Now this guy never had anything like this happen to him before. He may have been beat before but nothing like this, with the ambulance and all. Anyway there are rumours flying around town, shit things like I hit him from behind and that. He had this mate, a big 25-stone barrel of lard who thought he was a right handful. I’m in a nightclub and he’s looking at me and he’s telling people how I fought dirty with his mate. It’s the end of the night and I’ve had enough of this; he’s being disrespectful to me. I wait till it goes real quiet and I shout over, “Oi! Fat prick.” He turns around snarling at me. “You’re getting on my tits,” I shout straight at him. Everyone can hear this and he puts his drink down and comes straight for us. Soon as he comes near me I hit him with two beauts. Down he goes on his knees. I give him some more and I know I’ve broke both my hands but I grit my teeth and keep hitting him because I wanted to give him some. After all that, he’s in hospital with two broken legs, broken jaw and he’s stitched up like a road map. So I thought, well, that’s sent the feelers out to those daft twats. The big fat prick still told everyone that I had jumped him with friends and the reason he had broken legs was because I had done them with an iron bar. Pure lies. He never told people that he broke his knees when he landed on them on the tiled floor when I knocked him out.
There was another big lad, a friend of his as well, who had a bit of a do with me. Now this time I walked up to him at the bar and we started to fight. As he came back off the bar he’s swinging back and fore like the big heavy bag. I hit him with a left-right. Down he went and he’s carted off to hospital. Well he’s been training for a few months and one night he phones us up like. “Richy, it was a bit fast last time,” he tells me, so we arrange to meet in a car park. I had just one lad to take me there, just in case of any foul play. It was Bonfire Night and everyone was waiting for the news of the fight – seems the word had gone around the town. I go over to him and he’s a big lad, he’s got this white vest on and he looks impressive. We shake hands and he says, “Well, I’ve got to fight you now Richy, it was a bit fast last time and I want to get it out of the way.” Now the pair of us square up and I’m waiting for him to come toward us, but he didn’t come. I didn’t really throw anything, just a light feeler, and he comes down under it and grabs me around the waist, the sneaky fucker. He’s trying to pull us down but I’m too strong for him. I get him down on the floor and I’m trying to smash his head down on the pavement but his neck muscles are too strong for me to do it. “You dirty bastard,” he screams at me. I get my hands free and hit him with a left-right. He shouts at me to stop but I’m not satisfied yet, so I hit him a couple of times more and he’s all smashed up. I thought, I can’t hit him anymore or he’ll be dead, so I get up and walk away. As I was walking I hear him calling me “Richy! Richy!” I walk back and I look at him covered in blood. He can’t even get up. “Richy, you can’t leave us like this.” So I thought, fair dos, and I pick him up and lay him in the car all bashed up. You know I’m a fair man and I don’t like to take liberties; once a man is done, he’s done and that’s it. If I had got beat fair I’d come back to fight again, and if I still got beat I would have shaken his hand and admitted he was the better man.
I was in streetfights maybe four, five times a week. Seems people were coming from all over to have a go. I was getting so much trouble and getting locked up all the time. I never got charged, mind you. I guess it was because I had so many witnesses who came forward to say that I didn’t start anything, which was always the case.
I remember once it was New Year’s Eve and I’d been working since twelve in the day. This guy was trying to get into this young girl, a row broke out and I ended up hitting him. It was about four in the morning and I was very drunk. I went to the toilet and I was sitting there when I can hear all hell breaking loose outside. This big lad outside is going right berserk. He was shouting that he wanted to fight me out in the garden. I didn’t want to fight him because you don’t do justice to yourself when you’re drunk. Anyway, soon as I get on the grass, bang, I’m down. I’ve been hit. My legs are like jelly and I don’t know what the fuck is happening. He got on top of me and I couldn’t even lift my hands up, he was punching and punching me. I remember thinking, I wish I was sober. I really thought he was going to kill me; he just kept smashing away and I could feel myself slipping away. I kept trying to stay awake, and after what seemed to be an eternity, he got up. Now the guy I was fighting had rings on: I was cut to bits and I could see bits of flesh cut open on the end of my nose and all. I was in a right state – all around my eyes and all were cut open.
