Not being severely punished very often, it came as a real shock when it did happen. As a young boy my father would spank me.....not really that hard when I was very young, it was more the humiliation of having my shorts and underpants taken down than the actual pain that was inflicted. I was put over my father's knee and given about 10 hand spanks, enough to make me cry but mainly out of shame than from the pain. As I got older, however, the spankings became a bit more severe and I started to avoid, as much as a young boy can avoid, getting into trouble. So I was spanked only 2 or 3 times a year.
However, for older boys things were different. Being Scottish, the traditional punishment instrument is the tawse. In my youth it was quite normal for most households to have a tawse and quite normal for most fathers to use it on their son's hands and bottoms. By the time I reached my early teens I was promised that any major transgression would result in a session with the tawse. No more hand spankings for me!
Our home was not unique and had the traditional family tawse. This is probably hard to believe but it's true.....my father's brother had given him the tawse as a wedding present. Nice uncle! It was about 18" long, made of heavy brown leather and had 3 tails. It was kept in a cupboard in the livingroom which meant every time I had to fetch something from the cupboard I was reminded of what might happen to me if I misbehaved.
And misbehave I did. Not very often but I did have a few sessions with the tawse. This usually meant being sent to my room to wait for my father. I would wait there, sometimes for an hour or more, all the time my stomach churning. When I heard him coming up the stairs my _c_o_c_k_ would shrivel up and many times I nearly wet my pants with the fear of what was to come. He would open the door to my room and walk in with the dreaded strap in his hand. The usual punishment was four of the tawse on my hands and then six on my bare bottom. I always, but always, dreaded those thrashings.
The most severe thrashing that I ever got was when I was about 13 years old. I had been smoking in a building site across from my house. A few of us used to go there as the workmen would give us cigarettes if we ran small errands for them. The building site was a great place as you could smoke and be sure that no-one would see you. I had been doing this for a few months but one day I went home and my mother smelt the smoke on my clothes. She asked me if I had been smoking and I denied it of course. She called my dad in (I think he was in the garden) and he asked me if I had been smoking. Again I said no, but it was much harder to lie to my dad as I knew if I got caught I would get thrashed. My face must have given me away as he obviously didn't believe me. Meantime my mother went into the pockets of my jacket and found an unsmoked cigarette and also one that I had half smoked and then stubbed out. She showed them to me and at that point I knew I was in for it.
My father ordered me to go to my room and wait for him. I waited about half an hour, all the time dreading the thrashing that I knew I was going to get (but always at the back of my mind I thought that he would let me off....wishful thinking). Eventually I heard my dad coming up the stairs and then my door opened. He walked in with the strap in his hand so I knew I wouldn't get off. He told me to stand up in front of him and strip off to my underpants. I remember protesting saying that I had only tried half a cigarette but he said that he didn't believe that and yet again ordered me to strip. He always said that if he had to take my clothes off I would get extra.
So, I stripped off and stood in front of him in my underpants. He lectured me about smoking, all the time waving the dreaded strap in front of me. He told me that I was going to get 4 on the hands and 6 on my bottom and that this would be a thrashing that I remembered for a long time. I could feel my stomach churning and, as usual, my _c_o_c_k_ was shrivelled up with fear. Suddenly I could feel pee streaming out of my _c_o_c_k_, gushing past my foreskin and filling my white pants, then running down my leg. My dad nearly hit the roof....shouting at me, telling me that I was a disgrace (or words to that effect), that I was a stupid little boy who thought he was big smoking but not so big when it came to getting a thrashing. I stood there in my wet pants, the warm pee running down my legs, crying and sobbing. Dad then told me that I would get six on the hands and twelve on the bottom, the extra punishment for wetting my pants.
It was awful standing in front of him in my wet pants, the last remnants of warm pee dribbling down my legs and seeing the strap being raised up ready to beat my hands. The first stroke was, as usual, a shock. If you've never been strapped on the hands it's difficult to understand the intense pain that shoots through your whole body. Then suddenly your hand is ablaze and you just want to rub it, to do anything to alleviate the dreadful pain. However, my father was in no mood to be messed around so I stood there, crying, waiting for the rest of the strapping. After 2 more strokes on one hand I had to hold out the other.
The strapping was very hard and didn't bode well for what was to follow. I was told to take my pants down (but not off). When I had done that (which was not easy withburning hands) I was made to assume my usual position over the end of the bed. It was terrible lying there, sobbing like a little boy, knowing that I was going to get 12 really hard lashes of the strap on my bare bottom.
And I did get 12 hard lashes. The first one was terrible....the sting from the strap is unique but this was the hardest I had ever been given. I jumped up, not protesting but just crying hysterically but was pushed back down again. (Being 13 or so, I was no match for my father) So back down I went to receive the rest of my punishment. Twelve very hard strokes of the tawse, the Scottish strap that has been in use for years, reminding boys that their father's had the power to punish, to hurt, to correct.
In between strokes my dad would lecture me about the dangers of smoking and how bad it would look for him if I got caught. I just cried and cried, my bottom getting hotter by the minute, each stroke leaving a burning hot sensation. I also got lectured about being a little boy who wet his pants and reminded that that's what the extra strokes were for. Lying there, with my wet pants round my ankles I didn't really need reminded.
When the strapping was over I was made to stand up and pull my wet pants up. They were wet around the back and the cold pee now clung to my red hot bottom. I was made to stay in my room, with just the wet pants on for about an hour before being told to have a bath. Getting into the hot water was terrible...I started crying again when my bottom touched the hot water. That was the worst thrashing I ever received.