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    We Came In The Morning
    We Came In The Morning
    We Came In The Morning
    Ebook82 pages1 hour

    We Came In The Morning

    By Ray Derrick

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    Northern Ireland, 9th August 1971. On the orders of the British Government over 300 suspected IRA terrorists are being arrested and interned.
    The atmosphere in the province is tense and the mood is ugly. For a group of young soldiers posted there with the Royal Artillery,
    Northern Ireland is a death trap waiting to happen.
    But they believe in what they are doing.
    They believe that to achieve peace there must be sacrifices; people will inevitably die, on both sides.
    They are willing to kill are prepared to be killed, because they believe that their cause is just.
    Until, that is, they are posted to guard a mysterious block of buildings situated on a disused RAF airfield in Ballykelly, which they are told is a top-secret communications centre.
    This too they are prepared to believe.
    Until they hear the first screams......................

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRay Derrick
    Release dateFeb 12, 2018
    ISBN9781370102419
    We Came In The Morning
    Author

    Ray Derrick

    Ray Derrick was brought up and educated in Deal, Kent, England, UK. He joined the British Army as a ‘boy’ soldier in 1961 and then served in the Royal Artillery as a topographical surveyor until 1974, attaining the rank of Sergeant. On leaving the Army in 1974 he worked on various land seismic oil & gas exploration crews throughout Africa, Asia and the Middle East until 2002. In 2002 he became a Client Representative working as a consultant Health & Safety Advisor for major oil companies, again worldwide. He lived in Spain from 2002 until retirement in 2014. Married for 40yrs, he moved to Thailand after the death of his wife Margaret in 2014. He now lives permanently in Phuket in Thailand.

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      Book preview

      We Came In The Morning - Ray Derrick

      WE CAME IN THE MORNING

      (A story of Brutality, Betrayal and Torture

      in Northern Ireland during

      ‘The Troubles’)

      Ray Derrick

      ISBN 9781980287865

      Copyright © Ray Derrick 2002

      The right of Ray Derrick to be identified as the author of this work

      has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

      All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be

      reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without the permission from the author, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than in which it is published.

      Smashwords Edition 2018

      FOREWORD

      Northern Ireland, 9th August 1971. On the orders of the British Government over 300 suspected IRA terrorists are being arrested and interned.

      The atmosphere in the province is tense and the mood is ugly.

      For a group of young soldiers posted there with the Royal Artillery,

      Northern Ireland is a death trap waiting to happen.

      But they believe in what they are doing.

      They believe that to achieve peace there must be sacrifices; people will inevitably die, on both sides.

      They are willing to kill are prepared to be killed, because they believe that their cause is just.

      Until, that is, they are posted to guard a mysterious block of buildings situated on a disused RAF airfield in Ballykelly, which they are told is a top-secret communications centre.

      This too they are prepared to believe.

      Until they hear the first screams………………….

      This is the story of one man’s experience on his first four-month

      emergency tour of Northern Ireland at the height of the ‘Troubles’,

      and of how his faith in the system that had trained him was shattered

      by revelations of torture and manipulation by his own side.

      (Author’s note: The consequences of the actions taken this day by British soldiers serving in Northern Ireland, would lead to mass rioting across the province, eventually culminating in the now infamous ‘Bloody Sunday’ incident in the Bogside, Londonderry, 30th January 1972, where 28 civilians were shot with 14 fatalities.

      Forty-five years later (2017) the British Government were still

      ‘investigating’ those paratroopers that were involved in the incident)

      CONTENTS

      1 Internment

      2 Training

      3 Magilligan Point

      4 Welcome to Derry

      5 Amber Alert

      6 The soldier’s wife (1)

      7 Abandon Hope

      8 Bligh’s Lane

      9 The Truth

      10 In the Creggan

      11 Sensory Deprivation

      12 The Coach

      13 The soldier’s wife (2)

      14 Torture

      15 The Wedding

      16 Sniper

      17 The Hangar

      Epilogue

      1 Internment

      It was 2am, 9th August 1971. I was a sergeant in charge of a platoon of 30 British soldiers stationed in Londonderry, Northern Ireland. The soldiers were all volunteers, serving in 39 Medium Regiment, Royal Artillery, in Sennelegar, Germany. The soldiers were not well-trained infantrymen, most being field surveyors or other tradesmen.

      We had all been roughly woken an hour previously and given a briefing for the day’s events. We were all very excited, but deeply apprehensive.

      It really was going to happen. We had heard rumours, whispers, a few days before that many top IRA sympathisers were going to be arrested and imprisoned. We had been living in anticipation, whiling away the hours and days, waiting for something exciting to happen. We were confined to our rooms, ten soldiers each room, sleeping on camp beds in smoke filled windowless dormitories. Almost all the ‘other ranks’ smoked. The rooms were badly partitioned, the main building being an old disused warehouse. There was little privacy, no internal doors, and it was always very noisy.

      All our army and civilian gear was stowed at the bottom of the camp bed, in army issue suitcases or kitbags.

      There were no storage lockers.

      We sat around, confined, deep in our own thoughts. The air was stagnant, but it was too dangerous to go outside for fresh air.

      The old warehouse was overlooked by higher ground and taller buildings, there was always the threat of being shot at by a sniper.

      The telephones had been put off limits less those with families or friends outside could be warned.

      Each soldier had already completed his Last Will and Testament, written in the back of his pay book.

      We were getting impatient.

      We constantly checked our clothing and equipment. No bright shiny buttons or buckles, nothing loose that might clink or fall. We wore standard British Army camouflage uniforms, and we were all equipped with 7.62mm SLR rifles, with one end of the rifle sling secured to our wrists. We had been issued with 20 rounds of ammunition, all signed and accounted for. I carried a second magazine with an extra 20 rounds, spare, unaccounted for and given to me by the commander of a platoon of Coldstream Guards that we had previously relieved. I was told that the ‘spares’ were in case of any ‘accidental’ discharges. Nod nod, wink wink. It meant that our platoon could patrol the streets and return up to 20 rounds of fire, and not be accountable for any dead bodies should there ever be a court of enquiry.

      At 3:30am, selected team leaders were given a map and an accompanying address with the name of the person who was to be arrested. We had already practiced the words of the arresting procedure

      (Special Powers Act Northern Ireland) many times, though I don’t recall that the precise procedure or wording was ever followed by anyone in my platoon.

      It was the same with the ‘Yellow card’ procedure: no British soldier could shoot or return fire unless they first shouted out a warning that was printed on a yellow card that was issued to all soldiers. It was all bollocks to us, just political crap. We hadn’t yet come under any sniper fire, but I think we all agreed that we would dispense with the formalities of a polite warning. We were to be severely tested in the coming weeks, when the impacts of the of the mass arrests caused large scale rioting and sniper attacks on our positions. Little did we know that our actions this day would draw us into situations that we could never have dreamed of.

      We drove

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