The Sixteen (15 page)

‘What’s the big idea?’ I asked. ‘How come you’re always telling me how invaluable I am to you and yet you’ve just about killed us getting here?’

Chalky just laughed. ‘There’s no time to hang about, Geordie, there’s work to be done. Besides we can’t afford to be spotted by any British troops patrolling this area.’

There was a sudden thud at the rear of the jeep and I felt the pressure of cold metal on the back of my neck as a familiar voice quietly said, ‘Gotcha!’ close to my ear. I turned around to see Dynamo’s grinning face – he was pointing a .303 rifle straight at me.

‘Where did you come from and how did you suddenly appear like that?’ I asked. I’d heard nothing of his approach and couldn’t see anywhere in the near vicinity where he might have been concealed.

‘Just making sure no one was following,’ he said, winking at me. ‘But one day I’ll find it impossible to do this to you.’

Then he jumped off the jeep and followed Chalky into the building.

I wondered if he’d been up in the hills watching our approach but as he was wearing his CTC, he could have been hiding anywhere.
I pushed the thought aside for the moment and smiling, despite my sore ribs, I went inside too.

‘Close that bloody door will you?’ Spot shouted, complaining about the dust storm that the jeep’s arrival had created and which had swirled inside the building each time the door was opened. To my surprise, Ken was sitting at the table with Spot – I hadn’t seen him since the night I’d gone through the ‘One Step Beyond’ some four months ago. Chalky had told me that Ken brought our orders and supplied transport and whatever else we needed.

‘Hi there, Geordie, come on in!’ he said. ‘Nice to see you again. Right, now we’re all here let’s get on with it. I’ve got little job for you lads.’

Spot winked and smiled at me as Chalky and Dynamo joined him and Ken at the table.

Dynamo shoved a chair my way with his foot and nudged me as I sat down next to him. ‘Now we’ll have some fun, eh Geordie!’ he said, rubbing his hands.

Chalky must have seen my surprise. ‘That’s right, Geordie, fun! When you’ve been on a couple of these operations you’ll know exactly what we mean,’ he said.

I helped myself to a couple of sandwiches from a plate Spot handed round and poured out a cup of tea. Although I was now one of the team, I got the impression that the operation, whatever it was, had been planned before I arrived and they were merely going over it once again for my benefit, in order to make me aware of the details.

‘Right lads,’ Ken began. ‘There are a bunch of guys up in the mountains that we believe are responsible for running most of the guns to various parts of the island. As you know, in the past their chief method of attack has been by means of hit-and-run tactics using guns or home-made bombs and incendiary devices against their targets – mainly British servicemen and installations. You’ve
probably heard about the incidents involving the deaths of British servicemen and some of their families.’

I’d certainly heard rumours around my camp about the murders of several British servicemen, including a sergeant who’d been shot in front of his little boy in Nicosia. And it now appeared that the terrorists were targeting the families too. Rumours were spreading about another incident involving a sergeant’s wife who had been killed while out shopping with her daughter. Most of these apparently random terrorist attacks took place in broad daylight and were intended to demoralise the British troops garrisoned on Cyprus and thereby maintain an atmosphere of crisis. However, the army verified none of this, in case British soldiers went on the rampage, taking revenge on the locals.

‘Intelligence informs us,’ Ken went on, ‘that the number of terrorists is on the increase and there are now believed to be over two hundred activists, not to mention EOKA sympathisers, on the island, many of whom are hiding and being trained up in the Troodos mountains.’

‘Surely there are enough troops on the island to take care of that?’ Chalky asked.

‘Well, the army have increased the number of their patrols in the area and have stepped up the road blocks,’ Ken went on. ‘In general, they don’t do too bad a job in keeping a lid on things under the circumstances, but there just aren’t enough of them and, to a great extent, their hands are tied, which is where we come in. But I think the main problem is that the troops underestimate most of these people and the level of support they have.

‘The crux of the matter is that these bastards appear to be changing their tactics. Our information is that the Greeks expect the island to be invaded at any time by the Turks and are preparing themselves for an attack. Intelligence believes that they are now
being supplied with much more sophisticated weapons; just what these are and where they’re coming from we’re not quite sure but it seems a pretty safe bet that they’ve now managed to get their hands on grenades and mines, that sort of stuff. We’ve been given a pretty good indication of the area where these guys are holed up and that’s the reason we’re going in – our job is to find out exactly what weapons they have got and destroy them.

‘Besides,’ he chuckled. ‘It’s Geordie’s birthday later this month and it might be a good idea for him to get some practice in by having a little party up in the Troodos and let him have the chance to show what he can do!’

