Read Online Voices from the Grave: Two Men's War in Ireland by Ed Moloney - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Ed Moloney
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from an upstairs window on to the street, and this sent angry D Company members racing for their weapons, eager to avenge their fallen comrade. Soon a major gun battle was raging, as Hughes recalled: ‘We brought the place to a standstill.’ Almost immediately, the IRA drew blood. A member of the Royal Anglian Regiment, Ian Burt from Essex, with eighteen years’ service, was shot dead by one of an estimated twelve IRA gunmen attacking the troops. 22 But the soldier was not the last person to die.
… there was a wee girl, a wee Sticky girl, a member of the Official IRA, Patricia McKay you called her. She actually had an Armalite that the Officials had stolen from us, but the wee girl was only a kid. She was only nineteen and she was nervous. They were firing from all over the place and I took the Armalite off her. So I had two Armalites, one over my shoulder and one on my arm, and we were coming under fire from all over the place … and I ran out, and just fired like hell and got away but I told Patricia to stay where she was. Her daddy and mummy have asked me so many times about this. I just told her to stay, but she was scared, the child was scared. I said, ‘Don’t fucking move from here, stay here where you are.’ And I went down the street and carried on with the gun battle which went on for the rest of the day. Obviously the Brits had seen me firing from the house and they pinpointed it … if only she had listened to what I had told her … well, anyway, she came out of the house and they shot her dead. A child. Lovely child. I know her mammy and daddy . And, I remember going the next day to her home; I was on the run, and she lived in Divis Flats, and they put a big military funeral on for her, the Official IRA did. A Tricolour over her coffin and all the rest. I remember walking through them all. And it wasn’t easy to do, you know, [walking] through the Sticks, right? And her mummy and daddy kept asking me, ‘What happened?’ What do you say? I took the weapon off the wee girl. And she just came out; they just pinpointed the house where the firing was coming from. She was game enough to come out and do it. I mean, I was used to gun battles at that time but not her … it was like going to work for me, right, going into a gun battle in the Falls, you know .
The second D Company loss during Hughes’s days in charge took place seven months later and the account he gave of the death of twenty-seven-year-old Edward O’Rawe, known as ‘Mundo’, is sharply at variance with the official version of events. The British Army’s story was that O’Rawe was shot dead after firing at a patrol that was pursuing him and another man as he was climbing over an entry wall in Garnet Street in the Lower Falls. His inquest was told, however, that no weapons were found at the scene and that there was no forensic evidence to support the claim that he had been using a weapon. 23 Hughes’s version is that his death was a cold-blooded execution, a fate he might have missed himself by just a few minutes.
I remember when Mundo was killed, we were in a house off Raglan Street … It was the same house that we had organised the London bombs from. There was a whole crowd of us there, Lucas Quigley and all … he and myself had just left when the Brits hit the house. Big Mundo O’Rawe was still inside. Mundo tried to get over the backyard, that was always your escape but they were waiting for him. And I got out of the house, Lucas and me, just two fucking minutes before they hit the house. So I went and organised the boys and we started to hit back with Armalites. I was in Raglan Street where the 1920s ambush had taken place, and I actually saw Mundo against the wall, and then I next saw him on the floor in an entry. I believe he was executed in the entry of Garnet Street … and then a major gun battle followed. At that time Mundo was QM for D Company and he had a group of people around him, one in particular, a girl called
… there was a wee girl, a wee Sticky girl, a member of the Official IRA, Patricia McKay you called her. She actually had an Armalite that the Officials had stolen from us, but the wee girl was only a kid. She was only nineteen and she was nervous. They were firing from all over the place and I took the Armalite off her. So I had two Armalites, one over my shoulder and one on my arm, and we were coming under fire from all over the place … and I ran out, and just fired like hell and got away but I told Patricia to stay where she was. Her daddy and mummy have asked me so many times about this. I just told her to stay, but she was scared, the child was scared. I said, ‘Don’t fucking move from here, stay here where you are.’ And I went down the street and carried on with the gun battle which went on for the rest of the day. Obviously the Brits had seen me firing from the house and they pinpointed it … if only she had listened to what I had told her … well, anyway, she came out of the house and they shot her dead. A child. Lovely child. I know her mammy and daddy . And, I remember going the next day to her home; I was on the run, and she lived in Divis Flats, and they put a big military funeral on for her, the Official IRA did. A Tricolour over her coffin and all the rest. I remember walking through them all. And it wasn’t easy to do, you know, [walking] through the Sticks, right? And her mummy and daddy kept asking me, ‘What happened?’ What do you say? I took the weapon off the wee girl. And she just came out; they just pinpointed the house where the firing was coming from. She was game enough to come out and do it. I mean, I was used to gun battles at that time but not her … it was like going to work for me, right, going into a gun battle in the Falls, you know .
The second D Company loss during Hughes’s days in charge took place seven months later and the account he gave of the death of twenty-seven-year-old Edward O’Rawe, known as ‘Mundo’, is sharply at variance with the official version of events. The British Army’s story was that O’Rawe was shot dead after firing at a patrol that was pursuing him and another man as he was climbing over an entry wall in Garnet Street in the Lower Falls. His inquest was told, however, that no weapons were found at the scene and that there was no forensic evidence to support the claim that he had been using a weapon. 23 Hughes’s version is that his death was a cold-blooded execution, a fate he might have missed himself by just a few minutes.
I remember when Mundo was killed, we were in a house off Raglan Street … It was the same house that we had organised the London bombs from. There was a whole crowd of us there, Lucas Quigley and all … he and myself had just left when the Brits hit the house. Big Mundo O’Rawe was still inside. Mundo tried to get over the backyard, that was always your escape but they were waiting for him. And I got out of the house, Lucas and me, just two fucking minutes before they hit the house. So I went and organised the boys and we started to hit back with Armalites. I was in Raglan Street where the 1920s ambush had taken place, and I actually saw Mundo against the wall, and then I next saw him on the floor in an entry. I believe he was executed in the entry of Garnet Street … and then a major gun battle followed. At that time Mundo was QM for D Company and he had a group of people around him, one in particular, a girl called
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