An acclaimed British composer has been awarded compensation after being subjected to years of sexual abuse as a pupil at an exclusive boarding school for children from wealthy Jewish families.

Stephen Endelman, who has since forged a career in film, collaborating with leading Hollywood figures including Robert De Niro and Martin Scorsese, is one of a number of former pupils to be offered a payout following childhood abuse at Carmel College in Crowmarsh Gifford, Oxfordshire.

For decades he buried his memories, without telling anyone. Now in his fifties, he has written a script for a fictionalised film account of his experiences, and has started filming a documentary about sexual abuse, talking to victims about the impact of their abuse on later life, and in particular its effect on their physical health.

Endelman was one of at least eight boys who were preyed upon by housemaster and French teacher at the school, Trevor Bolton, over a 20-year period. One former pupil described being raped and abused several times a week for five years. “It was like pure torture. I could not wait to get out of the place.”

Their experiences at the once renowned school – known as the Jewish Eton – have overshadowed their lives. Their stories have, however, attracted little attention outside the Jewish press.

Endelman, who has waived his right to anonymity, went to Carmel as a music scholar at the age of 10. An accomplished clarinettist, he came from a modest background, unlike his wealthier peers some of whom used to arrive in chauffeur-driven cars carrying Louis Vuitton luggage.

“I didn’t hate being there,” said Endelman, who remembers playing his clarinet for Prince Charles. Bolton had his favourites and would invite them to his rooms on a Saturday night to watch Match of the Day, smoke, drink Coca-Cola and eat Jaffa Cakes.



Late in the evening the other boys would leave. “I would be taken back to my room then he would come and get me later, and I would spend the night in his bed. I remember holding his penis and him holding mine. I remember him lying on top of me. I remember him bathing me. I don’t remember too much more.”

Former Carmel College housemaster, Trevor Bolton, who was jailed for 19 years in 2015 having been convicted of 25 sexual offences against eight former pupils between 1968 and 1988. Photograph: Thames Valley Police/PNS

It went on for a couple of years before Endelman moved into the senior school, away from Bolton, and soon after his parents moved him to the Purcell School of Young Musicians because his music was suffering. He didn’t tell his parents what had happened; he didn’t tell anyone.

“Very quickly when you realise something is wrong, you put a veneer in front of you and that veneer gets thicker and thicker. I did not talk about it, I buried it.”

It was his music that saved him – he was ambitious and successful and went on to write scores for films like The Englishman who Went up a Hill but Came Down a Mountain and the Ben Stiller film Flirting with Disaster. Years later he became critically ill and fell into a coma for three months, suffering from a rare from of brain cancer.

He blames it on the abuse he suffered, which remained shrouded in silence for decades, until the police investigation and court case allowed him to feel a sense of closure. In 2015 Bolton was jailed at Oxford crown court for 19 years, having been convicted of 25 sexual offences against eight former pupils between 1968 and 1988. In 2016 the appeal court rejected an application from Bolton’s lawyers to get the sentence reduced due to his poor health.

Another of Bolton’s victims, Mark Joiner (not his real name – he has asked to remain anonymous), was also recently awarded compensation after he was abused over a five-year period from the age of eight.

“I was bullied because I was on a scholarship. It was absolutely horrid. I was homesick. I felt isolated. All the pupils he abused were homesick and lonely and being bullied. He took them under his wing and abused them.



“It ruined my entire childhood. I was a very bright pupil. I didn’t make it to university. I talked to my parents but they didn’t believe me. It was a horrendous period of time.”

Joiner has been unable to settle during his life. He has served time in prison and has only just found peace in a relationship. “I could have been anything I wanted. I was being groomed for Oxbridge. In the end I failed my A-levels to get out of the place. I handed in blank sheets of paper as a rebellion or protest.”



I was on a scholarship, homesick and preyed upon by Trevor Bolton Anonymous survivor of abuse

After leaving the school, whose alumni include retail tycoon Sir Philip Green and filmmaker Roland Joffé, he never returned home to his parents. “I never, ever, ever forgave them for sending me there.”

Carmel College, set in 40 acres of parkland, closed in 1997 having run into financial difficulties. The building, with its listed gallery and boathouse designed by Sir Basil Spence, still stands empty on the banks of the Thames. Plans to convert it into luxury flats have stalled.

“I think I’m one of the lucky ones,” said Joiner. “Talking to the police, the majority of these cases don’t get to court, and very often when they get to court the defendant is found not guilty.

“It’s only a very small percentage of people who get the closure they desire through the criminal justice system. It makes you wonder how many paedophiles are out there who have not been brought to justice.”

The court case was a huge relief. “I was there to see this through to the end and I did. It was just this enormous weight taken off my shoulders that had been with me all those years.”

Former head master rabbi Jeremy Rosen said he did not learn of Bolton’s crimes until 1998. “I was headmaster and principal of Carmel College from 1971 until 1984. During that time there was only one case reported to me of sexual abuse and I acted immediately. I fired the teacher concerned [in 1976] and informed the local police.

“I never had reason to suspect any other teacher. It came as a great shock to me to learn many years later that there was another case and that victims had been reluctant to talk about it at the time.

“Carmel in my time was a caring community and anything that betrayed that care is a stain on its stellar reputation and achievements.”

For Endelman the court case was empowering. “Stephen has learned to forgive himself for what happened to him. It wasn’t his fault. It’s taken me 40 years to say that,” he said.



“But I can’t forgive Trevor Bolton for doing what he did to me, nor can I forget it. He took away my innocence and my youth. But I’m trying to put what I’ve learned to good use, if that’s possible.”

Endelman will begin shooting his film, A Boy, A Man and his Kite in the spring.