The table was covered with maps and papers and Ken pointed to a spot on one of them.

‘Our reports indicate that these bastards are hiding out in these caves around here. They keep changing their location but there have been signs of activity in this area within the last twenty-four hours. We believe they are regularly taking truckloads of guns and explosives up into this area, probably smuggled in from mainland Greece,’ Ken replied. ‘OK. Any questions?’

Yeah, loads, I thought, but not wanting to show my ignorance and inexperience, I kept quiet. Although I wasn’t scared, I felt a little apprehensive because it was my first operation. But, with the training I’d been given, I felt very confident and was raring to go. I just knew I could do it!

‘What sort of opposition are we going to be up against?’ Dynamo asked. ‘Can you give us any idea of numbers?’

‘Intelligence informs us that they are a small group of about ten or twelve. You’ll have no backup from the rest of the team; there’ll only be the four of you.’

‘Well, let’s hope that Intelligence have got it right,’ Chalky muttered.

‘Oh, and keep a tight rein on Geordie, lads,’ Ken laughed, winking at them. ‘We don’t want him to get carried away and kill some local farmers, now do we?’ he added.

We spent some time discussing the equipment, route and transport we would take and decided upon only the bare essentials – our MK1s, sashes, boot-knives and ropes.

‘The idea is to hit them hard, get in and out as quickly as possible, then?’ Dynamo confirmed.

Ken nodded. ‘That’s right. This area is unknown to us, so it’s pointless making too many plans. Just look on it as an extra bit of training. OK, then guys, I’ll leave you to it. Catch you later.’ And with that, he left.

Each of us had a locker in the building and from the variety of equipment we had stored, selected only those items we needed for this operation. We knew the type of terrain and didn’t want to be bogged down with unnecessary gear. We each took out ropes, harnesses, pistols, ammo, boot-knives, dog-clips and a new CTC, together with a canteen of fresh water and dry biscuits, which we called ‘dog biscuits’.

As this was to be a totally clandestine, unofficial operation, there was to be absolutely no indication that any of us were British servicemen. Besides, if the unthinkable happened and we were caught, the British army would deny all knowledge of us anyway.

I changed out of my army uniform of shorts and khaki shirt into clothes similar to those always worn by the others – a white shirt, jeans, an old army tunic and American-style lace-up boots, which we wore rather than standard army issue boots. These American-style combat boots had softer soles and were longer in the leg than the ones we were ordinarily issued, making them ideal for concealing boot-knives. Finally, around my waist I fastened the belt-like weapon we called ‘The Sash’, the most lethal piece of equipment we carried.

As I was collecting my gear, I once again wondered about the organisation of all of this. How did all this stuff actually get here and who looked after it when we were gone? It seemed to me that the lockers were possibly removed from the building whenever we left it. They were always in a slightly different location each time I returned. Although the training area was in the middle of nowhere, there was always the possibility of some locals or even an army patrol stumbling across it. Removing our gear would certainly help to avoid detection.

We each placed our equipment into identical canvas holdalls, which we put ready for when we left, together with a map of the area. As we would leave at 0100 hours, we rested up for the remainder of the day and evening.

When it was time to go, we threw our bags into the back of the jeep and set off. There was a fine drizzling mist falling and it was freezing cold in the open vehicle. Ken had given us the coordinates of the area the terrorists were reported to be in, and as we travelled, the others chatted together and cracked jokes as they discussed the job and the route we needed to take. I said little during the journey. I wasn’t frightened or nervous, just a little anxious about what might happen, but I had every confidence in my colleagues, who had a lot more experience. I knew that I wouldn’t be here with them if they didn’t think I was totally ready for it.

There was a 10.00 p.m. curfew on the island and we had to be careful to avoid army roadblocks or any form of confrontation with British troops, who would probably view us as terrorists. In order to do this we had to take little-used narrow, winding tracks but these could be just as hazardous as the main routes, as we had no way of knowing whether we might bump into a group of terrorists using them for the same reason we were.

It was very dark on the steep mountain tracks and we had to drive relatively slowly as we couldn’t use the jeep’s headlights for fear of being spotted either by terrorists or troops. But every so often, the moon shone through a break in the heavy cloud and we caught glimpses of the sheer drop down the mountainside only inches away from the jeep’s wheels as we gradually climbed higher and higher.