Now it must have been a good six months gone past. I hear he’s going around thinking he’s King Kong, so I have to get my revenge. When things like this happen, you start getting doubts in your mind and that, you start thinking, was it the drink or was he the better man? When I was right and got myself sorted, I went to the club where he was drinking. Every day I had been thinking of what had happened and what I was going to do. I didn’t go in but I looked through the window and the big twat’s in there and he has his back to me. That’s when the butterflies in the stomach start. I wait outside for him and when he sees me across the road, he shouts, “So, you want another good hiding, do yah?” He’s so very confident. He comes at me, throws a big right hand but I block it and step in. I smash him twice and down he goes. I get on top of him and smash him to bits. I get back off him and I thought I’d killed him. I’d broke my hands on him as well, and he was in bits. He was rushed to hospital and it was touch and go for a while.
A good while went past and one night I was out celebrating my mate’s birthday. I was just stepping out of the pub when, bang, he hits me. Now I don’t know what the hell has happened. My head’s spinning and he hits me again. I fly back against the pub windows and he gets me again. If it wasn’t for the pub door, I would have been down. I steady up as one of my mates pushes him back. While this was happening, my head clears and I realise what’s going on. My pal shouts, “Right then, let them fight.” As I was walking towards him my legs are still like jelly. Seems we found ourselves in the middle of the high street, and everyone’s out to watch it. All the cars stop because they can’t get past. At first we both miss a few punches, then BANG. I catch him with a big hook and down he goes. I can see his eyes rolling and his head bounced off the tarmac on the road. I drag him off the road to where it started by the pub. I got on top of him and let him have it again. When I was done with him and got up and looked at him, it’s like he was dying. The ambulance came and they got an oxygen mask straight on him. I could see the life draining out of him. They got him in hospital and he nearly pegged it. I was scared bloody stiff, I can tell yah. I really thought he would die. He was on some sort of machine for a while in hospital. He wanted to press charges but there were too many witnesses to say that he had started it all. Years and years later I bumped into him at a party. I guess everyone thought it was going to kick off. I looked at him and he looked at me, we both smiled and shook hands. He told me that at the time all his friends had been winding him up saying that he was scared of me and that.
A few years ago I was drinking in this nightclub and happened to be talking with this woman. Nothing in it, just talking. I notice over the other side of the room there’s some guy waving his arms, threatening like, and shouting something I couldn’t hear because of the noise. There were two of them, a big one and a small one doing all the mouthing. I’m thinking, is he talking to me? I look around and realise he is. We lock eyes and I point to myself and mouth, “Are you talking to me?” He nods yes and continues with the obscenities.
I excused myself to the woman I was talking with, put my pint down and walked over. I stopped to ask a friend to watch my back. Thing is, people like this can’t be talked to, so I wasn’t going to mess around. I hit the smaller mouthy one with a right, left, right, smack on his chin. Down the twat went, unconscious before he hit the floor. I turn to the big guy and off he shot like Linford Christie. I catch up with h
im and threw a glancing right hand. It dropped him but fear was keeping him awake. He scrambled under the tables to hide from me. As the doormen arrived I was putting the boot into him and not having much success. After about ten minutes an ambulance came for the other one. Seems the doormen couldn’t revive the fucker. We were on the top floor of the club, so the bouncers had to carry him out. He looked a right mess. Turns out the smaller one had his jaw shattered. The big one said the punch that caught him was like being hit by a hammer. From what I gather the smaller one had been going out with the woman I was talking to for a couple years. The big one had a reputation as a fighter, the smaller one thought his mate would help him out of the shit, but of course the shit hit the fan.
