by Ken Wharton
We must also remember that in addition to the instant shock suffered by the members of the security forces (SF), there was the long-term mental damage also. It is a most sobering fact, but more British Falklands War veterans have now died at their own hands than on the battlefields of Goose Green, Darwin, Mount Longdon, Tumbledown, Wireless Ridge or beneath the icy cold waters of the South Atlantic. Similarly, the numbers of those who died during Op Banner at their own hands is truly frightening. For nearly every death on the massive roll of honour that reads ‘violent or unnatural causes’, one can put one’s own interpretation on its meaning and attribute various reasons for bringing about the demise of the individual named. None of us can truly appreciate the horror of seeing a body that has been torn apart, a limp bundle of bloodied rags that was once a laughing, crying, breathing human being, unless we have been there. One reads of cinema-goers who have been ‘traumatised’ by the opening scenes of Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan, with scenes of body parts strewn across the battlefield, traumatic amputations and miles of intestines bloodying the sand. The scenes brought home the savage and violent nature of warfare to the man or woman who had paid their entry fee to see this film. The following contribution is from a former RUC officer, which I publish in full. He was one of the first policemen on the scene on Saturday, 23 October 1993 when the Provisional IRA exploded a bomb inside a fishmongers on the Shankill Road, Belfast, killing ten people, including one of their own bombing team.
ACCOUNT OF THE SHANKILL BOMB, 23 OCTOBER 1993 RETIRED DETECTIVE CONSTABLE 18006 IAN MILLAR
On 23 October 1993 I was on early shift (0700–1500hrs) in ‘D’ Section, RUC Tennent Street, along with the rest of my section members. The day started as many other Saturday morning early shifts: clearing up calls from night shift, carrying out normal uniformed Policing duties. I was the driver of call-sign DT80 in an armoured ‘Tangi’ Land Rover, crewed with three other officers. I was in the canteen, enjoying some chat and banter with my crewmates and with some of the ladies from the typing pool. Suddenly there was burst of radio transmission; there had just been a huge explosion on the Shankill Road.
We immediately grabbed our flak jackets and weapons, boarded our vehicle and proceeded to the scene. As we exited left onto the Shankill Road, I could see immediately a massive scene of devastation just a few hundred yards away. As we neared, we could see tons of rubble spread all over the road; far too many people to count, either lying on the road or milling about totally dazed. I drove as close as I could, and I could see that there was a wide gap in the buildings where Frizzell’s fish shop and the wallpaper shop next to it used to be. When I got out of my vehicle, I was immediately aware of many people shouting and screaming in pain, with injured people lying about, some bleeding, others obviously with other physical injuries but mostly a huge pile of rubble where the pavement area was.
There were quite a few other Police and Army vehicles already arriving at the scene and I could hear sirens from other emergency vehicles on their way. I saw many of my colleagues attending to the injured on the road, including one man who was wearing a white coat; the sort that a fishmonger would wear. This, I found out later was Sean Kelly, one of the two bombers who had carried the bomb into the fish shop, but I took no more notice of him at that time. It took a few minutes for people to gather themselves, including myself. This was too much happening at once to immediately take it all in. Once we had gathered ourselves, we could hear many people saying that there were people trapped under the huge piles of rubble on the pavement and in the shop itself. Some members of the public were already clearing away some of the rubble to get to those buried, so we formed into an orderly clearing party.
I was at the shop front, next to a pile of rubble; close to me was a colleague, a fireman and a paramedic. We lifted a piece of rubble and passed them in a chain to members of the public on the roadway. After a while – time had stopped for me – I uncovered what was obviously the foot of a female child who was wearing a white-coloured boot. Eventually, we uncovered her full body, but as we did, the fireman uncovered the head of a woman and detected a pulse. Because the poor little girl was clearly dead, we knew that we had to concentrate on the one who might survive. What happened next will haunt me to the day I die; to lift the rubble off the woman, I had to stand on the body of the child; I had no choice. This was not done out of callousness, but I had to get the rubble off the woman. Because of the crush injuries to the child, she had no bones left and it felt like I was standing on a bag of jelly; I will never forget that, and my heart is breaking even now whilst I am writing about it. Seconds later, the fireman announced that the woman was dead also and when I looked around, someone had removed the child’s body. We continued to dig the woman out and she was gently removed. It got even worse, as under the rubble we found another young girl who was also dead and her body too, was removed. Then we found the dead body of a man; the time just blurred, and I have no idea of how long we were there, and you must remember that there was 2 or 3 feet of rubble; tons of it, lying on top of these poor people.
