Aftermath: The complete collection

by John Wilkinson

  ‘Get back in the corner, you fucking scumbag’ shouted Sergeant Welsh, before turning his attention to us. ‘What the fuck do you want?’ He snarled, pointing the bloody knife at us, before throwing it onto the desk.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ Replied Little D, reasonably calmly given what we’d walked in on. ‘You’re out of control Welsh.’

  ‘Shut the fuck up Davis, I’m in complete control. I’m the only one that knows what’s going on here, the only one that really gets it. I’m getting shit done, getting the answers to questions. Now I know where Torriero is hiding, this piece of shit has just told me exactly what I wanted to know.’

  ‘Is that after you took his eye?’

  ‘What do you care? These are the fuckers who murdered your brother, do you even care?’

  ‘Fuck you, you arrogant prick.’

  ‘What you gonna do Davis?’ Sergeant Welsh spat back, picking his hand gun off the desk, and aiming at him. Little D didn’t raise his weapon, it lay at his side as he continued to argue. But my instinct was to aim at Sergeant Welsh, not something I thought about, just an automatic response.

  ‘Put your fucking gun down Driver’ shouted Sergeant Welsh, briefly aiming his weapon at me before moving back to Little D. I didn’t move it, and he kept glimpsing at me, out of the corner of his eye.

  ‘You’re not fit to lead this team’ Little D responded. ‘You’re a fucking disgrace. I’m taking command of this company now.’

  ‘Don’t push me Davis, I will put you down.’

  ‘I’m sure you will.’

  Sergeant Welsh was getting redder and more animated, as he lost control of the situation. He was becoming twitchy, and sweat was pouring off him, which he wiped off his brow with his arm.

  ‘Stand down Driver’ he shouted, waving his gun back in my direction again. ‘Murphy, put your gun on Driver. Stand down Davis, this won’t end well for you, I’ll make sure you’re working in the kitchen for the rest of your service. Murphy, I’m fucking ordering you to aim at Driver.’

  Murphy looked at me nervously, his hand hovering around his weapon, muttering to himself.

  ‘Murphy!’ Repeated Sergeant Welsh, ‘Take out Driver, now.’

  Murphy lifted his rifle towards me, but then pulled it across his body towards Sergeant Welsh.

  ‘What are you fucking doing, I’ll have you all court marshaled for this. Put your gun on Driver.’

  ‘It’s you that needs to put your weapon down’ said Little D. ‘There’s no other way out of this, you’re done.’

  The desperation was all over his face, he moved his weapon from one member of the company, to another. Then he lowered it to the floor, his gaze following suite, as he started shouting.

  ‘Are you gonna shoot me you fucking cowards? So this is what I get for sorting your company out, fuck the lot of you.’ He fired his hand gun into the air, and then moved closer to Little D, getting right into his face as he shouted, trying to get a reaction. He then did the same to me, spraying my face as he screamed, I could smell his foul breath as he continued.

  ‘Which one if you fuckers has the balls to do it then?’ He shouted, firing his hand gun into the floor six yards from Little D, causing Murphy to twitch. He then fired a second shot that flashed inches from Little D’s head, the bullet embedding itself in the wall behind him. In a breath, Sergeant Welsh was hit in the chest from a burst of gunfire, that sent him sprawling to the ground, as more bullets from his gun thudded into the wall behind Little D’s head. It took us a few seconds to re-compose ourselves, and realise what had just happened, those seconds were in silence, just looking at each other. Murphy had fired the fatal bullets, he walked over to Sergeant Welsh’s body, and checked him, confirming he was dead with a nod of his head.

  ‘This is a fuck up’ he said, finding a chair to sit on.

  ‘He’d lost it, he was going to kill one of us’ I replied, trying to reassure him.

  ‘Maybe, either way it’s not going to go down well.’