It’s not as if I start the trouble. One Sunday night I was drinking with this girl. I had been working hard on the pub and club doors and could do with a night with no trouble. We got to the pub that I had been working the door at. I got between these two guys so I could get served by the bar. One of them said, “Who the hell do you think you are pushing?” I bit my tongue, as I had promised myself a quiet night.
“Do you want a fucking chew?” he screamed at me.
I replied, “No.”
“Well, you better not if you know what’s good for you,” he screamed again.
I got the drinks and went to the other side of the room. All the time this stupid prick kept going through my head. He kept looking over and talking to his pals, I thought, fuck the quiet night, it’s out the window now. I weighed the situation up: there was three of them and just me. I went and stood by the door – you had to pass through it to leave. After what seemed like ages, the three decided to leave. I finished my drink and stood there blocking the door. The prick with all the gob was thinking what the fuck was going on. “I’ve changed my mind, I do want a chew,” I growled at the arsehole. I brought a big right into play and the wanker didn’t know what had hit him. He was sleeping on the floor with blood coming from a deep gash. His two mates turned white and shit themselves. They didn’t want it. There were women screaming like mental cases and the manager ran over and said I’d better leave before the ambulance and the police came. I slipped into the crowd and disappeared.
Now I thought it was over, even though he had lied and told people I had hit him with an ashtray. One day I had to go to this pub to sort some trouble out and who was sitting there with all his mates but the arsehole with all the gob. It was like walking into an enemy’s camp. The lad I wanted to see wasn’t there. As I was leaving, the wanker shouts out, “Oi, you.” I turn and he’s standing there. “Who do you think you are, coming here to sort chew out in my pub?” I thought, I’m going to be killed, so I walk off and get a few friends to watch my back. I come back and the prick is now all by himself – all his mates knew I was coming back so they up and left. Now he wouldn’t come out in the car park with me because my mates were there, even just on our own. He starts raising his voice, so I thought, fuck this, and gave it to him. I smashed him so bad that I broke three of his ribs and he had internal bleeding. The barman told me that when they carted him off he thought the geezer was dead. He never came back. I found he had put a two grand price on my head for anyone who could do me over. Well that never happened, and no-one ever collected the money.
I never look for trouble but sometimes on the door it came my way. This bloke came in one night. He had just had a bust-up with his woman and was looking for trouble. He started to smash up all the glasses that were stacked waiting to be washed. He must have smashed about 60 glasses. I could hear all the smashing as I came from the toilet. The guy went to leave the pub but had to get past me to go through the door. The whole pub were watching him; he was marching straight towards me with a right snarl on his face. I stood in the way to block him and he threw a punch at me, I slipped the punch and snapped out a straight right smack on the button. He was on the deck groaning and covered in blood and all the fight had gone out of him. Another doorman picked him up and took him to be cleaned up in the toilets. I look down at my hand and there’s this big gash and blood is pouring out. Seems I’d knocked his front teeth out and they had stuck in my hand. I still have the scar today. A few weeks later, I got banged up for it – he didn’t go to the police until a fortnight later. Somebody had put him wise to getting compensation. Anyway, the Crown Prosecution Service kicked it into touch. It’s amazing how many arseholes there are like that guy out there.
I started work at this wine bar, a proper place with about ten doormen. My first night there and they tell me about this bloke who comes every weekend. This guy won’t see his drinks off and always makes them look stupid. You know the type: loud and loves an audience. Well it was late and practically everyone had gone. It was a bit of a headache getting everyone out, it’s always like that when they have had a few drinks. There were about six lads standing around some of the doormen, they were fucking around and acting up because they had this prick with them. The doormen had asked him to drink up but he just waved and said, “Bye, bye,” to them. I walk up and tell him to finish his drink or I’m taking it away. I don’t like people taking the piss so you have to be firm with them. The prick just sat there smirking at me. I reached over, grabbed his pint and poured it over his huge head. Before he could move I smack him with a straight right and flatten the prick. His mates shout out that they don’t want any trouble and off they go. Well they take him to hospital and they find I broke his nose, not to mention his ego. Suffice to say he never tried his little tricks again. He did consider pressing charges but thought better of it. Now, if he had done it to me I would never get the police involved. That’s the trouble with working the doors: you’re always in a no-win situation. In 1996 I packed the door work in, and thank God for that.
