British Voices (25 page)

Well, Dublin Castle from where the message originated were very annoyed about this and said that someone's head should roll. And the RSM decided that it would be me. Well, I consulted the barrack room lawyer and decided that under the ‘old soldiers' act' it wasn't my fault. Anyway, I appeared in front of the adjutant and then in front of the commanding officer and the case was dismissed. And an order was published that in future boys were not to be put on that sort of work.

Interviewer
: Did you ever get any impression of the situation in Ireland as far as the ‘Troubles' were concerned?

RG
: Yes, because we had men wounded, policemen were wounded, ambushes were of a frequent nature, police barracks were attacked and burnt down and there was little or no co-operation between the Royal Irish Constabulary and the troops – at least it seemed to me not to be to the same extent as there is at the present moment in Ulster. They seemed to fade out of it. And then they recruited the Black and Tans who were for all intents and purposes the dirty job boys. You know, they were ex-officers clad in all sorts of uniform, armed with various weapons and they were paid a pound a day. They were really tough people.

Interviewer
: Was a pound a day a lot then?

RG
: Oh, yes. My pay as a boy was a shilling a day and a full-blown soldier, a fully trained soldier, got four shillings a day.

Interviewer
: What did the Army think of the Black and Tans?

RG
: We didn't see a lot of them. They'd swoop into barracks, in out, in out, in out. They seemed to have a semi-independent role.

Interviewer
: Did you ever see any hostilities yourself in Ireland?

RG
: No. I saw the results of them. On January 4th 1921 the police barracks at Tramore was attacked, we sent out a large patrol and luckily the patrol heard a shot go off, the force was split into two and they caught the Shinners crossfire and killed and wounded several. Well, that morning I went into breakfast, at least we were told that breakfast would be in two sittings, and when we went in there was two bodies – naked bodies – laid out on the tables and a man was washing the bodies and plugging up the bullet holes. And as it was rissoles for breakfast that morning not many people ate them.

Interviewer
: So these were two soldiers who'd

RG
: No, two Shinners. We were very lucky. We had several men wounded but only one fatal one. That was a man that fell into the river at Clonmel on the night patrol clad in battle order.

Interviewer
: What was the Army's opinion of the people against whom they were fighting?

RG
: Not very much, not very high at all. It was this question of tip and run. You see the ambushes were made chiefly by flying columns. They used to rendezvous at a certain point and the weapons for the ambush were brought out by the women in jaunting cars and things like that. Well, then having counted out the ambush they'd push off and do another one.

Interviewer
: Did you take any prisoners of the Sinn Féin?

RG
: Oh, yes, yes, yes. But it usually meant at the latter part if they were taken prisoner they were court martialled and shot. For instance in one incident at County Cork four or five men caught digging trenches across the road. They were court martialled at four – if I remember – three or four o'clock on the afternoon and shot at half past five. Now the squad that carried out the execution all left Ireland that night because they were on the draft for India. Now it was six men rather and that same night the Shinners went out and picked six British soldiers who were courting girls and shot them. So it was tit for tat.

Interviewer
: Did you actually see any prisoners?

RG
: Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. They were brought into the guard room and interrogated by the intelligence officer.

Interviewer
: How were they interrogated?

RG
: Well, that I don't know but I think under their Marquess of Queensbury Rules, you know, we didn't have any yellow cards or anything to tell us how we should go. For instance if an ambush occurred then the nearest house situated to the ambush was destroyed by the security forces.

Interviewer
: What do you mean by yellow card?

RG
: Well, what they have in Ireland, in Ulster, at the present moment they have a yellow card which indicates when and how they should open fire. You see over there the challenge was, ‘Halt. Hands up. Who are you?'. And if you didn't reply to the challenge then the bloke covering the point of the patrol would open fire.There was an amusing incident once at Kilkenny a patrol was out and a figure loomed up in the darkness and the point of the patrol gave the challenge, ‘Halt. Hands up. Who are you?', and the man came rushing forward, he said, ‘It's all right soldier I'm Father O'Rourke the parish priest'. And the soldier replied, he said, ‘I don't give a bugger if you're Father Christmas', he said, ‘you get your bloody hands up'.

Interviewer
: And did he?

RG
: Oh, yes, quick.

Interviewer
: Did anybody actually get shot for not obeying this challenge?

