Down Among the Weeds

by Harry Beaves

  Behind 21 and 23 Riverdale Park South on 26th September, the morning after the bomb behind 25 Riverdale Park South. Picture 19 Regt.

  Windows were blown out of the houses nearby, tiles were blown off the roofs, ceilings were cracked and there was structural damage to some of the buildings. In the garden the bomb left a crater six feet round and three feet deep. Amid the chaos members of the Battery moved about offering help and assistance where possible.

  We had been out since 2230 and I felt our job was done, so I asked Richard Craven if my little patrol could return to Casement Park. Despite the rising dawn there was a spring in the step and a smile on our faces as we moved past the blast-damaged houses to a large mug of sweet tea in the cookhouse.

  A cartoon produced by the Battery after the arms find behind 25 Riverdale Park South on 25th September1972.

  When the others returned spirits were soaring with the night’s work and we all gathered for breakfast laughing and retelling events. We had not been impressed by ‘Wagtail’ and as usual Crash provided the most memorable comment. ‘That bloody sniffer dog,’ he said. ‘I reckon old ‘H’ could do a better job finding explosives with his backside than that dog does with his nose!’ Except, of course, he didn’t use the word ‘backside’.

  Chapter 17

  Getting on Top

  After the explosion at 25 Riverdale Park South it was essential to capitalise quickly on the local sentiment, to offer sympathy, to help where possible, and to point folk in the right direction for compensation and the like. Soldiers from other units came in and were busy with this throughout the day. Among them was the QM of 19 Regiment and his team who took orders for more than 200 panes of glass. They did a great job, but it was unusual for them to stray from ‘slipper city’, as we saw it, into the badlands of Riverdale and we were mildly amused when a gunman fired a few wild shots at their Land Rover as they were returning to MPH.

  As an illustration of the hearts-and-minds struggle we faced, the Irish News, a daily paper supporting the Republican movement, carried the following report:

  Windows were shattered and four houses damaged when bomb disposal experts blew up about 50-60lbs of explosives found at the bottom of a garden in Riverdale Park South, Andersonstown area early yesterday. The condition of the explosives was ‘very bad’ said an Army spokesman. They were ‘weeping’ and had to be blown on the spot.

  The street was evacuated and when the explosives went off windows were shattered, slates were blown off roofs and the house damaged.

  A statement signed by the Press Officer, Irish Republican Army (Riverdale) and the Sean McCartney Sinn Fein Cumman said, ‘The British propaganda machine has now sunk to its lowest depth. In the early hours of yesterday morning the British Army evacuated families from their homes in Riverdale Park South claiming that the IRA had left a large quantity of explosives at the back of a house. The Irish Republican Army deny any responsibility for the explosives and accuse and condemn the British Army for their insane and highly dangerous method of furthering their propaganda.’

  Two days after the explosion I was looking round McAlpine’s Yard, the waste land behind Riverdale South, and discovered an old chicken coop. Tucked away inside was a clean looking carrier bag. When I squeezed the bag I could feel several hard objects and a granular substance. When I took my hand away there was the familiar smell of almonds. ‘Felix’ arrived, this time without ‘Wagtail’, and examined the contents of the bag. It contained all of the components that would have been necessary to detonate the cache of Co-op sugar that I had found behind 25 Riverdale South. We had now probably found the complete bomb kit.

  The bag contained three feet of safety fuse, thirty feet of ‘cordtex’ detonating cord, five pounds of Co-op sugar, three electric detonators and a ‘Parkway’ timer. The Parkway clock-timer was originally intended to go on a key ring to remind you when your parking time was running out. Twist the dial to the required setting and the clockwork mechanism would run down to zero, in the same way as a kitchen timer. On the timer that I had found one terminal was soldered to the zero and another was soldered to the dial. When the terminals met an electric circuit was closed and the detonation took place. It was enclosed in a crudely made hardboard box and, as an indication of the level of intelligence expected of the bomber, written by the side of the zero was the word ‘BANG’, just in case there should be any doubt.

