Missing in Action (25 page)

In an account subsequently recounted to one of Pat’s colleagues, Despas heard that during a lull in the fighting efforts were made by two men to help the men inside an Irish Ford armoured car. Dr Defru and Fr Verfaille approached the armoured car and tried to offer the men help. Dr Defru apparently knocked on the car door while Fr Verfaille shouted out ‘I’m a missionary’. But, a few seconds later, there was a burst of machine gun fire into the air and both men fled to the safety of a nearby building. Despas recounted a story that several of Pat’s colleagues would later hear in different versions. It involved a simple misunderstanding – that Pat Mullins or Mick Nolan inside the armoured car might have misheard a shouted call of ‘missionary’ as ‘mercenary’. The immediate burst of fire into the air from the Ford armoured car was proof that those inside thought there was a problem. The missionary and the doctor scrambled for cover and watched the armoured car drive off, ultimately in the direction of a Katangan gendarme strongpoint. It is crucial testimony because it clearly indicates that one or both of the Irish troopers was still alive after the ambush and that they, and not Katangan gendarmes, drove the armoured car away from the Radio College.

The army now accepts that it is quite likely the Ford was driven away from the Radio College ambush site by one of its remaining crew members, Pat Mullins or Michael Nolan. Former comrades now believe it was likely that Pat was the driver, because Michael Nolan died from a combination of a serious shell injury and bullet wounds. It was only possible for Mick Nolan to have received the explosion injury in the initial ambush so, more than likely, he would not have been able to drive away from the site given such a serious and debilitating injury.

John O’Mahony pointed out that further credence is given to this theory by the fact that the armoured car may have gotten lost as it left the Radio College. ‘Mick Nolan was a corporal and, like the sergeants, he would have been briefed on all the routes and transit points around the city. If Mick was driving that night, he should have been capable of realising where he was – and how to get back to camp. But Pat, like myself and the other troopers, was never briefed on the roads around Elisabethville and the major routes to avoid. The truth is that Pat wouldn’t have known where he was going that night and would have been looking for a landmark that he recognised to guide himself back to camp,’ he added.

Brig-Gen. Pakenham advised the family that there is substantial evidence hinting at a major gun battle not far from a key Katangan gendarme base on 15 September. According to Pat’s former colleagues, the main combat point was on an elevated roadway, with steep drainage ditches on either side, running directly parallel with the Lubumbashi River. Evidence of that gun battle came in information given to Art Magennis in the immediate aftermath of the battle from Katangan sources, from the army recovery team who found the Ford AFV in 1961 and from independent information supplied by Europeans who were working or living in Elisabethville at the time.

The Katangan police – not to be confused with the Katangan gendarmes who were effectively a paramilitary force – also reported a gun battle around that time in which two UN soldiers were killed. Unconfirmed police statements indicated that one of the bodies was taken to a local hospital and later buried in an Elisabethville cemetery. The other body had vanished from the scene by the time the police arrived. There were unconfirmed reports that this body may have been subjected to tribal rituals, with its remains being dumped in the nearby River Lubumbashi.

An unnamed Katangan doctor – in information given to Pat’s comrades – reported a story he had heard from locals that two UN soldiers had been killed after a gunfight. He recalled the location as being on a route south of the Parc Zoologique and parallel to the River Lubumbashi – precisely the same location in which the shell-pocked armoured car was recovered by Captain Art Magennis and his team.

The review also found reference to bullet wounds on Pat Mullins’ death certificate. Telexes in the UN archives had reported Pat Mullins ‘Missing in Action’, but there were no records relating to Pat in the UN file compiled from all Elisabethville mortuaries. This could be deemed to be a particularly relevant point given two things. Firstly, the civil administration, which operated to Belgian standards, was still operating relatively efficiently in Elisabethville in 1961. Secondly, had the corpse of a white person, particularly a UN soldier, been handled by a morgue, a hospital or police station, a mortuary record would inevitably have been kept. It would also, almost certainly, have been buried in accordance with European traditions as was done with the body of Michael Nolan.

The most difficult aspect of the army review was dealing with what had probably happened to Pat Mullins
’
body after his brave stand to protect his injured comrade was over. The family was advised that there is absolutely no evidence to confirm any single theory about what became of the remains.

However, while no concrete evidence was found, some disturbing reports have emerged. Captain Magennis had already determined for himself from his South African contact, Bill Williams, that there was speculation within the native Katangan population that one of the dead UN soldiers had been subjected to tribal rituals. The Katangan police – keen to distance themselves from the Katangan gendarmes – also hinted that the body of one of the UN soldiers had been subjected to tribal rituals by some of the younger soldiers following the gunfight by the armoured car.