During the clearing, I found a handgun – obviously from the area of the explosion – so I passed this to a fellow officer. The Salvation Army had arrived and were passing out much-needed drinks of water. There I was, dressed only in my uniform shirt and trouser, wearing a yellow hard hat, covered in dust and filth. It was as I rested that I saw the RUC Chief Constable, Hugh Annesley, chatting to the reverend Ian Paisley, the DUP leader. He was spick and span and seemingly oblivious to what we were doing, when a member of the public approached the Chief Constable and took him by his arm, shouting: ‘Never mind talking to him; come and talk to your officers,’ pointing him in our direction. He looked at me, amidst all that suffering, pain and effort and said to me: ‘I hope you wouldn’t turn up on parade looking like that Constable.’ He then walked off and resumed talking to Dr Paisley, who had never uttered a word to us. I was absolutely disgusted.
We were now into the ruined shop, where we found the body of a man, but couldn’t move him as a large roof beam was trapping him; in fact, we had to get on ‘all fours’ to lift the beam enough to release him; it was hard taking that weight on my back. Time continued to fly by, but it was too hectic for us to even notice. Then we reached where the stairs had been, and obviously the seat of the explosion, there in several lumps were bloodied human remains. I helped a fireman to hold open a body bag whilst other Firemen literally shovelled up the lumps. Later, I was to find that this was Begley the bomber who was blown to pieces by his own bomb. You will recall Gerry Adams later carrying the coffin of this ‘freedom fighter’.
At this point I was totally exhausted and could take no more, so I walked back to Tennent Street RUC station, some five hours after we had left to attend the explosion. I went to the canteen and found many of my colleagues there in a similar condition to what I was in. I had a cup of tea and got changed into my civilian clothes. Some of my equipment (gun belt, personal weapon etc) and my uniform and boots were covered in dust and filth, so I put them in a bag to take home to clean. When I got home, I remember that my then wife and two small children were out, returning shortly after I did. My daughter was roughly the same age as one of the young girls that I had recovered. I remember dropping to my knees, utterly distraught, and giving her the hug of her life. My family calmed me down, my then Mother-in-law kindly took my equipment away and washed it all by hand for me.
The next day was another early shift, with my section unbelievably sent to guard the scene of the explosion; by the time that we arrived, the rubble was in skips; the bodies and the remains were gone. Later, we discovered that the paramedics and firemen received counselling, but as usual, the RUC were just expected to get on with it.
In my head, a ‘video loop’ of the dead child and having to stand on her was playing constantly, without pause, and I knew that I had to see someone to help me. I made an appointment with Occupational Health (OHU) and off I went to see him, although as you will see, it was f
ortunate that I wasn’t allowed to take my firearm with me! I saw a male Nursing Advisor; I can still see his face and know his name; I told him what I had been through and what was happening in my head. His response was: ‘You should be professional enough to work through this, to which I shouted: ‘We are wasting each other’s time here and you are lucky that I am not armed because I would shoot you where you sit.’ I left, totally disgusted at his attitude.
Some seven months after the blast, an OHU van attended the station and I climbed on board, but it was the same male nurse. No chance! I then saw a lovely female nurse and I told her in no uncertain terms exactly what I thought of OHU and her colleague. She was aghast and asked me if I was still suffering from the image of the child. I told her that it played in my head during every waking moment and in my sleep. There and then, she arranged an appointment for me to see her for counselling; this was five months after the bomb!
It wasn’t until 2001 when, because of many other incidents, that I was diagnosed with PTSD; I still struggle with this today and it is only through my own efforts to gain expert psychological treatment that I manage to keep my feelings under control. I must point out that the actions of the members of the public and of the emergency services on that day were nothing short of magnificent.
