Following on from our introduction last week to Jamie Fineran’s auto-biography, An English Boy, see below for the promised extracts. As mentioned before, once the book is complete, Jamie hopes to sell online and half the proceeds will go to the . Ed
I’m so tired. The sun is shining through the tiny window. It’s so beautiful. An orangey, red looking glow. My hands are very sore and swollen. I have a cut on my finger but am letting it bleed as the blood dribbles to the floor. It’s mid-evening and the sun is setting. What a gorgeous sight. I just wish you could see it, so I can show you what I see.
The door gunner looks over to me and smiles. His face looks cold. He holds the machine gun like a mother holding her child. He wraps his arms around the butt looking around at the men by my side.
I take a look at my friends or should I say my brothers. George looks so tired. His head keeps bobbing up and down as he tries to sleep. Pies is next to me munching on an old biscuit. I have to stop this bleeding, it’s starting to get a little messy now.
The gunner opens the door fully as we heave our bodies through the hatch. I plunge to the ground and sink into the mud. I try to get myself free but its so hard, I’m capped in thick wet mud. My Bergen (military slang for ruck sack) is dumped out the door into the mud, just frigging great I add.
I haven’t got to worry about the cut on my hand now, it’s capped in mud.
Finally we set off for the long haul to an army base called Anackmartin, right on the border. I had heard numerous stories about his place, not one sounded good. There was a rumour that every single machine gun tower (sangar) as we called them, were haunted, especially one in particular.
It was 2 kms south from Rosslea. It was obvious where the border was. This place was very secure. A wooded area to the east and fields to the west. We took over the last patrol that were here. They could not wait to get out of here.
One corporal briefed the boss, “It’s bad here sir, very, f**!ing bad.
“Last week the IRA kidnapped a local farmer, just here on the map, which is a couple of ks away. They drove a tractor right under our noses, filled with one thousand pounds of explosives heading right this bloody way. If it would of gone off we would have been blown to kingdom come.”
“So what happened?” demanded the boss.
“They got bogged down, with all the rain we’ve been having, the bloody thing got bogged down!…”it was so close but too far away to be detonated,” he stated.
They started the long walk back to Rosslea. We on the other hand were sorting our lives out. The Chin put out perimeter patrols known as GDA patrols. We were out for twelve hours at a time, this included guard duty in the sangars.
© Jamie Fineran 2008
Image: Echiner1
