Introduction:
In April 1990, a five page cover story in NOW magazine revealed how:
‘An English upper class gay network abused boys at orgies in Irish country homes and castles, according to new claims which link the vice ring with the notorious Kincora Boys Home in Belfast. The network included royal uncle, Lord Louis Mountbatten, the disgraced Keeper of the Queen’s Pictures, Sir Anthony Blunt, and Her Majesty’s Deputy Lieutenant for Co Tyrone, Capt. Peter Montgomery.’
The piece was written by Frank Doherty and me, David Burke (under the pen name John Byrne). The full article can be downloaded by clicking the link at the end of this story.
1. Media disinterest allowed child abuse to continue.
RTE, BBC NI, The Irish Times and other media platforms ignored the revelation. An opportunity to place pressure on the RUC to put a halt to an Anglo-Irish child abuse network was missed. Countless lives were destroyed. The ring was protected by the massive cover-up organised to conceal the truth about Kincora Boys’ Home in Belfast. Kincora was one of a number of state institutions involved in the child sex abuse scandal. The overwhelming majority of abusers were left to get on with their lives. The victims were Protestant children.
The Irish Times, a newspaper with well documented connections to the Foreign Office in London, the black propaganda Information Research Department (IRD), and the British Embassy, ignored the revelation (and many others involving MI5 and MI6 dirty tricks). Later, the paper had no qualms about reporting child rape perpetrated by Catholic clergy.
Ed Moloney was an exception to the rule at The Irish Times. Moloney was the paper’s Northern editor. He produced reports on the scandal in the early 1980s. He also carried out investigations into Official IRA-Workers Party corruption. The paper spiked his Official IRA investigation. The Official IRA attempted to get its allies in the UDA to murder Moloney. He later left the paper and went to work at The Sunday Tribune.
The paper has developed a sectarian approach to reporting child sex abuse. In April 2025, The Irish Times was criticised by the Press Council and the Press Ombudsman for ignoring child abuse perpetrated by Protestant paedophiles.
For details about MI6’s influence at management level at The Irish Times and the plot to murder Moloney, see our series on the newspaper commencing at: Our Man in Dublin. [WebBook]
The series can be found at: https://coverthistory.ie/tag/irish-times/
Chris Moore worked for BBC NI. His new book describes how a number of his managers sabatoged his inquiries into Kincora. They ruptured his relationship with a key souce he had inside the RUC. Moore’s new book on Kincora contains new information about Mountbatten’s complicity in the scandal.
2. Robin Bryans.
The primary source of the 1990 NOW article was Robin Bryans who was described as the author of seventeen books and that he was:
‘better known by his pen-name, Robert Harbinson. He wrote for many years from London for The Irish Press under that name. He is a cousin of ‘Hellfire’ Jack Bryans, the late Imperial Grand Master of the Orange Order. In 1979, when Mrs Thatcher admitted that the Keeper of the Queen’s Pictures, Sir Anthony Blunt, was a Soviet spy who had received a secret pardon, Robin Bryans was identified in British newspapers as the man who had revealed the truth about the spy to the satirical magazine Private Eye. Blunt and Bryans had been part of the London upper class gay scene for many years. Bryans claims he drew attention to the vice ring in 1972 when he wrote to various people in authority in London. He says any inquiry into Kincora should examine letters he sent in the early 1970s. NOW magazine has obtained, from a source other than Bryans, a copy of a letter sent by registered post on 26 September 1973.‘
3. A wider vice network than just Kincora. It included Portora Royal, Williamson House and Bawnmore.
Bryans revealed that Kincora was part of a wider network:
‘Bryans stresses that Kincora is only a part of a much wider child-sex abuse scandal which dates back to the 1940s. He says this began when a friend of Sir Anthony Blunt, the late Alfred Arnold, became secretary to the Stormont Prime Minister, Sir Basil Brooke. Arnold, an Englishman played a key role in Northern Ireland affairs until 1967. He and Blunt had been at Cambridge University together. ‘The Kincora thing will be covered up. I would love to go on talking if I thought it was going to come out, but it’s not. because I know how the establishment works,” said Bryans. “Be careful of the word Kincora, because you are going to limit it. There were other homes involved. There were three homes. There was one for boys from 12 to 16, and then there was one for younger ones“.’