Colin Breen* reports an incident that demonstrated not only how effective PIRA dickers were in the dirty war, but equally how quickly one of their ASUs could respond to a spontaneous target of opportunity. He records the words of one officer based at Antrim Road in Belfast, who explained that he and a few colleagues decided to go down to an Indian restaurant in Botanic Avenue in the city centre. Shortly after they had ordered their starter, they noticed a uniformed RUC officer talking to one of the waiters. On questioning their colleague, they were told: ‘There’s a threat to come here and shoot you three. They’ve spotted you coming in here and they’re coming down now to shoot you!’ As they emerged from the restaurant, leaving their meals untouched, they noticed immediately that their colleagues had sealed off the entire road to ensure their safety. This was just one instance of attacks on off-duty officers in pubs and clubs; in the war with the Provisionals, no one and nowhere was safe.
The RUC, despite its many, many setbacks over the years of the conflict, shone out like a beacon where many other police forces in the world might have weakened. As an organisation they were forced to contend with a constant terror that they were unable to leave at the police station gates, as that same terror pursued them to their homes, to the pubs, cinemas, even to the homes of their friends and relatives. The Ulster police officer had a pressure that was 24/7 and 365 days a year; his English, Scottish or Welsh colleagues never had these pressures to contend with. A former RUC officer told the author:
When I went home, I used to drive past the house several times to check if everything looked as it should; was a dustbin out of place; was the garage door open, that kind of thing. As I stopped the car, I reached for my service Ruger, ready for anything, ready for anyone who wanted to hurt me. A mate did the same thing, but one night he didn’t, and Republican gunmen shot him down outside his own front door. Every morning, I got down on my hands and knees to check under the car for bombs and my wife and my kids were taught to do the same. Even when we went out to the shops, pubs or even for a trip to the Antrim coast, my service weapon was always with me. It got so bad that I started sleeping with it under my pillow and even took it to the loo if I had to get up for a late-night piss.
The reader must remember that those are not the paranoid words of a nervous man; the scenarios that he describes all occurred with a depressing frequency. The following examples are but a few of the many off-duty deaths suffered by this police force; the list is not intended to be either definitive or exhaustive:
Constable James Heaney, shot by the Provisional IRA in Andersonstown as he worked on his mother’s car: 26 August 1976.
Constable Millar McAllister, shot by a PIRA gunman as he relaxed at home in Lisburn: 22 April 1978.
Reserve Constable John Proctor, shot by PIRA gunmen as he visited his wife, who had just given birth at the Mid-Ulster Hospital in Magherafelt: 14 September 1981.
Inspector Norman Duddy, shot by PIRA gunmen as he left a church with his sons in Londonderry: 28 March 1982.
Sergeant Thomas Cooke, shot by a PIRA gunman as he left his golf club in Londonderry: 23 April 1987.
Constable John Larmour, shot dead by PIRA gunmen as he worked off-duty in his brother’s ice cream parlour on Lisburn Road, Belfast: 11 October 1988.
Constable Norman Annett, shot dead at his mother’s home by PIRA gunmen in Garvagh, Co. Londonderry: 1 July 1989; the gunmen also shot and wounded his 81-year-old mother.
Reserve Constable Douglas Carothers, killed by a PIRA booby trap underneath his car at his home in Lisbellaw, Co. Fermanagh: 17 May 1991.
When dissident Republicans killed twenty-nine people and two unborn children at Omagh on 15 August 1998, the pre-celebratory mood of the Northern Irish was severely curtailed – dented at least. Republicans were cautiously optimistic, Loyalists were in the main sceptical but would ‘suck it and see’. Only really the neutrals – can there have been such a luxury in those troubled times? – were surprised by the blast. Less than a month later, Constable Francis O’Reilly (30), a Catholic officer serving with the RUC, was fatally injured in a bomb blast in Portadown; he died on 6 October.
