Families Part 6- Copyright Robert Fullarton 2007

 Families - Copyright Robert Fullarton 2007

Chapter 6

The armed struggle

There are many men across the distribution of the lands and many impulses within each and every man. Some men are pacifists, who wag their fingers and shake their fists at the troubles of the world, while trying to maintain a stable and sane society, they engage themselves either wholly or in half to the states they belong to. Many a pacifist engages in the less controversial side of existence, actively challenging the status quo of politics, thus engendering themselves to the pious affairs of the silent majority or some try with a meticulous effort to apply themselves to a religious or charitable cause to justify their dreams and tip the balance in the boundary of the pacifists.

                                                                                                                 In every country, shouted on through the high streets and the bustling sprawling centres of the human metropolis and way down to the country backwaters of population and thrown up daily in the media of the nations lie the actions of many a man who lies involved in a violent crime or action, achieved through a violent deed. Whether it is an armed struggle, a coup d’etat, a revolution or a common fight or brawl between people, the peoples of the world know crystal clear of the guilty Mens Reus of the violent men who wish to salvage their achievements in the roots of bloodshed.

                                                                                                        The island of Ireland as a whole has had it’s fair share of violence, from the days of Silken Thomas and his bloody and failed rebellion in Kildare, to the nine year war of Hugh O’Neil against Queen Elizabeth began the battle of the dispossessed against the invader and the intruder. The Irish struggle reached its pinnacle some say on an avaricious land war and the savage sectarian battles that ran from the Ulster plantation through to the Glorious Revolution of King William of Orange.

 In Northern Ireland in particular both the Republican camp and the Loyalist unionist camp, saw great fervour and vehemence in force to defend their communities from the enemy who threatened their civil rights and liberties. Many pacifists went underground in those days to some, as naked sectarian hatred brewed deep in the minds of many people. Could the actions of these violent men show a paradox, from a cycle unscrupulous? However many men seek peace only for it to bide some time to harvest war once again.

                                    It was a Thursday morning not far from the summer solstice in June, when the long summer hours were filled with the commotion of children playing on their local “stretch”, of land or barking out while playing football.

The temperature rose and the humidity of the heat swelled on the northern skin, hot on many a red crop of hair. About three kilometres south outside of Cookstown county Tyrone, there lay a stretch of abundant land painted with the summer meadows of gorse and the daisy patches of the mounds of grass, fringing the country lanes and byways that stretched into the hinterlands surrounding. In one particular spot there lay a tiny country road that led to a crossroads and from a stones throw there lay a dark and uninhabited forest of Scots pine and mountain ash, mostly coniferous as the eye could see around. In the foreground of an old famine cottage their lay a small thatched barnyard with a broken gate to its entrance and there lay a man to act as a sentry waiting for a friend to arrive. The man wore a small brown tweed coat and a cap, he was five foot seven in his stature and he stood nervously twitching and tweaking loose buttons on his coat to fasten it up. Then he flinched and yelled into through the door of the barn to sound the alarm.

“Oh wait its only Hayes as we expected”, he said clearing his throat.

Then the man strolled up beside the sentry took off his cap and shook with his right hand winking and smiling with the sentry.

“Where are the lads?”

“There inside there”,

said the sentry.

“You’re late, why the hell are you late?”

“oh family matters intervened and I lost track of the hour even as early as it is”,

responded the other man casually.

He went in immediately through the barnyard door and the sentry followed suit immediately afterwards.

The smell of pig’s slurry and silage left a strong stench in the old abandoned barn, its walls housed two dozen house martins and a pair of field mice that buried themselves deep within a patch of hay in the corner.

Two men stood opposite each other, left to right, both smoked their own rolled cigarettes, and stared anxiously at the two men strolling in.

Little light could yield against the deep blackened darkness that penetrated the circumference of the barn.

The four men formed a semi circle, and each of them wore brown tweed coats and some wore velvet leggings.

The four figures were in their twenties, they displayed an image of aggressiveness to try to assert their courage to each other and bury the fear they felt in the burrows of their stomachs and change the troubled look from off their countenance.

Then one of them began to speak.

“I have given the ultimatum for our demands, and only when our demands are met then will we release the prisoners.”

The man was tall, stocky to be precise and he had broad shoulders and was made of muscle, robust in his physic that slightly intimidated the other men.

He had wavy brown hair and his chin was covered with stubble.

“Where are the prisoners kept?”

, asked one of them.

“There around the back, tied down and unconscious, we knocked them out because they were giving us hassle.

Now fellas, listen good, I want you Hayes…

“Yes!”

