Leaving the railway, we found a big, rounded hill ahead of us and started up it. A few metres short of the summit we suddenly stopped. In that split second we’d spotted anti-aircraft gun barrels pointing into the sky no more than four or five metres in front of us. Standing still and staring at them, we realized we could see the top of a wall of sandbags, almost under our noses. Obviously there were Iraqis inside the sangar but, thank God, they seemed to be asleep.
Without a word, without turning, we backtracked down the slope, mere centimetres at a time, watching for any movement to our front. Nothing stirred. Once we were clear, we pulled away eastwards in a big loop, leaving the mound on our left, and then came back onto our northerly heading. But the incident gave us a fright, because we’d been walking carelessly, not worrying about the scrunching noise our boots were making on the loose rock and gravel.
By the early hours of the morning we were back into a system of shallow wadis and dry channels maybe ten metres wide, but less than a metre deep. These river beds were full of little bushes which threw thick, black shadows in the moonlight, so that every hollow seemed to be full of quite dense vegetation. I thought, Great — we’ll be able to get our heads down in here. It should be warmer too.
About 0530 we started looking for a place to lie up, and settled in a hollow. As I lay down next to Stan, he took off his webbing and laid it down in the middle of some bushes. We cuddled down together on top of it. It was really embarrassing, because we were front to front, with our arms round each other, and we had to take turns on whose head was at the bottom.
So we lay there, shuddering, drifting off into sleep, waking with a start, shaking all over, until dawn broke. By then I was bitterly regretting some of the mistakes I’d made in choosing and packing my kit. Apart from the brew-kit, which would have been a great morale-booster, I should have had a Gore-Tex bivvy bag or at least a space blanket in one of my pouches.
When daylight came, we found that some of the mud had dried on us, helped by our body heat, and our clothes were all stiff and covered with ice crystals, as if they’d been left out on a frosty night. Looking up, I saw that the sky was clear and blue, and thought, Thank God, it’s going to be a fine day.
Light revealed that the bushes, which had looked promising at night, were nothing but thorny skeletons, eaten down by goats. There wasn’t a leaf on them, and they weren’t going to hide us from anyone. So we crawled across and tucked ourselves into the wall of a wadi that ran north to south.
At ten o’clock the sun came up and shone on us. I’m sure that saved our lives. One more wet, windy day and we would have drifted off into unconsciousness and never come round. The sun never felt very warm, but it definitely made the air less cold, and we began to sort ourselves out a bit. We took off our webbing, and I spread out my map case to dry. We also cleaned the mud off our weapons and reloaded magazines. I found I’d fired about 70 rounds during the contact. Stan produced a sachet of American corned-beef hash from his belt-kit, and as I watched him eat it, I was thinking, Why didn’t I bring my own rations with me? All I had was two biscuits, my last.
At one point I said, ‘Stan — can you tell me, what are you doing sitting in the middle of Iraq?’
‘You know, Chris,’ he replied, ‘I’m asking myself that, right this very minute.’ He burst out laughing. ‘I bet we look a total state now.’
‘Too right we do.’
‘What about you, then? What are you doing here?’
It was a good question. When I thought about it, I saw that my involvement in the SAS was down to my love of being in open country. It was that, more than anything else, which had made me join the army.
I grew up in Rowlands Gill, a small village in the country just outside Newcastle, and went to the junior school there. From our house, I could walk straight out across the fields and into the forest, and I was always playing in the woods, making camps and sleeping out. My father worked on building sites, but he generally got laid off during the winter. That suited him fine, because all his life he’d been keen on shooting.
Dad would take me shooting in the country around Rowlands Gill. We used to build hides, in which we’d wait for pigeons, or ferret rabbits out of burrows in the hedges. On winter evenings we’d stand in the woods and shoot pigeons as they came into roost.
My dad had a five-shot Browning automatic 12-bore. Once, as we came round a corner, we saw five rabbits on the edge of a field. He got them all, one after another. With feats like that he soon became my hero, and I loved every minute of our expeditions.
But then came a great change. Some time in his thirties, my dad decided it was wrong to shoot birds and animals, and stopped altogether. By then I was mad keen, and kept suggesting we should go out. ‘No,’ Dad would say, ‘you’re better off just watching them or taking pictures, capturing them on film. If you want to go, shoot with a camera.’
At an early age I started asking if I could have an air rifle, and my parents kept saying no. At one point my dad bought me a .410, but I was only allowed to take it out with him, under close supervision. Later, when I was thirteen or fourteen, I saved up my pocket money and asked again if I could buy an air rifle. Still the answer was no, so my younger brother Keith and I went out with some older boys and bought one, a BSA .22. I kept the precious weapon hidden in the loft.
Again I asked my mum, ‘Can I buy an air rifle?’
‘No,’ came the reply.
‘What if I just get one?’
‘You wouldn’t be able to keep one in this house without your dad and me knowing.’
Keith and I were looking at each other, thinking, ‘Yeah — right!’ We used to smuggle the air gun out of the house. Keith would wait on the ground, while I climbed out of my bedroom window and handed the gun down to him. Then we’d run off into the woods and go shooting.
One day, as I came home from school, I found that Keith had got there before me; he grabbed me, his face all fearful. ‘Dad’s just bought a new TV,’ he said, ‘and the man’s in the loft, putting up the aerial. You’d better get up there quick.’
The hatchway going up into the loft was in my bedroom. I stood there with Keith, waiting anxiously, when my dad called cheerily up to the fitter from downstairs, ‘I don’t suppose there are any secrets hidden up there?’
Keith and I stared at each other in horror. ‘No,’ the aerial guy called. ‘There’s nothing up here.’
The rifle was never discovered — but when I was sixteen or so I owned up, and by then it was too late for anyone to worry.
At school I was quite soft, and used to get bullied. If a girl started making up to me, I’d get beaten up by someone else who fancied her. If there was going to be a fight, it took place when school finished. There’d always be a big crowd gathering at the gate, waiting for the action. Sometimes, if my brother Keith got the worst of an argument, he would say, ‘Right — my big brother Chris will see to you.’ Then he’d find me at playtime and say, ‘By the way, you’re to have a fight tonight.’ Sometimes I’d go over the back fence and do a runner across the fields to avoid facing the music.
When I was sixteen I decided that this sort of thing had to stop, and I began fighting back. I realized that if you have a fight, you probably get hurt, but it doesn’t last for ever. Listening to my dad, and taking a grip of myself, I put a stop to the bullying.