fairbridge Farm, a school in Australia for mostly British child migrants, said Viscount Slim would arrive in his Rolls Royce and the “next minute we were sitting on his knee and he's got his hands up our trousers”.
Mr Stevens, who was sent from England when he was eight-years-old, has given private testimony to Australia’s royal commission into child abuse and is preparing a submission to the commissioner seeking to have Viscount Slim, who died in 1970, stripped of his peerage.
Another former student, David Hill, formerly managing director of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the nation’s public broadcaster, has written a book about the school and said he was aware of two other boys who claimed they were molested by Viscount Slim in similar circumstances.
Viscount Slim fought in both world wars and became famous after restoring morale to the defeated soldiers of the Fourteenth Army – the so-called “Forgotten Army” – and leading them to victory against the Japanese forces in Burma.
He was labelled “the finest general World War II produced” by Lord Mountbatten.
His alleged abuse occurred while he was serving in Australia as Governor-General from 1953 to 1960.
The claim arose during a class action brought by 65 victims of alleged abuse at Fairbridge Farm School.
Mr Stevens said the abuse by Viscount Slim has “never left me and it can't leave me”.
"He used to visit Fairbridge and we were all in some cases given rides in his Rolls-Royce car, round the farm," he told ABC News.
“I don't care how brilliant a man he might have been militarily, if he abused children the way I was abused and others, I don't think people like that have the right to continue … in terms of peerage that goes on from family to family to family. I think it's outrageous.”
Bob Stevens, a claimant in a lawsuit against Fairbridge Farm, a school in Australia for mostly British child migrants, said Viscount Slim would arrive in his Rolls Royce and the “next minute we were sitting on his knee and he's got his hands up our trousers”.
Mr Stevens, who was sent from England when he was eight-years-old, has given private testimony to Australia’s royal commission into child abuse and is preparing a submission to the commissioner seeking to have Viscount Slim, who died in 1970, stripped of his peerage.
Another former student, David Hill, formerly managing director of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the nation’s public broadcaster, has written a book about the school and said he was aware of two other boys who claimed they were molested by Viscount Slim in similar circumstances.
Viscount Slim fought in both world wars and became famous after restoring morale to the defeated soldiers of the Fourteenth Army – the so-called “Forgotten Army” – and leading them to victory against the Japanese forces in Burma.
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| Field Marshal Sir William Joseph Slim (1891 - 1970) 1st Viscount Slim, inspecting troops during the Burma Campaign |
His alleged abuse occurred while he was serving in Australia as Governor-General from 1953 to 1960.
The claim arose during a class action brought by 65 victims of alleged abuse at Fairbridge Farm School.
Mr Stevens said the abuse by Viscount Slim has “never left me and it can't leave me”.
"He used to visit Fairbridge and we were all in some cases given rides in his Rolls-Royce car, round the farm," he told ABC News.
“I don't care how brilliant a man he might have been militarily, if he abused children the way I was abused and others, I don't think people like that have the right to continue … in terms of peerage that goes on from family to family to family. I think it's outrageous.”
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