The brief spells of moonlight were very bright and it was just possible to make out the fresh tracks of a bigger vehicle where it had dislodged several large stones and part of the road on its way up the narrow, winding track. Dynamo began to travel a little faster along the tortuous track ahead of us. He seemed totally oblivious to the dangers of the narrow trail that was now partially obscured by a swirling patchy mist.

Eventually, the fine drizzle that had begun just as we left the training area, turned into a heavier, steady downfall.

‘Oh, great!’ Chalky said. ‘That’s all we need – those tracks will be gone soon.’

‘It doesn’t matter, this has to be them, no one else would be daft enough to come up here; the army certainly wouldn’t risk it!’ Dynamo pointed out, peering ahead of him.

Spot was sitting in the rear next to me. ‘How do you feel, Geordie?’ he asked.

I turned and grinned at him, water dripping off the end of my nose. He looked and sounded so calm and relaxed, in fact they all did. I was cold and soaked to the skin, but adrenalin was pumping through every inch of my body and I was trying very hard not to show just how ‘keyed up’ I was. I knew that my actions today would no doubt result in someone’s death, the first death I would be responsible for, but I was ready.

‘I’m okay, Spot,’ I replied. ‘Just fine!’

I just wanted to get on with it to really prove to these guys that there were right to have chosen me, to show them that I really was one of them, part of the team, and ready for action.

D
uring the week before my nineteenth birthday, November 1958, I was training with Dynamo when Ken arrived. It was a couple of weeks after my first operation up in the Troodos Mountains and I hoped that his arrival meant there was another job for us. Dynamo and I broke off our training and followed him into the ‘office’ area.

‘Well, Geordie, it’s your birthday soon so we’ve decided to give you a few weeks off,’ he said, to my total surprise. ‘We’ll see you after Christmas, some time in the New Year, unless something happens in the meantime and you’re needed.’

I tried not to show how bitterly disappointed I was. I’d thought that he’d come to brief us for our next operation but this was a bolt out of the blue. Six weeks without training, without seeing
Dynamo, Chalky and Spot, six weeks to the New Year, six whole weeks of being stuck around the camp doing routine work! I was utterly deflated.

Back at camp work mainly revolved around preparations for Christmas, when a panto and variety show were to be put on by the lads.

As I crossed the parade ground one morning, I met Sergeant Lupton.

‘Well, Urwin, I’m certainly looking forward to seeing this act of yours,’ he said as he walked past.

‘Eh! Act, what act, Sir?’ I said, gawping at him. I hadn’t a clue what he was on about.

‘The one you’re doing for the Christmas concert, you’ve got your name down for it!’ he said, over his shoulder.

Immediately I knew who’d dropped me in it, my so-called pal, Dave Buckfield. He and Bill were always volunteering me for something or other, putting my name down for all kinds of things: table tennis, darts etc. I’d been good at both but, unfortunately, couldn’t take it too far. In the army, if you were good at something like that, it always meant taking part in some kind of league against other camps and I couldn’t get involved in anything that would mean being tied up on certain dates with matches etc. I had to be available for The Sixteen whenever they needed me.

God knows what I’d have to come up with now for this little caper Bill and Dave had involved me in!

As the days passed, more and more people began to ask me what I was going to do. I’d had all kinds of ideas but none of them seemed right. Then one night I went to the pictures with a couple of the lads. Before the main film, they’d shown a newsreel where a bloke had lain on a bed of nails with a paving slab on his chest
while another guy smashed it with a sledgehammer. My mates were impressed.

‘It’s a con,’ I told them. ‘There’s a knack to it, it’s not that difficult to do if you know how.’

‘If it’s so easy, why don’t you do it for your act, then?’ Bill said.

‘OK, then, I will,’ I replied, taking up his challenge, relieved to have something to do at last.

It took some time to get enough six-inch nails to make my ‘bed’, and over the next few weeks, I scrounged around for as many as I could find. They weren’t easy to come by and I had all the guys searching about for me and bringing them back from other camps. I practised my act and press-ganged a reluctant Bill into being my ‘assistant’, although on the one occasion he attempted to lie on the ‘bed’, there weren’t enough nails in it and he ended up with a sore and bleeding backside.

On Christmas Day, I got ready to perform my act in full for the first time. Bill and I hadn’t been able to practise the slab-breaking bit before as we’d only been able to get our hands on one paving stone, nicked from another camp, and obviously didn’t want to use it.

We tied towels around our heads for a bit of an oriental feel. When it was our turn, I asked for two strong men from the audience to lift the slab on to a towel covering my chest as I lay on the bed of nails. As the two volunteers came forward, Bill pranced about the stage like a magician’s assistant, pointing to what I was doing until I grabbed him and shoved a large sledgehammer into his hands.

