the best I was to have. Also on leave were Garry, who had himself recently joined the Second Battalion Royal Green Jackets where I was destined; Simon, who was just about to complete his Royal Electrical Mechanical Engineers course and be posted to Germany; and Steve, himself serving with the Third Battalion Royal Green Jackets in Celle, Germany. A more loyal, trustworthy and certainly 'thirsty' gang you could not find anywhere in the world. I dread to think how much lager we drank between us in that couple of weeks. It's a wonder none of us suffered any long-term liver damage. Our nightly -and daily come to think about it -haunt in those days was a small pub with a terrible reputation in Eltham called The Castle. The Castle at that time was run by a guy called Harry Starbuck a well-known 'face' in Eltham at that time, and as a result was a favourite haunt of some of the toughest men in the area.
The pub's reputation also attracted some undesirables from elsewhere either wanting to muscle in on the pub's success or looking to settle scores with some of the customers. Harry knew that if his more than capable team of bouncers were ever 'up against it' he could count on his newly trained gang of soldiers to jump in and lend a hand, which we willingly did on a number of occasions. I remember us finding it hilarious when we did get involved in such scraps. We used to spend hours afterwards laughing about it and giving Garry grief because, despite always being in the thick of it, he always managed to come out of it without a mark on his face while the rest of us would be sporting black eyes and broken noses. It was such incidents, coupled with his own vanity, that earned Garry the title of 'Pretty Boy' Thompson.
From The Castle every Friday and Saturday night we would pile into a taxi and, providing we were not already in the casualty department of Woolwich Military Hospital, we would descend on Spooks nightclub in Woolwich. This place was something else. In its historical life it had been everything from a café to a venue for underground boxing bouts. In our day it was a club that attracted all sorts of people from pimps and drug-pushers to office parties that innocently passed through the battered green double garage doors. 'Fat' Dave the doorman, who never got out of his tatty armchair for anyone, subjected everyone to an almost indecent search.
Even the Queen would have been searched while Dave remained slouched in his chair had she decided to pop in for half a lager shandy on her way home. Inside, the place was so dark that the Queen could have been dancing next to you all night and you wouldn't even have known it, and as for having a conversation, forget it. You would have to go outside or learn sign language. The only time the music would stop and the lights would go on was when a fight broke out, or someone tried to 'glass' the DJ with one of the plastic glasses that all drinks were served in. When this happened, it was like a scene from the TV show It's a Knockout. The DJ was situated in a box, which was up near the roof. It was his job to direct the bouncers to the trouble. All you could do was freeze and listen to the DJ shout, "Left a bit, right a bit, that's him". Then -whack! -the bouncers would dish out a crippling blow to the back of some bloke's head, only to hear the DJ shout, "Sorry, my mistake, wrong one. Left a bit, right a bit, that's him" -whack! This went on until they finally got the right man, but not before they had put about three or four blokes out of action for the night.
Trouble that started in Spooks inevitably spilled out onto the streets of Woolwich once the club shut. This was a dangerous time when you had to dodge running street battles being waged between various groups of men and women all of whom were pissed out of their tiny little minds. It was during one such night that I and Pretty Boy were slowly making progress down the mile-long queue into the only open kebab shop when we noticed
The pub's reputation also attracted some undesirables from elsewhere either wanting to muscle in on the pub's success or looking to settle scores with some of the customers. Harry knew that if his more than capable team of bouncers were ever 'up against it' he could count on his newly trained gang of soldiers to jump in and lend a hand, which we willingly did on a number of occasions. I remember us finding it hilarious when we did get involved in such scraps. We used to spend hours afterwards laughing about it and giving Garry grief because, despite always being in the thick of it, he always managed to come out of it without a mark on his face while the rest of us would be sporting black eyes and broken noses. It was such incidents, coupled with his own vanity, that earned Garry the title of 'Pretty Boy' Thompson.
From The Castle every Friday and Saturday night we would pile into a taxi and, providing we were not already in the casualty department of Woolwich Military Hospital, we would descend on Spooks nightclub in Woolwich. This place was something else. In its historical life it had been everything from a café to a venue for underground boxing bouts. In our day it was a club that attracted all sorts of people from pimps and drug-pushers to office parties that innocently passed through the battered green double garage doors. 'Fat' Dave the doorman, who never got out of his tatty armchair for anyone, subjected everyone to an almost indecent search.
Even the Queen would have been searched while Dave remained slouched in his chair had she decided to pop in for half a lager shandy on her way home. Inside, the place was so dark that the Queen could have been dancing next to you all night and you wouldn't even have known it, and as for having a conversation, forget it. You would have to go outside or learn sign language. The only time the music would stop and the lights would go on was when a fight broke out, or someone tried to 'glass' the DJ with one of the plastic glasses that all drinks were served in. When this happened, it was like a scene from the TV show It's a Knockout. The DJ was situated in a box, which was up near the roof. It was his job to direct the bouncers to the trouble. All you could do was freeze and listen to the DJ shout, "Left a bit, right a bit, that's him". Then -whack! -the bouncers would dish out a crippling blow to the back of some bloke's head, only to hear the DJ shout, "Sorry, my mistake, wrong one. Left a bit, right a bit, that's him" -whack! This went on until they finally got the right man, but not before they had put about three or four blokes out of action for the night.
Trouble that started in Spooks inevitably spilled out onto the streets of Woolwich once the club shut. This was a dangerous time when you had to dodge running street battles being waged between various groups of men and women all of whom were pissed out of their tiny little minds. It was during one such night that I and Pretty Boy were slowly making progress down the mile-long queue into the only open kebab shop when we noticed
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