  A bag of Co-op sugar, three detonaters, length of cordtex, a length of safety fuse and a Parkway Timer. Contact is made when two terminals touch at zero. The word ‘BANG’ is written on the device to help the would-be bomber! Picture 19 Regt.

  On 1st October we had another interesting round in the hearts-and-minds war when we received several reports of a suspicious package in Riverdale Park Gardens. The usual local sympathisers were telling the residents that it was a bomb that had been left by the Protestants. Sgt Moore was dispatched to secure the area while ‘Felix’ checked it out and declared it safe. We believed it was a hoax designed to remind the residents of the threat from the Protestant paramilitaries, in particular the Ulster Defence Association (UDA). The IRA had always justified their existence to protect the Catholic communities against such threats. In the event Sgt Moore did an excellent job reassuring the locals afterwards and we felt we won that round of the PR battle.

  We continued to patrol with the usual intensity on the days that followed and although we still picked up plenty of suspects the number of major incidents had dramatically decreased. In hindsight I believe that up until that time the IRA in Riverdale had been in disarray and were now preparing to become active again. Holding a party to celebrate this in the house where the explosives were being stored was hardly a wise move and it had allowed us to nip their plans in the bud.

  Because of the decrease in the number of incidents in our area we began to be used to support operations outside Riverdale, almost a welcome break from the boring routine of the small number of streets that were now so familiar to us. We worked several times with the Fusiliers in the Andersonstown lozenge and on one occasion deployed with 5 Battery in support of 40 Commando, Royal Marines in the Unity Flats area. Protestant extremists had exploded a bomb near a Catholic drinking club and killed the barman, whose funeral was on 29th September. Our task was to block the route from the Shankhill Road to the funeral route in case the notorious Protestant ‘Shankhill Boys’ decided to cause trouble. It was our first experience of working on the interface, and standing between two communities as the cortege went by was quite an eye-opener.

  At five the same afternoon I was due to take a Fred Basset patrol around our own patch. This Fred was new to the job, so before risking him on foot patrol, his handler wanted to practise him in the protection of a Saracen. We had not done mobile patrols for some time and I was not particularly enthusiastic, but fortunately the locals seemed to have forgotten the significance of two armoured vehicles cruising slowly round the area and we had an amazingly successful patrol. In the space of ninety minutes we picked up Joe Evans, QM of B Company, Eddie Donelly, QM of E Company, Jo Lewsey, a Volunteer from B Company and Terry Kingly, Frank Cassidy and Fred Holden who were attempting to start a stolen Hillman Imp.

  On several occasions we were called on to assist 1st Battalion the Light Infantry (1LI) with what were known as ‘Lollipop Patrols’ on the Crumlin Road where it runs between the Protestant Shankhill area and the Catholic Ardoyne. The Ardoyne consisted largely of rows of Coronation Street-style back-to-back Victorian tenements which run on to the Crumlin Road. IRA gunmen would observe these junctions from the attics and upstairs rooms of the houses in the Ardoyne and, as the soldiers patrolling along Crumlin Road crossed, they would snipe at them, usually targeting the last man in the patrol. The effect was often devastating and follow-up action was very difficult as the remainder of the patrol rarely saw where the shot had come from. To counter this, the end of each street was blocked off with an eight-foot-high corrugated anti-sniper screen, but even then there were always small gap
s which still gave the snipers a chance.

  Children from different denominations had always called each other names and thrown stones at one another as they walked to and from the schools that were on either side of the sectarian divide, but since the Troubles and the presence of the British Army these activities had taken an altogether more sinister tone.