  ‘Pull yourselves together’ said Little D, pointing towards the injured fighter. ‘This man needs a medic, we still have a job to do. Sergeant Welsh had lost it, he killed one man, attacked another, removing his eye with a knife. We confronted him, and he pulled a gun on us, it was either him or us. That is our story, that is what happened.’ We all nodded our understanding, and got on with the objective. We took the prisoners out of he building, meeting up with Lieutenant Colonel Carter, where the injured man was treated by our medics. Little D had a private conversation with Lieutenant Colonel Carter, and explained what had happened. None of Blue and White Company were privy to the discussion, but Little D later told us that Lieutenant Colonel Carter spoke to the generals in front of him, and he was promoted to sergeant with immediate effect. He said there would have to be an inquiry into what happened, requiring us all to give evidence, when the war was over. He was told off record, the generals knew Sergeant Welsh was a risk, they’d had other complaints, but he’d got the job done. Lieutenant Colonel Carter had also advised us to get our story straight, before we were interviewed. Little D probably didn’t have the experience required to take the role of sergeant, but having proved himself in combat, and having the complete respect of each member of Blue and White Company, he was deemed the right man for the job, at least on an interim bases. We left Sergeant Welsh’s body in the office block, at the request of Lieutenant Colonel Carter, who ordered in a new battalion to take our place when we leave, to orchestrate the clean up. By midday, the remaining tanks from The Black Cats Battalion had joined up with us, and were being looked over by our engineers, and re-stocked with ammunition. We had a short break for lunch, in which we discussed the next objective, and finalised our plan. Torriero had control of an area roughly half a mile radius, at the centre of which was The Headrow, a long straight road that split the camp across the middle. The road was under his control, with the might of his army positioned along it. He was already fighting running battles on the westerly and easterly points, as our circle enclosed around him. Our objective was to attack him from the south, but before we could do that we would have to work our way through the city. We followed the tanks along Neville Street past more and more office blocks, which all had to be painstakingly searched before we could secure it and move on. There was intensive fighting when we reached Leeds Train Station, as we finally started to collide with Torriero’s army. They had row upon row of dug in placements, high and low, setting themselves strategic defensive positions. From there they fought, with high powered artillery, and men on the ground. When we arrived, the area was clearly prepared for battle, but largely free from destruction. But that didn’t last long, as bullet holes, and explosions tore through everything. We moved through the train station, clearing buildings, carriages, but it was slow going. Just like an onion, every time we managed to remove a layer of soldiers fighting in trenches, there was another layer underneath, just as deeply dug in. There were hundreds of metres of trenches dug, using the lines of the railway to strengthen their defences, dug in making them hard to target. We moved through, using tank shells to soften their positions, taking a few casualties, but inflicting more on the enemy. After a few hours of fighting, we were past the train station, and found the battleground changing to a more built up, close combat style fighting. The enemy had gun positions on top of the bridge, that overlooked the car park, where we had parked when we arrived for our meeting with Torriero. After being pinned down for a few minutes, our tanks took out their gunners, allowing us to move forward through the car park, still littered with vehicles. As I ran past the first vehicle, I was blown into the air, and landed on the bonnet of the car behind me. The explosion was a member of The Riversiders Company, who activated a trip wire, and was blown into pieces. I saw it happen, the only person who did, all that was left to identify him from was his right arm. I think his name was Williamson, although I
have never spoken to him, he was only identified later when everyone else was accounted for. Another young man that wouldn’t be returning home, and no body for his family to grieve over. The circle we were tightening around Torriero now meant we were working side by side with other companies, The Riversiders Company to our left and Clarets to our right. There were just pockets of fighters in the car park, which we mopped up quickly, before moving onto the bridge. The corpses were still hanging underneath the arch, in fact they seemed to have been added to. Three companies were sent through the bridge arches, to attack Torriero’s men from a different position, as we tried to take control of the bridge. The battle for control was the bloodiest fight of the day, that I was involved in. Torriero’s men had the high ground, and used it to their advantage, laying fire down on our positions, and inflicting the majority of the days injuries and deaths. The top of the steps was overlooked by a gun placement, as was any climbable banking, soon a pile of bodies told the story of our attempts. Men were cut down trying to get into a position to attack them from, we lost upwards of twenty men in half an hour, dead or injured. Lieutenant Colonel Carter ordered the tanks to backtrack down Boar Lane, and take New Market Street which ends up on top of the bridge, where they could attack them from the front. Three companies from The Lancashire Fusiliers Ninth Battalion followed behind on foot, as we took cover and waited. We heard the tanks rolling across the top of the bridge above us, like the sound of thunder, as they unleashed a barrage of shells at Torriero’s positions. The soldiers on foot then cleaned up any remaining fighters, before we climbed up to meet them. We marched forward unopposed, through the abandoned security posts, to a row of terraced houses. These were the properties, Keenan told us were accommodation used by their fighters. Inside the buildings it looked like they had been packed in like sardines, with little in way of quality of life. Little D took his first sergeant meeting, as new intel was past down, and further objectives agreed. As we waited, a new anti-tank company joined up with us, The Bombers Battalion, part of The Duke of Lancaster Battalion. When we tried to move out, following Kings Street towards Headrow Road, we were put under fire from the buildings surrounding us. There was row upon row of houses, that disintegrated under machine gun fire, debris soon covering the road. We were ordered to only use tank shells as a last resort, to try and curb the destruction of the city, but it just slowed down our progress. Each building had to be searched and secured, before moving onto the next. Most fighters were in small groups of maybe three or four per building, in most cases, our tactic of shooting out the windows, throwing in grenades as a four man team breached the front door, worked well. We only took a few casualties, and no deaths. It took around five hours to reach the objective, a couple of blocks from Headrow Road, where we were to camp down. We used the houses, vacated by Torriero’s fighters, to sleep. The complete lack of respect shown to the original home owners by Torriero’s men was disgusting, if not altogether unpredictable. Before we went to bed we received a report on the days fighting from Lieutenant Colonel Carter, who confirmed Torriero had lost at least three tanks during the fighting, and approximately a hundred men, which was encouraging considering we were still to hit the bulk of their defences. The Queens Lancers Battalion had made progress along Headrow Road from a westerly direction, forcing Torriero’s army back towards Park Square, while The Rifles Battalion had made similar gains from a easterly direction, towards Albion Street. The Royal Norfolk Battalion had pushed from Woodhouse Lane, but made little headway, finding the bulk of Torriero’s army forcing them back. I had a brief chat with Chapman before we retired for the night, about how his first day had gone with his new company. He seemed to dealing with it well, losing your sergeant only hours after meeting him must be hard for anyone, even if he was a liability.