On one occasion I was sure I was going to be killed. I have this good mate known as Maori, who I have known since we were kids. He’s someone I can trust and think the world of. The both of us and another friend drive over to this big estate where we arranged to meet up with some guys that we had trouble with. The three of us get out of Maori’s Land Rover and walk over to the guys. Before we can say anything they pull out guns and start to fire at us. The three of us had the same idea, and that was to fuck off as fast as we could. As I’m running I can hear bullets flying all around us. We get back in the Land Rover and pull away. With that, all the windows get shot through. There were people coming out of the houses to watch us get shot at. Maori’s driving and I’m ducking my head down. We manage to get away but then realise that my other mate’s been shot through the shoulder. He’s sitting in the back clutching his shoulder, white as a ghost, and looks like he’s going into shock. We get to the hospital and dump him off in casualty. We looked a right sight driving up with all the windows shot in. Maori and myself were lucky to get away unscathed but the three of us walked around with hair like Don King for the next few weeks.
Maori’s always getting involved in something or another, it’s just the way he is. Life would be so boring without him around. Only the other day he nearly got himself killed again. He was living on some farmland and had a bag of gold jewellery that he had to hide, in case the police came around. Well, the daft bastard hid them on the roof of the barn where they kept the pigs, thinking nobody’s going to look up there. One night he climbs up to get them so he can sell them all. He loses his footing and comes straight down through the roof, landing on his back in all the pig shit. He must have fell 30 feet and was lucky that the shit broke his fall. He told me he was stunned for a while and just lay there in the pig shit with all the porkers around him. I told him he was lucky the farmer didn’t turn up and take him off to market. On the other hand nobody would buy him – too bloody ugly!
I’ve always loved Hartlepool and hope I never have to move. There are so many interesting people here and the town has some great history. The town itself used to be known as Little Chicago because of the amount of gangs that it once had: there was the Captain Cutlass gang, the Turquoise Gang and loads more. L
oads of tough, foreign merchant seamen came to this town. They would spend their cash in a row of pubs called the Barbary Coast. I remember a story that a prostitute opened up Captain Cutlass’s face with a bottle, leaving him scarred for life with a big “Mars Bar” across his face. A man I would have loved to have known would have been the town’s first bouncer: he was known as “Battling” Manners, a hard-as-nails mountain of a man. He worked here in the Thirties. He was a pro heavyweight who didn’t suffer fools gladly. He would literally bounce them out of the pubs.
When I was fighting all the time I got the nickname “Crazy Horse” because of my name being Horsley and my own interest in the American Indian. Well, I was a little embarrassed about it at first but got used to it. Crazy Horse was probably the greatest warrior the Indian nation ever produced. I don’t get called it now but a short while ago somebody said to me, “Now then, Crazy Horse.” I couldn’t help but laugh, seeing as I hadn’t been called it for years. I’m 37 this year [2001] and I can’t say it’s been the greatest of years. My sister Jackie passed away just lately, she was only 38 so it’s been an emotional time for us all. I have another sister, Debbie, who is 39 years old, and I have four kids. My oldest daughter, Jill Louise, just had a beautiful baby daughter so it looks like I’m now the best-looking grandad in Hartlepool. Next in line is my daughter, Donna, she’s coming up to 16 and is in her last year of school. She wants to go into nursing. My boy, Terry, is 14 and is music mad, it’s music all the time with him. My youngest daughter, Ashleigh, is only ten and a great gymnast; she has just been accepted at the school of excellence. Her ambition is to be picked for her country and with our fingers crossed go to the Olympics one day. None of my kids live with me but I’m a big part of their lives and I hope I always will be.
Streetfighters: Real Fighting Men Tell Their Stories Page 2