  Captain Richard Beath served with 1LI and in The Guardian on 19th February 2000 he described an incident that took place just weeks before the time I am writing about. It perfectly illustrates the threat:

  ‘The kids are clearing, boss,’ Corporal Lewis shouted at me… I turned my back on the TV crew and ran briskly to my patrol. We had been doing our duty, standing between Protestant and Catholic children on the Crumlin Road as they made their way home after school. These were the “Lollipop” patrols. In this our third day into the new term, the Catholic children had been pelting us with bottles and stones for over half an hour. More than usual, we thought, and this meant they wanted to draw us into the area ready for a gunman. We stood our ground.

  ‘Take cover,’ I shouted. Moments later the children cleared completely, and we knew something was about to happen. The soldiers pressed themselves more closely into the tarmac. Four shots broke the menacing silence: Corporal Lewis and another soldier were hit, one in the thigh, the other in the arm. Just a few inches of body showing around the corner and the gunman had got them.

  I remember the blood running down the road; the sense of desperation, calling up the armoured ambulance and having to wait; the shouting and the feverish attempts at stopping the blood pumping out of his main artery. Now there wasn’t a child to be seen. They had done their bit. We stopped the bleeding; the crash crew arrived at last. Our mates were sped to the Royal Victoria Hospital to live another day. One lost his leg.

  We resisted the temptation to chase stone-throwers and in frustration a gunman just loosed off seven rounds through one of the corrugated iron screens, hitting no one. On that day a battalion and a half of troops (about a thousand men) had been deployed over a mile’s distance just to keep school children apart.

  The tenement streets of old Belfast gave us, as soldiers, no cover so we were very happy to get back to the protection offered by the gardens of Riverdale where low-key incidents still continued to keep us busy. On the night of 7th October, acting on information received, the Battery lifted 7, 10 and 50 Riverdale Park Drive. 6 Troop were given number 7, the house that Peter (the Para) McMullen had been using. We arrived to find a key left in the front door, a sign that it was open for use that night as a ‘safe house’. We let ourselves in and found Eileen McMullen and her children. A man’s clothing was found in the house, but there was no sign of Peter McMullen or any other male occupant.

  Tired, we trudged back to Casement Park after a fruitless night’s work. We had seen the Troop sorted and settled back in the accommodation when Sgt Moore looked at me and nodded towards the exit on to the terraces. The wind swept through the void as I took his cue and followed him out to where he had left two glasses and two bottles of ‘Scouser Brew’. We filled the glasses like naughty schoolboys and sat in the stand, gazing at the silhouette of the Belfast skyline as we savoured our beer.

  I say ‘savoured’, but that is not quite the right word. I have never really been a fan of home-brew and this was probably the mankiest that I had ever tasted, due in no small part to an excess of crisp packets and cigarette ends in the mixture. The joy of ‘Scouser Brew’ was not in the drinking, but in the pleasure of the guilty secret of its manufacture. Was it mischief or trouble? There would undoubtedly have been trouble if we were discovered, but I doubt if it would have harmed either of our careers. I was soon to go home for my Rest and Recuperation (R and R) leave and when I returned the remainder of the brew would mercifully have all disappeared.

  But it had a kick like a mule and when I turned in after a second bottle I slept like a log.

  Chapter 18

  Running Down

  When on the afternoon of 8th October Bdr Brookes (back after his loss of teeth during the rioting on 6th July) found a car in Finaghy Road North with the number plate hanging off, he reported it to Battery Ops and, as expected, was told it was stolen. Our policy at the time was to remove any stolen cars that we found. When L/Bdr King of 4 Troop opened the driver’s door, ready to drive it back, he was overwhelmed by the smell of air freshener, but even that could not disguise the almond odour of explosives. ‘Felix’ inspected it and told us that the bonnet, boot and doors of the car would all have opened as normal, but under the back seat was a pressure switch that would trigger a huge explosive charge when someone sat on it. He detonated the bomb on the spot and we thanked our lucky stars that the booby trap, quite plainly intended for us, had been unsuccessful.

