by Paul Bruce
I felt a twinge of excitement. Although we weren’t yet operating in hostile country, this seemed far more real than anything we had undergone during training. We knew we had to escape capture, that there was an object to the exercise. We knew that passing this test successfully would mean going to Ulster on a real mission.
That first day, we must have travelled twenty miles, as Don set a hard, fast pace. We had one stop, at a bakery on the edge of Hereford, where we stocked up on steak and kidney pies, pork pies, sausage rolls and a couple of pints of milk each. We had never before been permitted to do anything like that when out training and we realised instinctively that, in Don, we had someone who did indeed know the ropes. Stocking up on pies may have been a minor point but it instilled in us the feeling that we could have confidence in him.
‘It’s far better eating this stuff,’ he said, ‘rather than spending hours trying to catch some poxy fish which we couldn’t even cook.’
Already, he seemed like a man after my own heart.
That first night, we were halfway up a hill at the edge of the Black Mountains where we found a drystone-walled shelter used in winter to keep the sheep together in snowy weather. We took the usual precautions, taking turns on guard, although we had kept our eyes peeled during the march out and had seen no sign of troops anywhere. Nonetheless, we were taking no chances.
The weather wasn’t particularly bad, alternating between showers, wind and sun. As it was early September, the nights turned cold in the mountains but our sleeping bags were warm and the food we had brought along kept us reasonably happy. I would have preferred a lovely steaming-hot beef stew at night but the cold pies were certainly better than poxy cold fish.
For the next three days, we headed in a zig-zag line upwards into the Brecon Beacons, always keeping a sharp look out for the troops trying to find us. We didn’t know whether they would be following us or were perhaps ahead of us, so we could never afford to relax.
Every couple of hours, we would find some high ground and Don would go alone to a commanding position and scan the entire countryside with his binoculars. We also took the precaution of making use of the mountain streams, walking along them for a few hundred yards, just in case the troops following had been provided with dogs to track us.
To make the task more difficult for the following soldiers, we would never simply cross a lane when we came to one but would walk down it for perhaps a couple of hundred yards before going off to the other side.
When we met flocks of sheep, we would walk along with them for a hundred yards or so. At first they would automatically assume that we had hay with us, but when they realised we had nothing for them they would leave us to walk on alone. That helped in two ways. It made it more difficult for the trackers to follow us and it also made it more difficult for sniffer dogs, as the smell of the sheep would put them off our scent.
We began to think that the CSM had conned us. We had seen no one following us and believed the CSM had just said what he did to keep us keen and make us march harder and longer than we would otherwise have done. Then, on the fourth day, Don went to make another recce and came back much faster than he had done before. ‘There are four men about a mile and a half behind us. I’m virtually certain they’re the ones sent to find us. Let’s go.’
He decided that our best chance of evading them would be to turn 180 degrees in a wide arc and come up behind them. That march took us a good hour and we must have covered a few miles, despite having to keep behind cover at all times. When we found their trail, the four men had disappeared from view but Don suggested that we use their footprints so that, if they did succeed in following our 180 degree arc, they wouldn’t be sure they were still on our trail.
After following them for half a mile or so, we came across a metalled country lane and so we legged it, as fast as possible, for five miles or more, running for perhaps a mile and then walking for a mile, and so on. We hoped that we had succeeded in throwing them off the scent.
We had seen no helicopters and were virtually certain that no following units had any idea of where we were. If they did come across us, it would be totally by chance. Don suggested that we try to reach the other side of the Brecon Beacons before the seven days were over because he had an idea as to where we might spend the next fourteen days. He was fairly certain that we were now safe from our trackers and that the unit following was probably still searching for us in the opposite direction. To celebrate, he told us that, the next day, we would have our first hot meal since we had left camp seven days before. ‘We’ll have a barbecue,’ he said.
We looked a little surprised, wondering where he would find the steaks and sausages.
JR said, ‘I can’t see any fucking sausages out here.’
Don replied, ‘There are plenty of frigging sheep around, aren’t there?’
None of us had ever killed a sheep and we had no idea how on earth you skinned it afterwards. It didn’t seem a very bright idea but we just hoped that Don was not only a good hunter but also a skilled chef.
The following evening, we made camp in the corner of a field, miles from any buildings or country lanes. Don disappeared to find a likely lamb, taking me and JR with him. Kenny was left behind to start a fire.
At first, Don tried to sneak up on a lamb with the intention of slitting its throat. However, it seemed to us that the sheep knew what he was after. They would let him approach to within six feet and then run away, leading him a merry dance around the field. For twenty minutes, he failed to catch one and was becoming more and more pissed off. He was also feeling a prat in front of us – a respected, well-trained, professional, experienced SAS sergeant unable to catch one defenceless sheep.
Fed up with chasing about, Don decided to put an end to the charade. He put a magazine on his SMG, saying out loud, ‘Right, you little bastards. I’ll teach you to take the fucking piss out of this desert hero,’ and he opened up at point-blank range, killing six of them, while the others scattered.
