Veronica's Bird

by Veronica Bird

  The jangle of keys is a sound redolent of slamming doors and iron-barred windows beloved these days of television documentaries. It defines the profession of a prison officer more than anything else. As a trainee, I was not privileged to carry my own bunch, but for some newly qualified officers this could be the end of their short career. So powerful was the totem, some were known to be unable to insert a key to lock up a woman prisoner.

  ‘I can’t turn the key,’ one might say. ‘It just won’t turn in the lock.’ But of course, it always did.

  I can understand why it happened. One day, our Training Officer herded us all together into a cell, left us and locked the door. The impact on us was immediate and quite horrifying. A solid door, solid walls and solid bars on the window; the room resisted every time we made to place a finger on a surface to touch some part of the cell for whatever reason. The space appeared to be shrinking, closing in on us as if to squeeze the very life out of us. And I was with my friends and colleagues. Alone, I would have felt a terrible despair as the door clanged shut behind my back. It was an object lesson in understanding the mindset of some of the more sensitive prisoners especially first-timers. It was also much easier to understand the mentality of those potential suicide cases which occurred all too frequently in jail.

  I was always shadowed by a prison officer, not only to see I was learning the ropes correctly, but for my own safety. I was young, naïve. Though the police force had straightened me up in many ways, I was still quite vulnerable. Events would, all of a sudden leap, out at you. A peaceful afternoon could be shattered in a blink of an eye when vicious fighting might break out as a prisoner was attacked, possibly serving time for sexual offences which had included children. There were many mums inside who had their own children cared for by grandparents but aware there were often unguarded moments in their young lives. This led to worry building up in their idle moments making it a dangerous place for such offenders.

  In my four years in the police force, I thought I had seen and experienced life fully in the raw. Not a bit of it. Holloway opened my eyes to a much darker world where we, as the supposed guardians of safety, strolled its perimeter and occasionally looked in. It was a world I wanted to understand better and, as I came to the end of my time there, I knew the future would lead me down a path of seeking ways to improve conditions but I was fully aware I was still a trainee and not yet a prison officer with a voice.

  While all this intense training was continuing, I was living in a Nissen hut outside the grounds. It wasn’t much but then, I had never had much, so the changes were not so acute for me as to some of my friends and colleagues. The officers were friendly and some had never moved, having been there for years. The Governor, a big woman in all respects, did not wear a uniform so she was always in her everyday clothes. Below her grade, a Principal Officer wore two silver stripes on her cuff and a red background to the cap badge. Me? I was still in my blue overall yearning for the day I could put on that uniform, look the part and jangle my keys.

  Respect from the prisoners was surprisingly high. They would, for example, always stand when I entered a room. Now that was because they had been taught to do so but there are two ways to stand up as someone enters the room you are in and it was always with a smile rather than a surly half-rising from a chair. We would address women prisoners by their first names (men were by their surnames – hence, Fletcher) while I was always addressed as Miss Bird. It is nice to reflect, now I am retired, some Governors hold me in sufficient respect today by continuing to call me Miss Bird. That is a long, long way from Doncaster Road. One of these Governors, Bob by name, was appointed as an investigator during the escape from Armley. He was in a position to extinguish my career if he had wanted, but instead he was very supportive at all times and one could see why he was so respected in the Service. He was, quite simply, a very special Governor.

  I had determined not to let Fred’s name pass my lips or to divulge any of his antics to anyone. I had made a clean start and wanted it to remain like that. However, I had been warned he had called on several occasions while I had been working. Fearful again, fearful of the future, I took one of my training officers into my confidence and told him of Fred’s history. I could see, vaguely, a career in front of me but if I decided only to go the two years I had planned this could still end in embarrassment. She was as good as her word and helped me to keep away from returning to Holloway after I completed my training.

  Before I leave Holloway, I want to describe impressions of Myra Hindley I gained in my time with her. There were women murderers as evil as Myra Hindley but it was she who is remembered today for her depravity, being elevated in the Press over a long period almost as a celebrity. There is plenty of evidence to suggest she enjoyed her notoriety in her early years.

  My first brush with her did not stir my consciousness at all and I had no idea who she was when I first saw her. It took a prison officer to say to me, ‘Do you know who that was?’ Prisoners would go out of their way to point her out to me as if she was a bus route or a ‘D’ celebrity.

  There was no doubt she was an extraordinarily evil woman. She was born in nineteen forty-two to a father labelled a ‘hard man’. He taught her to stick up for herself and to use her fists but continued to beat her regularly in his drunken rages.

  The history of the killing of five children with Ian Brady is well-known and will remain as a dark chapter in Yorkshire’s history. When she was finally caught, and sentenced to life imprisonment, the presiding judge declared she was ‘the most evil woman in Britain’.