  At any one time three soldiers were on duty to open the main gate and check vehicles in and out. In addition two men were deployed in bushes on the left and right of the gate as a guard against a drive-by gunman. It was a wet evening and at about 2100 a blue Ford Transit van drove by. The back doors opened and a man fired a volley of rounds from a machine gun at the gate. Gnr Collins and Gnr Edwards were on sentry and returned fire. The transit van was the signal for gunmen to open fire from three covered positions on the other side of the road (in the 2RGJ area). Sgt Moore arrived with the immediate response team as Armalite rounds were whistling through the tin sheeting on the gate. He checked for casualties and took charge. Then he and L/Bdr Taylor returned fire from a firing platform inside the gate. Meanwhile BSM Self had organised a group to fire from the terraces of the stand.

  A car bomb discovered in Finaghy Road North by Bdr Brookes on 8th October 1972 detonated by ‘Felix’. Picture 19 Regt.

  We had alerted 2RGJ and, to our relief, they arrived and formed a cut-off group on the other side of the road. They cornered two men carrying weapons, claimed to have hit one and recovered a Czech Schmeisser sub-machine gun near a pool of blood. This had been a brief but intense firefight and at last we had received timely assistance from the Green Jackets.

  * * *

  In 1972 soldiers serving a four-month tour of duty in Northern Ireland were entitled to a free flight home and four days’ R and R leave. I had been trying not to tempt fate by looking forward to it too much, but my turn finally came around on 16th October. Several of us from the Battery were taken to MPH in a Saracen and onwards to Aldergrove by military bus. When we had made the same journey on our arrival in July it was the start of an adventure, everything was new and exciting and we didn’t know what to expect. Now there was no light-heartedness or relief at the prospect of departure as we all felt very uneasy travelling through the province in plain clothes and without weapons.

  My father met me at Southampton Airport and we drove home to Salisbury where my sisters were waiting. It was a wonderful reunion and after dinner my father and I strolled down to our local pub, where we spent a quiet evening. That night I slept well in the comforting surroundings of the home in which I had grown up through my teens.

  The next evening I went out to find my mates. I did not have to look far, as always they were ensconced in the Pheasant Inn in Salt Lane. They welcomed me back and we settled in to the old Friday night routine. It was the usual conversation – bachelors comparing the merits of the Mini Cooper with the Ford Capri and the young marrieds talking about mortgages and Tesco bargains – but somehow I didn’t feel part of it. It was just trivia: how could their lives be so banal and empty of anything of real importance? Where was the excitement? I packed the required number of pints under my belt, but passed on the normal curry and shuffled off home. Shoulders rounded and hands thrust in pockets, I felt very lonely.

  The following morning I mooched around the house, confused. They were the friends that I had known for years, but it was as if I had just come from another planet.

  In his excellent book The Scars of War Hugh McManners quotes David Cooper, who served with distinction as the chaplain to the 2nd Battalion the Parachute Regimen
t during the Falklands War.

  When you think you are going to die, things like financial problems have no relevance. Human relationships are more important. The problem comes when you return and bank balances, recessions and the pressures of normal life re-impose themselves. You end up going back to live like everyone else. You can remind yourself that it wasn’t always like that on the battlefield – but you still end up living your life like the rest of the world…

  … Being involved in the fighting marks the soldier off as having gone through an experience that can’t be explained. It doesn’t matter how eloquent you are, you can’t describe it, and civilians can’t understand it. A soldier finds it very frustrating to explain… They would be very easily angered then very easily depressed as well.

  David Cooper’s sentiment describes the feelings that my father and I shared.

  After dinner I asked my father if he fancied a game of snooker. We strolled down to the club in the police station on Wilton Road, knocked a few balls around and from there went back to the West End Inn for a couple of pints with the landlord, John Watkins, and his wife, Vi. We had a pleasant, gentle evening and chatted as we strolled home. In Canadian Avenue, where we lived, the houses are private semi-detached, built in the 1920s, and the road is wide. We rounded the corner approaching our house, past the parked cars, when something caught my eye.