4. Mountbatten and Portora.
Portora Royal College was part of the network:
‘Bryans says that boys from Portora Royal, Northern Ireland’s most prestigious public school in Enniskillen were also abused. They were in demand by members of the upper class gay ring who preferred boys who were younger and of a higher social class than the teenage boys at Kincora.‘
Bryans pointed out that Lord Mountbatten’s sexual activities were known by many in Britain:
‘Lord Louis Mountbatten’s homosexual activities have been well-known in British society and media circles for many years. But only since his death have specific details begun to emerge. One of Britain most respected writers on spying, former intelligence officer Richard Deacon, in his latest book The Greatest Treason, says that the Americans always believed him to be a security risk because of his homosexuality.‘
Mountbatten had boys trafficked to him from Portora:
‘[Bryans] claims Lord Mountbatten, known to the Royal family as ‘Uncle Dickie’, was actively involved in the gay ring. “Mountbatten was a great one for boys in the first year of public school, like at Portora Royal, which was 13 and 14,” he said.‘
In 2016-17, Sir Anthony Hart, a former Portora boy, chaired a calamitous inquiry into the Kincora scandal. He failed to probe promising leads, ignored facts, vilified whistleblowers and even managed to contradict himself; all the while exhibiting a breathtaking bias in favour of MI5 and the RUC. He managed to find no wrongdoing by the state.
5. Lord Rosse of Birr Castle.
The NOW article revealed that Lord Rosse of Birr Castle was also part of the vice ring:
‘In one letter, of which NOW has obtained a copy from another source, there is a reference to an alleged incident at Birr, Co Offaly. It refers to “the old snapshots at Birr Castle showing the late Lord Rosse getting Alan Price to flash his prize codpiece for Lord Mountbatten and Anthony Blunt“.’
6. A fear of certain elements of the press in the Republic of Ireland.
While MI6 had its array of assets at The Irish Times, there were reporters elsewhere in the Republic who did not bend the knee to Her Majesty’s diplomats and spies in Dublin. The British establishment, (in particular, MI5, MI6 and the Cabinet Office), were afraid of elements of the Dublin media which they did not control:
‘Bryans who knows a large number of intelligence officers through his links with [Sir Anthony] Blunt and Capt. Peter Montgomery, says that they are always afraid something is going to come out in the Dublin papers. The first media reports that Sir Maurice Oldfield, former head of the Secret Service, was gay appeared in Dublin. Later Mrs. Thatcher confirmed this in the Commons.‘
7. A pair of paedophiles: Sir Anthony Blunt and his Irish lover, Captain Montgomery. Two friends of Mountbatten.
Bryans drew attention to the role played by Anthony Blunt:
‘According to Bryans, Sir Anthony Blunt, the infamous MI5 traitor, and other members of the vice ring regularly travelled from London to Ireland. “The gay scene was one of the reasons why Blunt loved Ireland. He often stayed at Blessingbourne; Captain Peter Montgomery’s estate near Fivemiletown on the Tyrone-Fermanagh Border. Sometimes he stayed with the Duke and Duchess of Abercorn,” said Bryans. .. Blunt met Peter Montgomery at Cambridge in the 1930s where they became lovers. While Blunt acquired another Ulster lover. Belfast-born soldier John Gaskin, who lived with him for many years until his death, he and Peter Montgomery remained life-long friends. Montgomery, son of General Sir Hugh Montgomery, and a cousin of the wartime hero, Field Marshall Montgomery, was Her Majesty’s Deputy Lieutenant for Co Tyrone. He died two years ago.‘
Montgomery trafficked Portora boys to Mountbatten:
‘Montgomery, as Her Majesty’s deputy lieutenant with an estate not far from the Mountbatten Irish home at Mullaghmore, Co Sligo, provided the link between Portora Royal School and Mountbatten.‘
Montgomery was also the link to Kincora. Boys from the home were taken across the border to places such as Co. Donegal to the home of Henry McIlhenny:
‘Montgomery was also the link with Kincora. “Most of the boys didn’t actually go Classiebawn Castle (Mountbatten’s Co Sligo home) they went to Henry Mcllhenny’s. He had Glenveagh Castle, in Co. Donegal, which now belongs to the Irish nation,” said Bryans. Mcllhenny was a millionaire whose money came from Tabasco sauce and gas meters, according to Bryans. He was an active member of the vice ring until his death several years ago.‘
8. Sir Knox Cunningham, another friend of Mountbatten.
Bryans also exposed Sir Knox Cunningham MP. Knox was mentor to James Molyneaux, leader of the dominant Unionist Party, 1979-95.