JR and I looked at each other, speechless. We had never seen anything like it. I thought to myself, ‘I wouldn’t want to upset him in a pub.’
After the shock of the killings, we all burst out laughing, including Don. He realised he had gone over the top and I thought he must be a bit loopy to react to sheep in that way. I wondered how he would react if the enemy ever tried to take the piss out of him.
We had a look round to check that no one had heard the sound of the SMG and then looked at the sheep, trying to find one which hadn’t been riddled with bullets. We were fortunate; one of them had been shot just once, through the head. We dragged the other five sheep to the edge of the field and threw them in a ditch before covering them with branches. We took the other sheep back to our camp, hung it up by its hind leg from the branch of a tree and cut its head off to allow all the blood to drain out. When it had stopped bleeding, Don took his knife and skinned it. He had obviously done this before because the whole operation took him only fifteen minutes and seemed absolutely professional.
We wasted most of it, simply cooking the legs on spits over the fire. They took more than two hours to cook thoroughly, with each one of us taking a leg and holding it over the flames like a spit roast. Most of the time we spent laughing about the whole episode. We hadn’t had much to laugh about during the previous four days and the affair helped to ease the atmosphere. The sheep tasted fantastic; our first hot meal for days. We hadn’t realised how hungry we had become.
I asked Don how he would account for the rounds he had used.
‘Haven’t you heard of the six Ps?’ he asked.
‘No, never,’ I said. ‘What are they?’
‘Proper planning prevents piss poor performance,’ he said, speaking slowly and emphasising all the Ps.
‘I understand,’ I said.
‘And another point,’ he added. ‘I always carry spare ammunition. Don’t forget that. You never know when it might come in useful.’
After we had devoured the f
ood, we felt better, more comfortable and at ease with life. The fire still burned and we began chatting together for the first time since we had set out. We told each other about our lives and backgrounds, and Don took this opportunity to describe how he had been killing gooks out in Oman. ‘Not much different from killing those sheep,’ he said, and laughed.
I couldn’t imagine what it would be like actually to kill someone or, for that matter, even an animal, especially like that. I had all but pissed myself laughing when Don took his machine gun and had opened up on a flock of sheep but I stopped laughing when I realised that one day I would have to do things like that myself. I didn’t give it much more thought, however, for we were going to Ulster not the Middle East; there would be no gooks in Ireland.
While we were heating the water for our coffee at dawn the following day, Don announced that we were off to Milford Haven, the oil refinery port on the Welsh coast. ‘Shit,’ I thought. ‘That’s more than a hundred miles away; that will take us four or five days.’
He told us that he knew of a place where we could hole up in peace for a couple of weeks, relax and enjoy ourselves. We had wondered how we were meant to survive for three weeks with no rations. We knew we should be living rough and we wondered whether we were expected to survive the entire time on insects, birds and any vegetables we came across. It had made sense to us when Don told us to bring along our Post Office savings books, despite the fact that it would mean spending our own money. We had seen hardly anything, except sheep, during our seven-day trek that could have kept four hungry men happy.
However, we hadn’t counted on Don’s initiative. ‘Fuck marching,’ he said after an hour on the road. ‘It’s time we took things a bit easier. We’ll hitch-hike.’
We looked at each other. We thought that was against the rules but who were we to argue. Don was in command.
As we waited for a lift, Don said, ‘Let me give you some advice. You don’t live rough if you don’t have to; and you don’t march for miles when you can ride. You only march when it is imperative to do so.’
Because we were in army uniform, people happily stopped to offer us lifts but we would only accept a lift if there was room for the four of us. In all, the journey took about twelve hours and we rode in eight separate vehicles. It was wonderful driving along at 60mph, watching the country fly past rather than humping our packs, hour after hour, along lanes and across country.
We finally drove into Milford Haven in a transit van at about 9pm. We thanked the driver and began moving out of the town to a house where Don said we would be able to stay in some comfort. An hour later, we arrived at an old, detached cottage, a few hundred yards off the beaten track up a tiny little lane.
JR said, ‘This looks like fucking luxury to me.’
The cottage consisted of one large room with the kitchen off and a small hall where the stairs led up to two bedrooms and a bathroom. In one bedroom was a double bed, which JR and Benny shared, and I slept in one bunk bed with Don in the other. After seven days of sleeping rough, this place seemed like the Ritz.
It was obvious that Don had stayed there before. We all had a steaming hot bath, the first for a week, a shave and general clean-up. Then we slept for eight hours solid with no one standing guard. We knew we were safe and the front door was locked and bolted.
We packed our weapons and ammo in polythene and buried them in the back garden in what must have been the original cold store. On top of that we piled compost. We felt they were safe enough from any casual passerby.
I began to suspect that someone knew we were going to stay at the cottage because the refrigerator and the larder were packed with enough food for a large family on a two-week holiday. That couldn’t have been an accident. Later, we asked Don whether the cottage had been specially laid on because we were going to be roughing it in Ulster for a long time; this being a sort of holiday during which we would get to know each other by living, eating, sleeping and relaxing together.