He responded sharply in an instant.

“To stay and remain here with the prisoners. Leave them tied down, don’t speak to them, Keep an eye on them and give them a slap if they even move.

If they want food I have left meagre provisions to keep them alive in the shed beside the back of the barn. If they need anything of absolute necessity then grant it otherwise slap them around if they hassle you”

“Of course, Oshinn”

and he nodded respectively in response.

The leader of the gang was the Oshinn Flynn who the RUC were after and had linked his IRA unit with several over brutal crimes throughout the province.

He was however an amateur. After every crime, evidence mounted on him and now he attempted to collect the ransom money for the lives of the three constables kept, to provide for the weapons the East Tyrone IRA required bringing the war to the British authorities. However most of the time this usually meant inflicting their brutality upon innocent Protestant civilians many who were farmers or just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“The Brits are going to watch every movement we make, so we’ll find a good spot and we’ll ambush them right outside the town hall. We’ll hide on the roof if we have to. I want you Mullan, to conceal yourself at the back of the town hall and don’t allow yourself to be hassled by anyone and when I signal to you to fire on my instruction then fire at all of them. I expect the Brits will lay a trap for us and be there before us, so we’ll surprise them and if they touch us Hayes here will shoot the prisoners.

I want you Dooley to be the bait I want you waiting at the front of the town hall, and I want you to enter some kind of false negotiation so the boys and me can get into position and fire. Anyone in the town hall must be released. Now here I have five automatic Thompson sub machine guns and three 45 colt handguns straight in from a shipment from our brothers in Boston. I want you all to carry ammunition, cause when all guns go blazing I want nothing to go wrong. Dooley tell them the hostages are in the town hall and whatever you do, make sure you collect the money, which will be held in three paper brown bags.

Lads its now or never, we’ll be decorated as heroes by our own community and immortalised in the pages of Irish history as patriots and any who die will not die in vain but shall be martyrs to the cause.”

“Amen, you said it”, shouted out one of them.

The four men jostled each other and laughed, shaking each other’s shoulders and joking in their anticipation.

They filled their guns with ammunition and departed from there hideout and they slipped silently weaving through the woods into a car were a driver awaited them.

“Jim, leave us to Flattery’s pub on the main street”,

said Oshinn to the driver, while the five of them were crammed into the car.

“Lads don’t worry as I mentioned before, I’m going to meet several other men who will assist us in Flattery’s pub. It’s now nine o'clock and that hopefully gives us plenty of time, as were set for half two. Put you’re guns carefully in the shopping bags I’ve given you and if you can stick them deep in any pocket as far as possible then do it.”

The men all nodded in response.

The car drove off the splinter of the country lane and onto the main road. Each man sat in silence and awaited, nervously with their hearts pounding and bulging, they were heavy and resilient with fear on their face but for now they sat in silence.

(2)

Andrew Campbell had slung himself out of bed bright and early that morning at approximately six o’clock. He arrived at Belfast central station at eight o’clock on a sunny and settled Thursday morning, where he joined four other colleagues who worked under him at the criminal investigation department.

They boarded on the train some carried bags containing food and other belongings and two of them brought suitcases in precaution if they had to spend the night in Cookstown.

The five men sat in a carriage all to themselves they looked suave in their suits and they had a sophistication of any policeman and the respect that any decent person gave them. Andrew Campbell sat there facing three men with a constable to his right.

The men were all younger than Andrew two of the men were at lest 27 years old and looked like rookies to the police force but they weren’t. One of the men had severed at the Somme as corporal under the Ulster Volunteer force and was wounded in the ankle when a bullet ricocheted and almost left him unconscious in no-mans land during the offensive and he lay alone in the hollowed earth until he was dragged away and sent to a Red Cross field hospital in France.

Andrew sat smoking as the train chugged along and steam burned fast, as the locomotive went through the winding countryside and passed through town after town with washing lines and church steeples visible from the view with the rolling hills set firmly in the background.

“So gentlemen we received the news that three constables from the Cookstown RUC station in county Tyrone were held at gunpoint when they were attacked at two o’clock on Wednesday morning. Two other officers were knocked unconscious by these brutal men. Were told there was four of them, however, all of course wore scarves over their faces and tried to disguise their appearance.

They left a message and they stated they would release the three constables if we paid fifty thousand pounds to be kept in brown paper bags and left at the town hall at half past two. I know that these men will have something planned, so we’ll be prepared to fight if we have to.

First of all I have with me in this suitcase the weaponry and secondly the money is in this black carrier back here. Fifty thousand has been withdrawn from the bank by the commissioner.”