‘As part of the Orange gay scene Peter Montgomery was friendly with another Cambridge old boy, Sir Knox Cunningham, the homosexual Unionist MP for South Antrim.’
Knox was also a friend of John McKeague, an MI5 agent, sadist, former bodyguard of Ian Paisley, torturer, serial killer, ally of the UVF, and leader of the Red Hand Commando.
“According to Bryans, Sir Knox Cunningham and Alfred Arnold in 1966 assisted [John] McKeague to escape from a charge of molesting two boys.‘
In addition, Knox Cunningham knew William McGrath, the ‘housefather’ of Kincora.
9. Sir Maurice Oldfield, another friend of Mountbatten.
There were revelations about Sir Maurice Oldfield, MI6 chief, 1973-78, and Ulster Security Coordinator 1980-81:
‘Sir Maurice Oldfield, was also a member of the gay network. Bryans and Oldfield often met at the Secret service chief’s flat in London’s West End. “Oh, yes. Marsham Street, I know the flat very well. That’s where Blunt was interviewed too,” he said in a reference to the confession [Sir Anthony] Blunt made to Ml5 there admitting he was a Soviet agent.‘
Oldfield and Mountbatten also knew each other:
‘According to Bryans, Lord Mountbatten and Oldfield were linked through their mutual friend, Labour MP Tom Driberg. Bryans says that despite Mrs Thatcher’s claim that Sir Maurice had not been a practising homosexual while he was head of the Secret Service, Oldfield was an active gay until shortly before his death from stomach cancer.
‘“He had this thing. Several of them had it. If Tom Driberg could go into Russell Square toilets (in West London) and pick up a boy at his age, then so can I. Blunt was the same. You see they loved danger, they adored danger so they said prayers (carried out a certain gay act) in this public toilet,” said Bryans.‘
‘He said Oldfield was over in Ireland many times before being appointed Ulster Security Coordinator. “You must understand that there are letters to Peter Montgomery and Anthony Blunt about Oldfield being there,” said Bryans. Asked who wrote those letters he said: “I did. And Oldfield was alive at the time and read them, because they were handed over to him. That was in the Seventies when he went over there.” Asked if he had copies of the letters, Bryans said: “They were all before the High Court. I was served with three gagging writs and later jailed for contempt because I insisted on talking out. But you see it eventually came out in Private Eye about Anthony Blunt, despite that. And now some of the stuff about Kincora is coming out”.
‘“Be very careful. There are one or two people around Fleet Street who are trying to whitewash Oldfield and say, ‘Oh no, he didn’t do these things.’ The only honest person about this is Tom Driberg. He gave some idea of what was going on on his book, Ruling Passions.’”
10. Peter England of British Intelligence.
Bryans also exposed the part played by Peter England, a British intelligence officer who masqueraded as an official of the Northern Ireland Office at Stormont:
‘“The main thing to do with covering up for Kincora was a man called Peter England. He’s dead since about 1979. I knew him very well. He was Under Secretary or something quite high in the Northern Ireland Office at Stormont. He was also in MI6 (the Secret Service)”, said Bryans. Peter England was appointed to the Northern Ireland Office in the 1970s but, like Sir Maurice Oldfield, his links to Northern Ireland pre-date this. He was a close friend of Alfred Arnold. He was, according to Bryans, charged with a sex offence in London after being arrested at a public toilet in 1979, according to Bryans.‘
11. Guy Liddell of MI5, the man who helped set up G2, Irish Military Intelligence.
Guy Liddell was an MI5 officer. During the Second World War, he helped the Irish government, led by Eamon de Valera, set up G2, Irish Military intelligence. Liddell was also part of the wider vice ring. The NOW article revealed that:
‘Liddell was married to Calypso Baring, whose family home was on Lambay Island off Portmarnock, Co Dublin. In The Greatest Treason, [author Richard] Deacon says Liddell was “part of a mostly homosexual set of aristocratic pro-Soviets that included Anthony Blunt. Guy Burgess. Peter Churchill .. and Lord Louis Mountbatten.”‘
12. Robin Bryans was a reliable historian.
Was Robin Bryan’s a reliable witness? There are many reasons to suggest that he was.