He replied, ‘Surely you don’t think even the SAS would make us live rough for three weeks and then ship us straight out to Ulster, not knowing what conditions we might have to put up with there.’ It made sense.
The first stop the next day would be the nearest launderette to clean all our gear.
During the following two weeks, we travelled most days to Haverfordwest, about five miles away. We would search out the best pubs, go to a few discos, have some good meals and hope to meet the odd good-looking girl. In fact, we all scored.
One night we decided to throw a party back at the cottage. We invited some girls we had met, plus their brothers and their girlfriends. That night about sixteen of us had a great night with lots to eat and drink and everyone bonking all over the house. That seemed to go on most of the night. They thought we were four young lads on holiday. The girls gave us their addresses and we all said we would be in touch. That, of course, was out of the question, but we hoped they had enjoyed themselves.
By the time we arrived back at Hereford, having hitch-hiked most of the way, the four of us were bosom pals. We had all come to know each other really well and happily accepted Don’s authority. He was a natural leader but never authoritarian. We respected him for that and it made the relationship between us all that much easier and more comfortable.
When we walked in to see the CSM, he said with a wink, ‘I see you’ve been really roughing it.’
He knew all right. He probably had a good idea what the next twelve months would be like as well, but he said nothing about that either.
CHAPTER FIVE
Two days later, and dressed in civvies, we were driven to Liverpool in a Land Rover and caught the ferry to Belfast. The overnight crossing could not have been worse; a gale-force wind sent waves crashing against the ship and half the passengers spent most of the crossing being sick. We couldn’t have had a more unpleasant welcome to Northern Ireland.
Belfast looked dull, drab and very wet. The innocent thoughts I had cherished of serving with the SAS in the sun and sand of a Middle East country evaporated in the damp mist of Belfast as we walked off the ferry into heavy rain.
Before leaving Hereford, we had been briefed by a major who first gave us a potted history of the political troubles during the past few years and then explained, in greater detail, what had been happening in Northern Ireland during the past few months. A large map of Ireland covered the wall. It was coloured in different shades, showing the Catholic, Protestant and mixed areas of Belfast and Londonderry, as well as dividing the six counties into their relevant religious and political lanes.
He told of the British Government’s decision, under Prime Minister Edward Heath at the end of July 1971, to dramatically change the army’s role in the Province from a non-active, defensive one to an active one.
During the previous few months, the IRA had become far more active, gaining much greater credence and control in Catholic areas and proving themselves the protectors of the beleaguered Catholic minority. The major said that Friday, 23 July 1971 had marked a watershed in government policy towards the handling of the IRA, with British forces in the Province being ordered on to the offensive instead of maintaining the passive tactics they had adopted since the troubles began in 1969. On that day, 1,800 British troops, backed by hundreds of police, had swamped Belfast, Londonderry and eight other towns in the Province, searching the homes of known IRA members and sympathisers, looking for activists responsible for outrages.
Home Secretary Reginald Maudling, revealing that 10,000 British troops were now stationed in Northern Ireland, told the Commons that day, ‘The army’s operation in Northern Ireland this morning marks the beginning of a new phase in the battle against the IRA.
‘It is our duty not only to contain disorder and violence but to search out the men and organisations responsible. In this new phase the security forces will act with vigour.’
However, the army’s new tactics brought a swift and devastating reply from the IRA, illustrating the power they p
ossessed to galvanise the Catholic minority into action. Within days, tens of thousands of IRA supporters and sympathisers took to the streets, demonstrating against the British troops in some of the most violent riots encountered by the army.
During the following weeks, attacks on army patrols escalated alarmingly, with petrol and nail bombs being hurled. Bomb explosions also blasted targets in Belfast and Londonderry.
The officer explained that the two wings of the IRA, the more politically inclined Official wing and the hard-line Provisionals, appeared to have buried their differences and to be working together. The two wings had issued a joint statement at the end of July, stating that the IRA would be stepping up its campaign of murder, sabotage and terror in its efforts to attain its military aims as well as in its determination to push for the abolition of Stormont, the Northern Ireland government.
The impact of the highly controversial policy of internment in the Province was also explained to us. The major told how internment had been introduced on Monday, 9 August, after a weekend of mayhem when IRA gunmen with loudhailers had toured Protestant areas in the Ardoyne, telling families: ‘Get out of your homes and leave, otherwise we will burn you out.’
This shock tactic had resulted in hundreds of families quitting their homes in fear, seeking shelter at police stations; others had taken refuge in school buildings which were guarded by police and army patrols. A real sense of fear had gripped some Protestants who felt vulnerable to IRA threats and intimidation.
Before dawn on Monday, 9 August, police, backed by troops, had raided hundreds of homes in Belfast and Londonderry, arresting 300 IRA suspects and sympathisers under sweeping new powers taken by the Stormont Government with the full knowledge and approval of the British Cabinet.
Announcing the new policy of internment, the Northern Ireland Prime Minister Brian Faulkner said, ‘We are quite simply at war with the terrorists. We are now acting to remove the shadow of fear which hangs over too many people.’