People began to get on the train and walking past carrying cases and the children carried towels for the seaside.

Andrew then whispered and starred into the eyes of all his fellow colleagues.

“Were going to try negotiate and extract information on the whereabouts of the kidnapped men. However my gut says different, these men could be bluffing; there might be no prisoners even in the town hall. So my advice is this, secure the perimeter of the town hall and I mean watch carefully to any of the roofs around for anyone who might fire. We’ve got firepower and the more the better.

“Andy, should we check out Flattery’s pub on the far side of the main street, that’s a notorious nest for republican activity”, said the man facing him.

“Good thinking Dodds, we’ll get right to it as soon as we arrive.”

“Andy are we getting any back up from the local police at all just in case anything happens unexpectedly”, said the policeman beside him to his right.

“Tyrie, were going to meet at the station in Cookstown first and their the Superintendent in that district is going to inform us on any information which will assist us and its in my discretion under the orders given from the Commissioner whether or not we’ll receive back up.

However I have decided that help is needed if this turns into a sticky situation.”

An hour passed and Andrew and his colleagues stood in the premises of the Cookstown police station there the team met with the superintendent. The men exchanged brief pleasantries and introductions and then the local sergeant informed Andrew on some informer information from a local source that a meeting in Flattery’s pub was under way where several IRA men were in operation. The source was in fact a former anti-treaty republican who was the same source that credited Andrew with information before.

“Gentlemen we must look casual and be calm, we must not give off any signals,

in fact we must dress differently, don’t wear uniforms, wear normal clothes and obviously hide your guns. Now I want Adams and Ferguson to slip quietly down the road, check Flattery’s, and make sure you check it out carefully. I myself will go with Dodds and Tyrie down to the Town Hall and I will stand a metre or more away and we will just watch and wait and see what happens next. The money will be in our custody which we’ll use to extract information on the whereabouts of the three kidnapped men.

I will negotiate on this matter as the Commissioner has instructed me.

I want the rest of you to form a perimeter set up around the radius of the town hall.

Finally all I have to say is this, we must try and hold one of them and question them otherwise three men will have lost their lives and we’ll have failed completely,

any questions at all gentlemen.”

Unanimously everyone agreed and nodded solemnly. The men looked at Andrew who wore his fancy pinstriped suit looking brash and brave and quietly impressed with Andrew speaking thunderously with his fiery words, which gave courage to the men. Andrew could be filled with rage and aggression easily but it took time to invoke it from him and once it came he could get carried away.

He was a man who loved to get thinks done never leaving them to linger. Andrew had a practical approach to everything.

All the men moved out and went into their positions. The men were given previous notice before Andrew’s arrival so they were well equipped for the worst situation. The men slipped into normal clothing some wore suits and fancy black leggings others wore braces with woollen jumpers and caps to hide their faces. They strolled casually down the street and broke off into groups.

Andrew, Dodds and Tyrie went down the main street ahead of the others and stood over a metre across from the town hall they gazed almost hidden from gaze under a tree on the pavement. The trio stared all around they looked straight at the large red bricked building in front of them. No one went in no went out and no signs showed any suspicious activity. Andrew’s eyes trailed to every one that even walked by the building.

“Just wait gentlemen, wait and see, its now ten to ten in the morning,”

said Andrew quietly.

“Sir were set to meet them at half two so why are we here at only ten to ten in the morning?”

Dodds questioned Andrew growing impatient waiting

“Because these men are trying to kill us and take the cash, they are going to arrive early and I can guess that at least one or two will be on the rooftop to shoot precisely at us and pin us down. Then I believe that one will arrive at the front of the town hall carrying demands, looking for the money. He’ll be the bait to suck us all in.

We’re going to storm the building and were going to have a firefight with these bastards. These bastards I believe were responsible for the brutal murders in Pomeroy just the other week. Now let’s just wait and see, the men will arrive back in fifteen minutes.”

Ten minutes had dragged by and several other policemen congregated and were dismissive in their search for the terrorists.

“No, sign of anything suspicious, the pub is half empty, only old drunken men hanging about. By the way several men have formed a perimeter around the building, everything is tightly knit, I don’t think anything can slip by us now,

said one of the policemen.

“Good, spread out. I don’t want anyone to suspect anything, go!”

Andrew smoked a cigarette with his fellow policemen; to the outside eye they could pass for ordinary men having a harmless conversation on the pavement.