For a start, he was right about Sir Anthony Blunt being a traitor who worked for the KGB while he was in MI5 and exposed him to the world.
Second, he was correct in his assertion that there were homes other than Kincora where boys were abused. These included Williamson House and Bawnmore. Richard Kerr was abused at Williamson House. Kerr did not speak out in public until long after Bryans’ death.
Third, he was right about the scale of the vice ring which had connections to England, Scotland and Wales.
Fourth, declassified British Government documents concerning Lord Shackleton, the Labour Leader in the House of Lords and son of the famous Antarctic explorer, have added to Bryans’ credibility. Bryans exposed Shackleton as someone who was prepared to turn a blind eye to child sex abuse. As Bryans revealed in his book, ‘Blackmail & Whitewash’, he tried to get Shackleton to intervene to put a halt to the Kincora scandal but Shackelton did nothing. Bryans wrote:
“I knew too much and too much would come out because in 1973 I had told Lord Shackleton about the Kincora abuses and the terror of its young inmates. .. Shackleton chose to do nothing about the Kincora scandal because he had no wish to upset his fellow Establishment figures who were also Knights of the Garter such as Lord Mountbatten who had known Belfast for an even longer period than Shackleton had.’ (p. 533).
Significantly ‘Blackmail & Whitewash’ was published in 1996, long before declassified British Government files confirmed Shackleton’s willingness to protect child abusers emerged.
In May 2015, official papers revealed that in 1988 Margaret Thatcher was furnished with a 19 page dossier which contained details about Sir Cyril Smith’s abuse of children, including an undated letter from Shackleton, then a member of the Political Honours Scrutiny Committee.
In it Shackleton disclosed that the police had investigated Smith in the early and mid-1960s. During 1970 they had carried out inquiries about his ‘indecent assault against teenage boys’. Shackleton told Thatcher that the DPP had not prosecuted Smith because ‘there was no reasonable prospect of conviction’. This is not surprising since MI5 had confiscated police files and disrupted evidence gathering.
The purpose of Shackleton’s letter was to recommend Smith for a knighthood. Shackleton told Thatcher that he felt it would be ‘slightly unfortunate’ if this ‘episode’ impeded Smith from obtaining a gong. Thatcher agreed and one of the most brutal paedophiles of his era became a knight of the realm.
There is a fifth indication of Bryans’ reliability: in 2015 an anonymous MI6 agent confirmed to the Daily Express that Bryans had indeed tried to save the victims at Kincora before it was exposed by the Irish Independent in 1980.
There is a sixth reason to believe Bryans: he knew something about Ted Heath’s abuse of boys. Bryans referred to Heath as ‘the despised Edwina’.
Bryans was once interviewed by another Kincora whistleblower, Captain Colin Wallace (who worked with MI5, MI6 and military intelligence in NI in the 1970s). Bryans drew a link between Heath and a former Unionist MP who had been involved in the vice ring.
13. The first British ambassador to Ireland abused boys from the Freemason school in Dublin.
One scandal which The Irish Times and other media outlets ignored – because they made no effort to investigate the Anglo-Irish vice ring – was the abuse of protestant children at the Freemason school in Dublin. One of the child abusers involved in that scandal was Sir Gilbert Laighwaite, the first British ambassador to Dublin (1949-50). This aspect of the Anglo-Irish vice ring story is not covered by the NOW article. Bryans was the source of the information.
14. The original article.
The NOW article can be downloaded here:
15. The Mountbatten Dossier.
A lot of information has emerged since the 1990 NOW magazine article Much of it can be found on this website in a ‘Webbook’ entitled the Mountbatten Dossier. See: The Mountbatten Dossier. [WebBook]
David Burke is the author of four books published by Mercier Press.