‘Here,’ I told him. ‘Get on with it.’ He suddenly became concerned that, not having done it before, he might injure me.

‘’Ow ’ard do I ’ave ter ’it it?’ he said, with a worried expression. ‘I might cave your bloody chest in!’

By now, I was holding the large, heavy slab on top of me.

‘Just get on with it, hit it as hard as you can, right in the middle, and watch my flaming fingers,’ I told him as he stood with the hammer hovering above me amid loud shouts and jeers from the audience:

‘Just belt it!’

‘Go on, hit it!’

‘Bash the bloody thing!’

‘Smash his chest in!’

Bill crashed the hammer down on to the paving slab, which instantly broke into four or five pieces, the audience roared their approval, and he began prancing around again holding the hammer above his head. We were a success and, more importantly, I came through it unscathed!

In early January, much to my relief, my teammates started to pick me up for training again. For some reason, our training had now intensified and I was with them on a much more regular basis, every other week in fact. I asked Dynamo what it was all about.

‘Well, it’s a while since we last saw you, Geordie, we don’t want you to get rusty, now do we!’ he said and took a swipe at me. I countered his move and he went on: ‘Cyprus is off the map, now, Geordie. The government’s about to give them what they want so we can concentrate on doing the jobs we’re trained for. Not spending our time chasing these daft sods around the mountains.’

I swivelled my body and countered another of his moves. ‘By the way, what you said to me about me signing on for three years, you did say I would get two weeks’ home leave, didn’t you?’

‘Of course,’ he replied. ‘But you’d better discuss all of that with Ken.’

For months I’d thought long and hard about this, ever since it had first been mentioned to me during my initiation. I was still
torn and not really able to make a firm decision. During these last few weeks away from them, I’d realised just how much I wanted to remain a part of the group, to keep on training and carrying out operations. The simple fact was it was in my blood now. I couldn’t get away from it.

And yet I desperately wanted to see my mother again, not just because I missed her but also to let her see that she had been right to encourage me to do my National Service. I wanted her to see how much I’d changed, how I’d grown up, gained confidence and lost my stammer, I wanted her to be proud of me. I wished with all my heart that I could tell her about the group, I knew just how proud she would be that I’d been so specially chosen; she’d always told me that I was special, that I would never end up like my father. But of course, most mothers think that about their kids. Obviously, I would never be able to tell her or indeed anyone about The Sixteen. I was also unsure how she’d react to me signing up for such a long period.

But, on the other hand, for the first time in my life I felt that I’d met real men, not loud-mouthed boastful drunkards, but men who trusted in my judgement and who I trusted implicitly. For all I’d spent a lot of time with the lads back at camp since we’d come here, it was these guys who were the first real mates I’d ever had, who’d given me an unshakeable belief and faith in myself and my abilities. Who’d shown me how to achieve my full potential. As desperate as I was to see my mother again, I was equally desperate to carry on working with them.

I just couldn’t decide what to do; I was almost halfway through my National Service and would be sent home and demobbed at the end of the year. I knew that I’d have to make my mind up soon and decided to speak to Ken about it as soon as the opportunity arose.

For a couple of weeks nothing much happened. I trained one
week and spent the next back at camp. The following Monday I assembled on the parade ground with everyone else and after roll call we reassigned our duties for the coming week. The sergeant called out half a dozen names including mine, for a works party, which meant I could be sent anywhere on the island. A corporal was assigned to our group, and when we were dismissed off the parade ground, I went over to him to find out where we were being sent.

‘We’re all going to a camp near to Famagusta, but you’ll be on your own at an Ordnance Depot at Dhekélia, Geordie,’ he said. ‘They want you to drive a forklift truck or something, some cushy number. We’ll drop you off as near to the depot as we can.’

Bill was also in the group and we sat next to one another on the truck taking us off to the other camps.

‘How the ’ell did you get a cushy number like that, you jammy sod?’ he asked. ‘It’s alright for some, you must have pals in high places,’ he joked, totally unaware of how close to the truth he was.

‘Oh yeah, like last week you mean, stuck in that sweaty cookhouse. I must have lost half a stone in weight and peeled twenty in spuds. Call that cushy do you?’ I joked back.

We drove along the main coastal route through Limassol and Larnaca, passing a couple of army checkpoints along the way. After about three-quarters of an hour the truck came to a halt near to a road junction. The corporal jumped out of the cab and shouted my name.