On 5 September, the last of the Omagh victims died when Sean McGrath (60) succumbed to his terrible injuries of 15 August. On the same day, in the Protestant Corcrain estate in Portadown, tensions were running very highly as Loyalists continued an ongoing protest over the banning of parades along the Catholic Garvaghy Road. RUC officers were in the area when a member of the Red Hand Commando (a Loyalist organisation with interchangeable personnel) threw a blast bomb towards a group of officers. Constable O’Reilly was very badly injured, losing an eye as well as receiving severe head injuries. He was rushed to the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast, where the medical teams fought for thirty-one days to save his life. He left a widow and three very young children. This chapter has been designed not only to demonstrate the appallingly high sacrifice of the RUC, but also to show how it came through such adversity. It is also intended to link the deaths of Victor Arbuckle on 12 October 1969, and Francis O’Reilly 10,238 days later.
Necessity has always been the mother of invention, from man discovering fire 600,000 years ago, to the invention of the wheel in 3,500 BC, and leaping forward to telephone, radar and the internet. The RUC, too, were forced to continually develop and reinvent themselves. The emergence of undercover police groups such as Headquarters Mobile Support Unit (HMSU), E4A, which was established in 1978, and the SPG (Special Patrol Group) were evidence of the RUC constantly striving to match and outwit the Provisional IRA, INLA and IPLO. Their adaptation of long, dangerous undercover operations, mastery of electronic surveillance and advancements in intelligence gathering, primarily through the recruitment of a network of agents and informers, bear testimony to the magnificent job that they performed.
The RUC was awarded a collective George Cross in April 2002 as a recognition for its service, courage and dedication. On 4 November 2001, largely at the insistence of Sinn Féin, the RUC was disbanded and replaced by the Police Service of Northern Ireland. The PSNI – known to some disaffected Loyalists as the PSNIRA – has had a difficult start as it faces regular riots, shootings and bombing incidents, also suffering the contempt of many Loyalists as well as Nationalists. There is the constant danger as presented by dissident Republicans (DRs) that resulted in the death of PSNI officer Stephen Carroll at Craigavon in 2009. Equally dangerous are the number of ‘viable’ explosive devices that have been used to maim officers known to have been planted by DRs. The PSNI has tried to reflect the religious composition of Ulster with a force which is 67.16 per cent Protestant and 31.50 per cent Roman Catholic with the remainder – 1.34 per cent – ‘not determined’.* The gender balance is 70.1 per cent m
ale and 29.9 per cent female among its 6,756 members as of 1 November 2017. The job that they face, while very, very problematical, can never be as dangerous as the one faced by the RUC in the years 1969–98.
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* Each weighed 120lb (54.5kg) and contained 40lb (18.2kg) of high explosive.
* Colin Breen, op. cit., pp.35, 36.
* Two such officers were referred to by name by former British agent Kevin Fulton when he gave evidence to the Smithwick tribunal in 2013; one was a reservist who was simply sacked from the RUCR, the other was secretly jailed. Another former RUC officer who betrayed secrets to the UVF was John Oliver Weir, who was convicted of a sectarian murder in 1977.
* Beechmount Avenue in the Lower Falls district.
** Colin Breen, op. cit., p.123.
* Colin Breen, op. cit., p.99.
* www.psni.police.uk/in.
CHAPTER 8
LOYALIST PARAMILITARIES
As the list of PIRA, Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) and Irish People’s Liberation Organisation (IPLO) atrocities began to grow, much was heard of the ‘Protestant backlash’. It was coming, so the ‘experts’ in the media said, but when would it come? There are those who point to the bombing of McGurk’s bar in December 1971, or the Grand National Day ‘tit for tat’ bomb attacks as evidence of its genesis. The truth is that although there had been several Loyalist atrocities, notably the Dublin/Monaghan attacks, the so-called ‘backlash’ was always present; it didn’t just arrive, it was being planned and executed almost by stealth. Did it begin on the New Lodge’s North Queen Street**just before Christmas, 1971; was it heralded by the Daily Mirror’s front-page photograph of a woman’s severed foot on the streets of Dublin in its Saturday edition on 18 May 1974?***Which Provisional IRA outrage triggered the phenomenon ‘backlash’, if that is what it was? Was it the murder of the three Scottish soldiers at Ligoniel; was it the bombs that slaughtered so many at Donegall Square; or was it the bomb that left so many limbless at the Abercorn?