  What came to light, thereafter, is astonishing? Myra abandoned writing to Brady in his prison, for she had fallen in love with Patricia Cairns, a former nun and now a prison officer in Holloway. Cairns was a lesbian and had fallen frantically in love with Myra where they had first met playing table tennis in Association time. An affair began, lasting three years which eventually became common knowledge among the Holloway staff.

  Now comes the first extraordinary part of the story. The two women planned to escape to South America where Myra thought she could become some form of a preacher, no doubt led by Cairns’ vocation as a nun in her former life. Myra moved forward, while the plot developed, being permitted to change her name by deed poll to Myra Spencer and applied to have a driving licence. It is not clear to the authorities how she would have found any use for such a document bearing in mind she was in for a minimum of twenty-five years before consideration of parole, but she was allowed to go ahead with her requests.

  The movements of prison officers were noted and soap and plaster impressions were made of three separate door keys. Pink Camay soap was, apparently used for the moulds, using the kitchens as a convenient workshop. Of course, Cairns, the ex-nun now a Senior Officer, was not only able to get hold of these three keys but managed to secure the master key for D-Wing where Myra was being held. The planning proceeded with help from another inmate, Maxine Croft. Passport photographs were taken with both women wearing wigs.

  The final plan laid out the escape in detail, though without a date in mind, scaling the perimeter wall where, once over, Myra would be met by Cairns in a hired car.

  It was in November nineteen seventy-three, the police began to pick up news that Myra, the most hated woman in Britain might be planning an escape. Cairns was arrested, talked and as a result was jailed for six very difficult years for her part in the plot but eventually adapted to prison life and, on release, was given a new identity. The prison returned to its normal routine.

  Or, did it? There is a second narrative to this sorry saga. Myra had been locked up with some of the most dangerous women in the country. During the investigation, it came to light those same keys, put together as a package could have been used to unlock the other cells on the wing where many of the inmates were extremely dangerous. Detective Chief Superintendent Frank McGuiness from Scotland Yard and a highly-regarded officer was placed in charge of the investigation into the attempted escape and began to make
the links. Dolours and Marion Price, the IRA sisters who are mentioned in this book, were due to be imprisoned in this same high security wing following their sentencing. In Myra’s cell block also resided a member of the Angry Brigade, you might remember the title, who had direct links back to the IRA who, in those days were fighting the British with a long drawn-out programme of terror bombing.

  Here was an association with bomb-blasted Belfast, McGuiness was looking for. There was a special irony. The key impressions which had now been found looked remarkably like a bomb in their package. The connection to the south of Ireland was made by chance, for on opening the suspect bundle, the link back to Myra was made. A second farce arose earlier when Cairns attempted to leave the package in a left luggage locker at Paddington Station only to be told she had to go elsewhere due to an IRA bomb threat and nothing was being stored in the Station.

  Frank McGuiness summed up the result as a brilliant piece of planning right down to the driving licence in Myra Spencer’s name.

  It might have been thought this was the end of an alarming episode in Holloway’s long, sordid affairs but at the time, due to the IRAs’ continuing impact on mainland Britain, McGuiness’s report was buried, sealed for one hundred years. It was only when Myra Hindley died that this file came to light, now released into the National Archives Office in 2002, the year of her death. If the escape had succeeded it would have been one of the worst and certainly the most dangerous jail breaks, in history. It would have caused resignations at the highest level in Government.

  The real end of the story was dismal. Myra, after trying everything in her power to have her sentence reduced or at least, be given parole, retreated into her cell for the last eighteen months of her life. If she had been paroled she would never have survived outside in what, to her would be an infinitely more dangerous world of reprisal.

  When she died, the prison, as usual, approached the local undertaker to cremate her body, but on reviewing his future clients, made the decision not to undertake the work. He would have lost a great deal of future business based on the continuing hate and venom local families attached to the dead woman. The prison was then obliged to approach twenty other undertakers before one brave company raised its head above the parapet and agreed to deal with the problem. Such was the mood of the country and the almost, everlasting spleen directed towards the Moors Murderer.

  There was a sequel, of course. I was often asked by the public and the Press, later in life, if Myra had really died or had she been released under cover at the end of her sentence. ‘We want to have a picture of her dead body,’ went the clamour. ‘Prove it to us.’ But she had died and that was the end of the affair.

  Myra’s reputation was powerful as all truly evil people impress, in a sick, sad way. Outside the prison, following the escape plot, children had to be reassured it was safe to go outside, and mothers would glance across the street as they waited for their children to come out of school. There was no way they were going to allow them to walk home alone despite being told she was safe inside her cell. Such was the status she ‘enjoyed’ but remember, she was not a celebrity, manipulative, yes, evil very, but don’t let us fall into the trap of giving her a cult status.

