1 Tuesday, 1st July 2003
2 (9.30 am)
3 SOLDIER C, sworn
4 Questioned by MR ROXBURGH
5 LORD SAVILLE: If you look across you can see who is talking
6 to you. I say this to all the witnesses: I am the
7 Chairman. The questions will come from the barristers,
8 they are the people in front of me. Could you try and
9 keep pretty close to the microphone. Where you are now
10 looks pretty ideal and then we will hear what you have
11 to say.
12 MR ROXBURGH: May we have on the screen, please, page B68.1.
13 Private C, do you have with you a copy of the statement
14 that you made to this Inquiry on 27th November 2000.
15 A. Yes, I do, sir.
16 Q. Are the contents of that statement true to the best of
17 your knowledge and belief?
18 A. They are, sir.
19 Q. In the first paragraph of your statement, you explain
20 that you were originally a member of the reconnaissance
21 platoon in Headquarters Company 1st Battalion of the
22 Parachute Regiment and that at some stage you were
23 transferred to the Mortar Platoon of Support Company.
24 Towards the end of that paragraph you tell us that on
25 30th January 1972, you were working with Headquarters
1 Company and you know that you were not deployed as
2 a member of Mortar Platoon that day.
3 Does the term Guinness Force mean anything to you?
4 A. No, not at all, sir.
5 Q. Or the Composite Platoon?
6 A. No, not to me memory now, no.
7 Q. Could we have on the screen, please, page R24. This is
8 an extract from the January 1972 edition of Pegasus, the
9 magazine of the Parachute Regiment. If we look at the
10 right-hand column there is a heading "Guinness Force."
11 It then states:
12 "Guinness Force is the nickname given to Admin
13 Company, when it turns out as a Rifle Company. This
14 stalwart body consisting of quartermaster's staff,
15 orderly-room clerks, pay clerks, bandsmen, off-duty dog
16 handlers, spare drummers and not infrequently volunteer
17 drivers and signallers from Command Company was first
18 formed during severe rioting in Bligh's Lane
19 Londonderry, in July this year."
20 Does that bring back any memory to you of the
21 Guinness Force?
22 A. No, not at all, sir.
23 Q. May we look at B68.015. This is the statement that you
24 made on 5th March 1972 and right at the beginning you
25 say, this:
1 "I am a private soldier in 1 Para and have been in
2 Northern Ireland for a year. On 29th January I attended
3 an orders group in the late evening and I was told that
4 I was to be a member of a composite force (drawn from
5 different platoons) and that we would have security
6 duties at the march in Londonderry on the next day."
7 Do you remember being part of a composite force
8 drawn from different platoons on that occasion?
9 A. No, I cannot remember that, sir, I cannot remember the
10 word "composite force" or anything like that.
11 Q. I am next going to send you the name of an officer who
12 is known to us as Captain 200. The name will appear on
13 the screen to your right. Please do not say the name
14 when you see it, but if you just look at the name and
15 then I will ask you whether you remember the individual
16 in question.
17 Do you see the name on the screen to your right?
18 A. Yes, I do, sir.
19 Q. Do you remember him?
20 A. No, the name rings a bell, but I cannot actually
21 remember. I cannot put a face to the name or any, you
22 know, sort of orders or anything to Captain [blank] at
23 all, sir.
24 Q. Could we go on, please, to paragraph 2 of your statement
25 to this Inquiry at B68.001. May I ask you as we go
1 through your evidence not to mention the name of any
2 other soldiers because, like you, they are entitled to
3 anonymity. In paragraph 2 you explain that you recall
4 two occasions when you came under fire in
5 Northern Ireland, once when you were returning to
6 Belfast from Armagh in a Land Rover and once in Derry on
7 30th January 1972. Then, towards the end of the
8 paragraph, you say that the situation in Londonderry on
9 that day was very different from other riot situations
10 that you had faced.
11 "All of a sudden when shots were fired it was more
12 serious."
13 Is it right that by January 1972, you would have had
14 quite a bit of experience of dealing with riots?
15 A. Oh, yes, sir.
16 Q. And had you ever encountered a situation before that day
17 in which shooting had broken out in the course of
18 a riot?
19 A. (Pause). I cannot answer that question because I cannot
20 remember that, sir, I cannot remember any singular riot
21 that, um, you know, that would have happened. You know,
22 I cannot, I cannot remember that.
23 Q. Nothing sticks in your mind?
24 A. Nothing, no.
25 Q. Did you also have experience of dealing with civil
1 rights marches?
2 A. I never had too much -- no, not with civil rights
3 marches, no.
4 Q. Or other kinds of march?
5 A. No, not that I can remember.
6 Q. Is it right that you do not now have any particular
7 recollection of any briefing that you received before
8 the operation in Londonderry?
9 A. No, sir.
10 Q. May we look, please, at B2022.056. You probably will
11 not have seen this before. This is part of some notes
12 made by Captain 200, the officer commanding
13 Guinness Force for the purpose of briefing soldiers
14 under his command. There is one part I would like to
15 look at with you. In Section 1 he is dealing with
16 "Enemy" and there are various items that he mentions,
17 starting with the NICRA march and at (c), the hooligan
18 element and (d) the Rossville Flats. Then at (f)
19 "Deliberate attempt plus IRA plus riots plus sniping
20 bombing, et cetera."
