By Alice Porter, news correspondent

From the outside, it was idyllic – a big house on the beach, a safe haven for young, vulnerable children.

“Then you walk through the door, and you’re in hell.”

Amanda, 52, sits flicking through family photo albums, her curly brown hair rests on her shoulders, her lipstick is flawless, her clothing smart. The photos from the 1980s look like normal family snaps and show her playing with her siblings on the beach in Kent, eating ice cream and jumping in a pool with glee.

But they hide a sinister truth.

Warning: This article contains graphic descriptions of physical and sexual child abuse that some readers may find distressing. 

She was just seven years old when she and her two siblings were sent to Sandyridge children’s home in 1979. It was one of two unregistered children’s homes which operated in Kent for almost 30 years and the trio were victims of daily physical and sexual abuse.

Amanda is one of six people who have spoken to Sky News for the first time about the trauma they suffered at the hands of Denis and Anne May, who ran the home.

The pair have now died and were never convicted of any crime.

Two other sisters recalled how they were molested at bathtimes – one says her head was held under the freezing water until she was forced to sexually abuse another child. 

Victims reported their abuse to multiple authorities and the Mays were arrested in 1996 but never charged. They died escaping justice, but many are now calling for the case to be reopened.

‘I HEARD MY BROTHER BEING RAPED’

Born in Tooting, Amanda and her siblings previously lived at several children’s homes in south London, including the notorious Shirley Oaks in Lambeth which was involved in one of Britain’s worst abuse scandals.

The family were then trafficked by what Amanda called a paedophile ring 70 miles away to Kent, where she says the abuse continued at the hands of Denis and Anne May who ran Sandyridge and Costa Villa children’s homes.

These homes, despite being in Kent, housed children in care from London – more than 40 children were sent from Lambeth alone.

“The physical and sexual abuse was on a daily basis,” says Amanda, her voice calm and matter of fact.

“I’d been sick, Denis came up – he always liked to play the nurse. He got a bowl of water, and he was washing me down.

“At this point I had no clothes on, and he’s touching my private parts, and my backside, with his fingers.”

Amanda speaks quietly when recalling her time at Sandyridge but remains composed. The trauma she and her siblings suffered there was a continuation of what befell them in south London.

“When you’ve gone through two children’s homes already, where you’ve been systematically abused, it becomes quite normal.”

This warped version of normality included children being told they couldn’t wear knickers or pyjamas to bed; waking up to find their foster father next to their beds, telling them he was just there to tuck them in.

Being masturbated while they slept and not understanding why their genitals were sore the next morning. Having their breasts touched while swimming. Hearing the cries of children being raped.

All three siblings allege they were molested but it was Amanda’s younger brother, Jason, who suffered the most. He was just eight years old, when the abuse began.

Denis May would anally rape Jason, putting his hands over his mouth to block out the screams.

In later life, Jason struggled with alcohol and drug addiction, using substances to try and escape from the horror of Sandyridge.

He would later die of an accidental overdose, aged just 35.

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‘WE HAD TO ABUSE OTHER CHILDREN’

Sisters Winnie and Rose were taken into care by Brent social services in the mid-1980s and came to Sandyridge with their siblings.

They’re now 46 and 49 and still very close – they constantly finish each other’s sentences, the hell of what they went through deeply entwined in their relationship with each other.

The sisters sit on a park bench in north London, a few miles from where they initially grew up, as Winnie describes what happened to them.

“I was forced, and so was another child, to abuse each other. We’d be thrown like animals into the freezing cold bath, we’d physically – out of fear – wet ourselves.”

She alleges they were held under the water until they complied. “Because we didn’t want to die, we would have no option but to abuse each other.”

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‘THEY CONSTANTLY USED RACIAL EXPLETIVES’

No one was immune to the violence in the homes.

Jake – not his real name – came to Sandyridge in 1980. He was a bright, well-spoken child who had come from a middle-class black family before being taken into care.

Now Jake smokes a cigarette outside his flat to calm his nerves as he recalls the racism and sexual abuse which awaited him at the home.

“They’d constantly use racial expletives, calling me the n-word,” Jake says.

“It wasn’t just what they said but how they said it, Denis May would foam at the mouth.

“Sometimes she would check my genitalia at the dining room table. If I was ‘naughty’ they were obsessed with stripping me naked and smacking my bottom, in full view of everyone”.

Outside of both homes, Denis May projected an image of respectability in the local community. He was a school governor and chair of the local branch of the Folkestone and Hythe Conservative Association.

Through this role, he associated himself with the aspiring Conservative MP Michael Howard, who later became home secretary.

The children from the homes, like Amanda, say they were involved with the campaigning for general elections.

“I remember Michael Howard coming round with his wife and his daughter. We would have to fold all these campaign leaflets to post in letter boxes, we’d walk for miles,” she says.

None of the children allege any misconduct by Michael Howard.

When approached by Sky News, Mr Howard said he was not “close friends” with Denis May and only knew him professionally through the local Conservative association.

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WHY DID SOCIAL SERVICES NOT ACT?

Many children had the same Lambeth social worker, Charlie Elliot, who the Mays had personally requested as their point of contact with the council.

It’s understood that Elliott, a senior social worker, also abused a child in his care and he played an integral role within the paedophile ring, bringing children to Denis and Anne and ignoring their pleas for help.

An investigation was launched by Kent police after multiple victims gave statements to the force.

Amanda first heard about it when Charlie Elliot rang her up and pressured her not to say anything bad about the Mays because they had been his “mum and dad”, to which she responded: “You know the truth, I know the truth.”

Elliot died in 1999 before any charges were brought against him.A document from Lambeth children services in 1996 – which shows multiple children disclosed the abuse to Charlie Elliot but he took no action – was discovered by the organisation.

The document, which has not been made public until now, confirms what several victims have told Sky News about Elliot.