  I write in some detail about Myra Hindley’s time in Holloway. Although she was carefully moved about the country from prison to prison, a fellow prisoner was able to get to her in an unguarded moment. The prisoner’s name was Judith, a dangerous psychotic. She was apt to flip from eating out of your hand at one moment to a sudden and unsafe rage. This day, for whatever reason, Judith launched herself at the Moors murderer and managed to throw her over a high balustrade where Myra landed on the security nets strung across the light wells to prevent suicides. Such was the force used, Myra’s head was smashed in and she had to have plastic surgery to repair the damage. These incidents occur in the flash of an eye and those eyes need to be in the back of one’s head.

  This protection of prisoners, from prisoners, was an everyday requirement particularly if a woman was inside for sexual crimes which had involved children. There was little clemency for such people especially where many of the women had their own babies with them. Such dangerous women had to be moved very carefully from one unit to another which meant the other prisoners had to be locked up prior to the transfer. Today, it has become even more important as it is within prisoners’ rights – those Human Rights again – that all-encompassing shield they use, to sue if they are hurt by fellow prisoners. Ian Huntley, the Soham murderer did sue the Prison Service twice after he was constantly attacked and hurt badly.

  Let me stay with Judith for a moment. When she was at Styal prison she climbed one night out of her cell window which had no bars, urged on by the knowledge it was New Year’s Eve. She shinned down a drainpipe (yes, really), into a workman’s yard where there was a conveniently stacked set of ladders. (You cannot make this stuff up). Selecting one of the long ladders, Judith climbed out before walking off holding out her thumb as she went. Who should be the first to stop and help her but an off-duty policeman. (I told you it could not be made into a film – no-one would believe it). He said goodbye to Judith, a dangerous psychotic, at the start of a motorway and drove off secure in the knowledge he had helped a lady in distress. Having enjoyed a night’s celebration through into the New Year, she finally turned up at a friend’s house in Swansea at three in the morning. She had managed to remain unchallenged for over twelve hours as a friendly inmate had signed the register at seven in the morning for her. This meant she remained unnoticed until lunchtime when the duty officer saw her name was not in the book. The alarm was raised; the hunt was on but Judith was well gone. The police finally apprehended her in her friend’s cellar and took her back. Red and faces were two words which probably came to mind several times that day with the prison officers, and no doubt, those ladders were securely locked up.

  This checking was all part of the eternal need to know how many prisoners there were at any one time in any part of the prison. To do so, numbers were checked four times a day, at seven in the morning, when Judith’s friend stood in for her, at lunch, in the afternoon and when the night duty staff arrived. When prisoners were moved around the prison or had to leave to go to a trial for example, chalk boards were constantly updated. As one prisoner left, the number was rubbed out and a revised figure inserted. When they came back the number was altered again. The boards were divided into sections, such as Remand, Trials and Section the last was where a prisoner had to be transferred to the hospital section. Pretty low- tech in those days but it worked, usually.

  As I came to the end of my eight weeks I was skilled in controlling fighting prisoners, night patrolling, interpersonal skills, gate duty, the switchboard and…. counting.

  I was ready for Wakefield.

  CHAPTER SIX

  EVERYTHING ALRIGHT, VERONICA?

  I was going back to learning again, the first time in nine years with the exception of night school. There were close reminders of my last school at Ackworth as I arrived at Wakefield for the start of my thirteen-week course. Wakefield was a college, like a University or sixth form school, but at least our earlier experiences in Holloway and Risley had given us a firm base on which to understand what we were about to embark upon.

  Wakefield was fresh air, space and sanity, the absence of smell and noise, rather, you sensed the aromas of chalk in the classroom and the lack of clamour and echo assailing your ears while you were on duty.

  Those with me on that course had all passed the first hurdle of Holloway. Those left in the bottom of the strainer, so to speak, had a more respectful and dedicated approach knowing now they could come to terms with this job. Of course, as in every avenue of life, there were those who did not make the grade during progress Sometimes, on a Monday morning we noticed an empty chair where a trainee had been told on a Friday night, when most trainees went home, not to come back the following week. Some indiscretion had arisen such as a criminal record from the past which was not spe
nt, that is, it had not run the course of five years. In those days, even motoring offences were deemed to be criminal. Some POUTS – Prison Officer Under Training – might change their mind as they began to focus on a life in the future, literally in prison, albeit they were on the right side of the bars. Meanwhile, to those of us left, we were subjected to a wide array of topics some of which I was already familiar with, having been a police officer; other matters were brand new.

  We learned about Categories for prisoners. Category A was for the worst and most dangerous prisoners such as terrorists and drug barons, and in the past, IRA prisoners. Category B covered rapists, murderers; C was for run of the mill offenders and D was for white collar crime such as motoring offences. Geoffrey Archer would have found he ended up there.

  At the time, there were only two training centres in the country, the other was at Leyhill. We lived on site and absorbed our lecturers’ pleas as they sought to train us in keeping ourselves safe at all times. It was easy to forget, in the evenings, just how dangerous some of these inmates were. Many had nothing to lose at all, and knew that an attack could bring them, albeit briefly, an overwhelming sense of power and control. We all had to listen carefully for it was a salutary lesson in the art of self-preservation.