Then suddenly the men stood and stared, they peered forward and spotted a man who stood outside the town hall, he covered his face with a scarf and his head was crowned with a cap. In his hand he carried a Smith and Weston pistol. It seemed to be an insane sight to the men who without hesitation realised who he was. They thought to themselves “I wonder is there only one here? Where are the three kidnapped men? and will there be a gunfight after all?”

It appeared to the police that this one man was easily out numbered, but none of them had the foolish naivety to truly believe the terrorists were not coming for a fight.

“Alright gentlemen it begins. I’ll negotiate.

Cover my back and make sure there’s no one on the roof.”

Andrew stamped out his cigarette with the sole of his shoe and crossed the main street to face this intimidating man.

“So you’re in charge obviously,”

said the gunman.

“Yes I’m in charge, and I want to negotiate with you and you’re comrades for the release of the three kidnapped men. My colleagues across the road have the £50,000 as you requested in three brown paper bags. Take a look for you’re self.”

The gunman looked directly across the road to the pavement and spotted the two policemen holding up the brown paper bags and lifting out briefly the tied paper bags.

“Alright then In a minute I’m going to inspect the money myself, but no funny stuff, remember we have eyes everywhere, we’ll be watching you’re every move.”

“No problem I’ll call one of my colleagues over immediately.”

Andrew composed himself well, he was calm and in control and seemed to be seeking to negotiate with the gunman and his fellow brothers at arms.

“I have to ask you some questions, first of all are the men alive?”

“Yes, there all safe we have them hidden”

“Secondly, we need to know are they in the building at all?

Where exactly are they, we wont give you any money if we don’t know where they are”,

Andrew stood face to face with the gunman and he began to grow impatient with the façade that had unravelled. It seemed to be a no win situation for Andrew and the police, so Andrew thought hard and well on what to do next and for a split second there was silence and then Andrew began to feel a fiery anger brew within him and for once he decided to oblige the impulse that he ignored for so long.

Andrew as fast as lightning turned up his fist and it smacked the gunman straight in the face and almost knocked him cold. Then immediately afterwards Andrew produced a small colt handgun which he had concealed and tied to his back.

He grabbed the gunman’s pistol and left it in his pocket and held the man back and ordered him to move across the road slowly.

With the scar removed you could see the youths face, his nose was bleeding and his sandy blonde hair was perspiring with sweat.

Andrew held his arms back and applied a brutal force to keep him on the ground with the police.

“I don’t believe it Andy you’ve shown that Fenian whose boss”,

grinned Dodds, “with a punch and he’s gone.”

“Stop talking, and take out you’re weapons, damn it”,

said Andrew annoyed.

Then he faced the gunman and held a pistol up to his temple.

At that moment groups of police began to arrive on the scene they were amused at the spectacle they witnessed.

“Andy that’s unorthodox we cant get information if we act like this they’ll be no negotiation, cried out one of the policemen that crowded around him.

“Get back you fools, cover yourselves, they’re on the roof damn you!”

“There can’t be. The entire area has been searched; no one can get to the roof,

cried one of the policemen.”

Andy held down the gunman firmly, pressing his arms tightly together almost to the point of seriously harming him.

Andrew began to shout on the top of his voice.

Any person who witnessed the scene kept their distance and was cautious not to get involved but nonetheless ordinary bystanders began to stare at what was happening.

“Come out and drop you’re weapons, I know you are on the roof of the town hall.

I have one of you’re comrades here and his life is in you’re hands. If you cooperate and surrender you’re arms then, I’ll let him live. However I might hold him as a prisoner of my own and keep him in exchange for the three constables.

Don’t forget there are at least twenty armed policemen around the building, so you won’t escape.” Andrew’s rage grew more by the minute and the policemen behind stood and stared up at the roof occasionally muttering to each other.

Then the sound of gunshots went out into the air and four gunmen began to fire down on the police. Bullets whizzed past and one ricocheted from a tree and almost hit Andrew on his left hand shoulder.

“Get the men back behind the left hand wall over there, go run and cover yourselves were under bloody siege go.”

Andrew roared at the men as he pulled up the captive gunman, still holding him at gun point.

“Dodds take him and hold him down. If he tries to escape at all, then feel free to knock him out.”

“Yes sir.”

“Tyrie, Johnson, Jones and Stewart, fire, we’re going to take these bastards out,

I want you to come with me and run as fast as you can across the road were going to storm the building. I want the rest of you to keep firing, keep them distracted and keep them pinned down; we’re going round to put an end to this once and for all.”

“Yes, sir!” shouted the men as Andrew drilled them into order.