RG
: I can only recollect one. Yes, at the same place, Kilkenny. They were taking up the rations under escort of a lance corporal and six men in a limber and the lance corporal heard a scuffle and saw two men trying to wrest the rifle off the rear man of the escort. He shot one of them dead and he saw another man running and said, ‘Halt'. The man didn't stop and he shot him dead. And that poor fellow was an ex-serviceman diving for cover.

Interviewer
: Were there any consequences for the guard for that?

RG
: Oh, no, no, no. There was none of this business of reporting it to the director of public prosecutions.

Interviewer
: When you saw the Sinn Féin prisoners what impression of them did you get? Can you describe what they looked like?

RG
: Well, they were normally ... I shan't say they were nondescript but they were all, they seemed to be of a certain age group.

Interviewer
: What would that be?

RG: About the thirties, early thirties I should say, maybe a bit younger. The older men of course were the commandants as they called themselves, the OCs of the various brigades and whatnot.

Interviewer:
How did they behave under captivity? Quietly or defiantly or what?

RG
: Well, there was a lot put in the Kilworth camp, they established an internment camp at Kilworth up in the mountains and dozens of them broke away. Well, I don't think much of an effort was made to recapture them because the treaty was in the offing.

Interviewer
: When was this?

RG
: 1921 the treaty was signed, the latter part of 1921.

Interviewer
: Did you have any dangerous moments yourself in Ireland?

RG
: Not myself because I was young, silly, I used to wander miles out into the countryside taking a girl home but nothing was said to me but yet in other cases men had been picked up and shot by (through) associating with Irish girls. You see Cork was the worst place of the lot; they'd be more militant there than anywhere. Cork and Dublin were pretty bad.

Interviewer
: So you were courting an Irish girl were you?

RG
: Well, you know the usual thing, a lad of fifteen.

Interviewer
: Did you feel as you went amongst the population that there was any danger to you?

RG
: No, in Waterford ... as a matter of fact the day we left Waterford to come home the local paper printed among other things a tribute to the regiment. They said that during the time they'd been stationed at Waterford the 1st Devons have always upheld the best traditions of the British Army. You see we were not allowed to get out of hand. For instance the Buffs in Fermoy when they heard that the brigadier had been kidnapped they smashed up the town. Matter of fact we used to play the ... the ambush I mentioned previously at Tramore the man that was killed on the bridge had played hockey in Waterford city against the battalion the previous day. So there was a certain amount of ...

Interviewer
: Fraternization?

RG
: Yes. Slightly but it was there you know.

Interviewer
: So the Buffs smashed up Fermoy did they?

RG
: Oh, yes. They broke out of camp and smashed up the shops and all that business.

Interviewer
: What happened to their brigadier?

RG
: Well, he was kidnapped. Brigadier Lucas was fishing on the River Blackwater with his brigade major and, strange as it may seem, they were both released unharmed a week later. One can't imagine that happening today in Ulster.

Interviewer
: How did the population at large – the civilian population – behave towards the British troops?

RG
: Properly. They were glad we were there because, well, we spent our pay there at the pubs and the what-have-you.

Interviewer
: So did you meet any hostility?

RG
: Not a lot. They rarely showed it to you, you know, they kept under cover.

Interviewer
: How would they show it if they did?

RG
: ‘English bastard!'

Interviewer
: This would be shouted out in the street would it?

RG
: Yes, yes, yes.

Interviewer
: How did the troops react to that?

RG
: Well, ‘Irish bastard!'. It was
quid pro quo
.

Interviewer
: How did you come to leave Ireland?

RG
: Well, when the Treaty was signed all British forces, with the exception of the garrison of Spike Island, were withdrawn.

Interviewer
: Were you glad to leave or sorry?

RG
: Well, if I say that as we pulled out from the quay at Waterford one soldier said, ‘They should have pulled the bloody plug out years ago', because Southern Ireland was poor, there wasn't the industry there that existed in Ulster. It was definitely a poor country.

Interviewer
: So what did he mean by ‘They should have pulled the plug out'?

RG
: Well, let it sink, let Ireland sink into the sea.

Interviewer
: So you were glad to leave then were you?

RG
: Well, yes, because we were going back to Devonport which was our station – Plymouth – and large garrison town and it was a bit more life, pictures and theatres and what-have-you.

Interviewer
: What did the civilian population think of the Black and Tans?

RG
: Oh, they loathed them. They hated them.

Interviewer:
Why was that?

RG
: Well, because the Black and Tans stood absolutely no nonsense. They bashed people about, shot them. And it is suspected that they burnt down the main shopping centre in Victoria Street in Cork after thirteen or fourteen of the chaps had been killed in an ambush.