‘Urwin, out! This is where we leave you,’ he said, handing me some papers. ‘Here’s your orders. Report to the officer at that gatehouse.’ He pointed towards the nearby Royal Army Ordnance Depot then he climbed back in the truck. ‘And don’t forget, we’ll be here to pick you up at this spot 1700 hours on Friday,’ he yelled as it drove off.

‘I’ll try t’get round t’see you through t’week.’ Bill shouted at me from the back.

‘Righto,’ I yelled back with a wave, and then began to walk towards the camp.

I could see a jeep parked nearby on my left and as I walked along it suddenly pulled up alongside me and there sat Chalky, grinning.

‘Hop in, Geordie.’

‘Thank goodness for that,’ I sighed as I sat down beside him and we roared off in a cloud of dust.

‘What’s the matter, did you think we weren’t coming back for you?’ Chalky yelled above the noise of the engine.

‘Well, not so soon,’ I shouted back.

‘What’s up, have you had a hard time?’ He laughed.

‘You can laugh,’ I said. ‘But I’ve been stuck in the flaming cookhouse all last week cleaning pans!’

‘So what? You must have been getting the best of the grub, eh?’

‘What about these orders then? I’m supposed to be driving a forklift truck at that camp back there?’ I said, waving the sheaf of papers the corporal had given me.

‘They haven’t got any such orders and they aren’t expecting you, so forget about it, and don’t ask how, because even I don’t know that!’

‘But there’s a pal of mine coming to look for me during the week,’ I told him, remembering about Bill.

‘Well, he won’t find you will he! Anyway he won’t get in the camp if he doesn’t have a pass so stop worrying about it.’

As usual we were flying along the road at breakneck speed, bouncing and jolting over every rock and stone. ‘You didn’t tell me what happened to those puppies. I bet they caused you some problems, didn’t they?’ Chalky shouted, changing the subject.

‘I gave them to one of the officers I’m a bit pally with, Lieutenant Stevens. He’s a bit of a dog lover and said he’d try to find them good homes. I had a job convincing him that I’d found them near the camp though, but I think he believed me in the end. Anyway, he’s taken them to other camps to be trained as mascots or something.’

We were yelling at one another in order to be heard above the racket of the engine and it was difficult to have a proper conversation. As usual we were flying along narrow twisting tracks in order to avoid travelling on the main roads, and I was beginning to get the feeling that we were going around in circles but I knew that eventually we would end up at that old hangar. We came to a small river and Chalky slowed down only a fraction before driving straight across it and travelling on for about another half an hour.

Each time I was taken to the training area I arrived by a different route. I always had the feeling that we were being observed, but I never saw anyone, and, although I wasn’t aware of Chalky giving any kind of signal, as I suspected he had done in the past, I was fairly certain that other members of The Sixteen were nearby, guarding the place until we left.

My teammates always seemed to be very relaxed, but I knew that security around the training area had to be tight. Despite the fact that they smiled and cracked jokes a lot, I knew that this was something they were deadly serious about – they needed to be. We couldn’t afford to have anyone, terrorists or British troops, find us there.

I’d brought the subject of security up only once before when Dynamo, in an unusual moment of seriousness for him, had let it slip that their security was the best there was, but then he quickly changed the subject and it was never mentioned again.

The landscape began to look familiar as we neared the mountains and suddenly there it was, roughly four to five hundred yards in
the distance, the old hangar. Well, that’s what I called it but it was really too small to have held anything other than perhaps a couple of light aircraft. We drove in through the gateway or what remained of a metal barred gate, which was now mainly broken and rusting. As usual, there were no obvious signs of security in place, just the feeling that someone was closely watching us as we pulled up outside the old tin hut.

Chalky pushed the old creaky door open and following him in I saw my other teammates sitting around a dirty old table that was covered with bits of paper, maps and photographs. Dynamo turned towards me, smiling.

‘Here’s Geordie,’ he said. ‘I’ll bet he can help us to solve our little problem.’

‘You must joking,’ I said. ‘I thought I was here to learn off you lot.’

Chalky nudged me. ‘That’s why you’re with us, young man. You were good at stuff like this during your training, so I’m sure you’ll be able to help us to come up with an answer now.’

After my first operation, and my blunder with the rope that had almost resulted in my death, I’d wondered whether they might think I wasn’t up to it and reconsider my being part of the group. I really felt that I’d let them down badly, but they never referred to it, it just wasn’t important to them. Besides, going over past events simply wasn’t their way of doing things – they didn’t waste time: that was then and this was now. Their attitudes towards me hadn’t changed and, if anything, I now felt more a part of the team than ever before.