The firefight continued and the police and the gunmen exchanged fire back and forth every man fired and then ducked behind to cover himself.

Then suddenly one of the policemen was struck in the chest with a bullet and he fell to the ground unconscious and his wound gushed with blood.

“Don’t worry he’ll be alright, see to him Roberts, you were a doctor before you joined the force weren’t you,” shouted the superintendent.

“Are you joking? I haven’t anything to help him with, obviously” said the bemused officer beside him.

The gunmen shouted to one another and one of them drew out a machinegun and its bullets pounded against the wall going deeper and fragments of stone exploded all around and fell on the police with clouds of dust rising up.

Meanwhile Andrew had sprinted bravely across the road with the four other men under his command. They were directly away from the target of the gunmen and they faced the front door of the town hall. What menace they faced would reveal itself once they went inside.

Then Andrew fired several rounds at the left window to the front door and then the glass obliterated into a thousand pieces on the ground and one of the gunmen collapsed and dropped his weapon.

“Sir how did you know he was there?”

“I saw his shadow moving like a reaper silently against the glass, Johnston”, said Andrew gleefully.

“Come on lets get going!

Kick down the door lads”, shouted Andrew.

The door went down and the five men ran through the empty expanse of the wooden floored hall. No one stirred, and it was silent except for the sound of gunfire coming from outside. At the back of a large stage lay a little backdoor and this drew the obvious attention from the men who ran towards its and jumped up onto the stage in as fast as they could.

The men went through the door and out onto a musty old corridor and found a staircase that proceeded up at the side to the roof.

“Gentlemen I want you to cover me I’m going up there”, shouted Andrew as he ran up the stairs slamming open the wooden doors.

Immediately on the roof Andrew spotted four gunmen firing down below, all of them had their backs turned and failed to notice Andrew who for a brief moment watched them as they ducked and dodged the fire of the police. The rooftop was broad and wide and it extended to the building beside it.

Andrew fired a round and immediately wounded one of the gunmen and knocked him straight to the ground.

Then the gunmen began to panic they started to fire directly at Andrew and the four other men. Andrew hid behind the huge fat triangular ventilation on the roof from the fire of the gunmen.

Andrew and the men all hid behind the ventilation, still exchanging fire and loading their weapons and praying they would survive the bloody battle that ensued, but then almost as though an avenging angel had sown its wrath, Andrew and the men all stood up and fired, they picked off the terrorist who had been firing his machine gun and had them pinned down for five solid minutes like mice with their tails between their legs in terror.

Andrew and his men all walked forward pointing their guns at the two remaining gunmen. One of them dropped his gun while the other man suddenly sprinted off.

“Halt or I’ll shoot, hey you’re surrounded!”

Andrew shouted out and fired but he missed point blank and watched the gunman slip off as he ran down the stairs.

“Lads go catch him, I want to question all of them!”

“All of them?”

, Joked one of the policemen.

“Well all the surviving ones.”

“Yes sir”, said two of the men and they ran down the stairs in pursuit of the gunman.

Andrew borrowed handcuffs from one of his colleagues and bound one of the captured men. Andrew breathed heavily, and his face dripped with perspiration and blood dripped from his forehead onto his shirt.

Both Andrew and the other man were exhausted and they both sat completely content despite the bloody conflict that had occurred. The sun shone down in glory in the cloudless sky and Andrew’s face lit up with a wide smile like beacon on his tiresome face. People shouted and screamed in commotion trying to find out what had happened. The men down bellow roared in commotion and celebration, jubilant in this victory that resulted for the men.

The police had lost track of the gunman that had escaped, the men looked around for him for the rest of the day, up and down the streets and even into Flattery’s bar for him, but to their misfortune he was not found.

Andrew had been a hero to the men, he led the whole operation with a valiant display of courage and quick thinking tactics, with a no nonsense approach that scared the living daylights out of the terrorists and gave hope to the policemen.

However the anger and aggression which had lay dormant in Andrew for years began to resurface in him again, and he began to feel and yes believe that he was the finest criminal investigator in the whole of Northern Ireland and a man who could beat the bull of terrorism with brute force.

The prisoners would answer any questions given them or face a severe beating; this would obliterate their confidence and self-esteem and squeeze like a tube toothpaste the information on the three constables that were kidnapped. The enemy would be liquidated one way or another and the threat neutralized. Violence however has a one-fold effect, it achieves more violence and results in revenge and retaliation and as times unfold only a peaceful approach shows that it alone can achieve peace. So the pacifist must be patient and wait around until the end of time when the healing of the nations shall come into fruition.