Perhaps in an effort to conceal that fact, the body was later dumped in the river as one source implied. The reality is that cannibalism was relatively commonplace within certain Congolese tribal groups and there was a body of opinion amongst Irish and Swedish troops that it was still ongoing in Katanga during the deployment period of UN troops. However, it also happened that bodies were dismembered without such practices taking place. In some cases, the tribal ritual was as simple as removing the brave hand that wielded a sword in battle or the finger that pulled the trigger of a gun.

In the case of Pat Mullins, no one will ever really know what happened in that lonely ditch to the heroic soldier’s body once he made the ultimate sacrifice to protect his friend and defend his armoured car. One possibility mooted at the February meeting was that Pat’s remains may have been subjected to some ritual after he was killed in the gun battle. The family was advised that it is not considered feasible to offer them any hope that Pat’s remains can ever be found.

Brig-Gen. Pakenham and his team gently informed the family that, given all the reports and evidence, there was simply no point in convening a formal court of inquiry at this stage. It was felt that such an inquiry would serve no additional purpose over and above the review process, either for the family or the military. Even should such an inquiry be held, there was only circumstantial evidence as to what actually happened. There are no records from the Elisabethville mortuary and, after a tribal ritual, a body was unlikely to be buried in the European manner. As some local reports indicated, it was quite likely to have been thrown into the local river.

As heartbreaking as it was for them to hear, the Mullins family simply nodded as they were told that the recovery of Pat’s body was not a realistic hope at this stage. The remains of the heroic and steadfast eighteen-year-old will most likely never be found and brought back to the foothills of the Galtees. It was not the outcome that the family had prayed for but, sadly, the one they had feared all along.

However, Brig-Gen. Pakenham and his team were determined that the review should also address all the issues the family were concerned about. No UN force since the Congo has sustained the level of casualties suffered by the ONUC force in Katanga between 1960–64. Yet, in all the acts of heroism and courage shown over those five years by UN soldiers of many different nations, Pat Mullins’ actions now stand tall.

To better recognise the sacrifice the eighteen-year-old made and the needs of his family, the Defence Forces are considering three additional measures:

* Glasnevin Cemetery – Pat’s name is on a plaque at the cemetery and the impression is clearly given that he is buried there. That will now be corrected.

* Kilbehenny Memorial – to better commemorate the eighteen-year-old’s memory in his home village, a special memorial will be erected to honour his courage in the Congo in September 1961. Pat Mullins will be remembered as a hero.

* Congo Trip – to offer the Mullins family some additional form of ‘closure’, a special trip could be organised for the family to Lubumbashi-Elisabethville, pending permission from the UN. It would allow Pat’s loved ones to visit the places associated with his final hours and pay their respects at the spot last associated with him on earth.

The meeting in Mitchelstown where Brig-Gen. Pakenham outlined the circumstances leading to the death of Pat Mullins and the non-recovery of his remains, is perhaps what the family most wanted to hear. In particular, the Defence Forces will never forget soldiers like Pat who died in service overseas. To his family, Pat was always a hero. They never doubted that the eighteen-year-old had shown the most incredible courage and selflessness in the hours leading up to his death – it was a part of Pat’s nature that his family never for a single moment questioned. But now the country that they felt had forgotten Pat would properly remember both his heroism and his name. Fifty years after an eighteen-year-old had made the ultimate sacrifice by laying down his life through his courageous refusal to abandon a wounded comrade, Ireland would remember Pat Mullins.

It was a monument that meant more to his family than anything carved in marble or cast in bronze.

Des Keegan reads the headstone inscription on the Mullins family grave behind Kilbehenny Church. Pat’s parents, Catherine and Ned, are interred here. Pat’s name is on the headstone but his body remains unrecovered in the Congo. (Photo: Paudie McGrath)

The Memorial Wall unveiled at the former Fitzgerald Camp in Fermoy, County Cork, in October 2009. Pat Mullins’ name features twice on the monument. The old barracks’ chapel is now Fermoy’s Queen of Peace Church. (Photo: John O’Mahony)

Mary Kent, Dinny Mullins, Peggy Dwane and Tom Mullins pictured at the Curragh Camp in 2009 at the dedication of a special memorial in the name of Tpr Pat Mullins. To the left is Brig-Gen. Seán McCann, General Officer Commanding-Curragh and to the right is (now rtd) Lt Col Eamon Cullagh, Director of the Cavalry School (Curragh). (Photo: Paudie McGrath)