21 Do you have any recollection at all of receiving
22 a briefing to the effect that there was a risk of
23 sniping or bombing or some other form of attack by the
24 IRA on that occasion?
25 A. No, sir.
1 Q. If some briefing had been given to that effect, would
2 that have been unusual in any way?
3 A. No, I would not say it would. I would say, you know,
4 sort of, we were briefed before most things, but nothing
5 about -- I cannot remember anything like this, you know
6 now 30 years later, about being told about snipers or
7 anything like that.
8 Q. Before you went to Derry had you heard of the
9 Rossville Flats?
10 A. No.
11 Q. You do not remember being told anything about the
12 Rossville Flats?
13 A. No, sir, no.
14 Q. May we look at B2022.004. This is part of a statement
15 made by the officer commanding the Guinness Force. In
16 paragraph 23 what he says, is this:
17 "The Rossville Flats was a notorious area in
18 Londonderry at the time. It was known as a 'killing
19 ground', and the car park or courtyard area in front of
20 the Rossville Flats was known to be particularly
21 dangerous. We had heard about this even though we had
22 not been to Londonderry before," and then he refers to
23 something that had just happened that confirms what he
24 had heard.
25 Does any of that remind you of anything that you
1 knew about the Rossville Flats before you went to
2 Londonderry?
3 A. No, sir.
4 Q. Let us go back to your statement, B68.2, please,
5 paragraphs 6 and 7. You say in paragraph 6 that you
6 cannot recall waiting anywhere in particular before
7 being deployed and you do not recall the terms of any
8 orders that you were given. Has any further
9 recollection come back to you since you made your
10 statement about anything that happened before you were
11 deployed?
12 A. Could you say that again, sir?
13 Q. Since you made the statement that we have on the screen,
14 have you remembered anything more about what happened
15 before you were deployed into the Bogside on that day?
16 A. No. No, I cannot. What you got to think of, sir, when
17 I made this statement to Eversheds, sir, I had not read
18 my other statement on purpose so my mind to be clear on
19 what had actually happened that day.
20 So I did not go back to reading my original
21 statement from -- made by the Military Police.
22 Q. You have made that very clear in your statement to this
23 Inquiry, but you have now had an opportunity to read the
24 statement that you made at the time; have you not?
25 A. I still -- I had started to read 'em and I thought, no,
1 I am not going to read that it is going to sort of
2 mix-up me mind. What I have seen on telly and the time
3 that has lapsed since this happened, I did not want to
4 get no further mix-ups in me mind.
5 Q. I follow that, but in the statement you have made to
6 this Inquiry, towards the end of that statement, you do
7 make a number of comments about things that you said in
8 the previous statements; is that not right?
9 A. Probably things that I remembered, yes, sir.
10 Q. So in order to do that, you must have looked, at least,
11 at what you said in those previous statements?
12 A. I did not go through the actual previous statement
13 in-depth or anything like that because I just did not
14 want to, did not want to mix-up -- to make two
15 statements and 30 years after making one, there is a lot
16 of things that go on, you know, that you see on telly
17 that distorts your mind a little bit, so. I tried not,
18 you know, to go into depth on me very first statement.
19 Q. We understand the difficulties, a lot of witnesses face
20 them, of remembering things 30 years later, but we will
21 try to concentrate on what you can now remember.
22 May we look next at a photograph, please, P199.
23 This is an aerial view of the area where the events we
24 are dealing with took place. Just to help you get your
25 bearings, I can tell you that the civil rights march
1 followed a route down a street called William Street in
2 the direction of my blue arrow and turned right down
3 Rossville Street and when your force was deployed, it
4 would have come down in the direction of my red arrow,
5 down Little James Street and into Rossville Street where
6 some soldiers moved to the left and some to the right.
7 Before that stage was reached there is a great deal
8 of evidence that members of Support Company and of the
9 force of which you appear to have been a member,
10 assembled in the area that I am now marking towards the
11 bottom of the photograph with a little red arrow, not
12 far from this building which was a Presbyterian Church.
13 Do you have any recollection at all of forming-up in
14 the area of the Presbyterian Church?
15 A. None at all, sir.
16 Q. We know that a party of soldiers went up on to a wall
17 near that church to cut wire and there is evidence that
18 shortly after that happened, a shot was fired that hit
19 a drainpipe on the side of the church. Any memory of
20 that happening?
21 A. No, sir, no.
22 Q. May we look at B68.015. This is, again, the statement
23 you made in March 1972. In paragraphs 3 and 4, if we
24 could enlarge those, please, you said at that time:
25 "In Londonderry we formed up in Queen's Street. One
1 platoon in two Pigs was in front, followed by our
2 composite force in two 4-tonne soft-skinned vehicles,
3 followed by another platoon in two Pigs.
4 "4. I saw the leading platoon move forward to try
5 to get through by the Presbyterian Church. I heard one
6 shot at this stage and smelt the CS gas. Then the
7 leading platoon returned."
8 Does that bring back any memory at all of an
9 incident in which you heard a shot being fired when you
10 were somewhere near a Presbyterian Church?
11 A. Not now, no, I cannot remember that, sir.
12 Q. Let us go back to your statement to this Inquiry, B68.2,
13 paragraph 7. You say:
14 "I think that we were pitched straight into
15 a volatile situation when we arrived in Londonderry.
16 I did not hear gunfire as I first disembarked although
17 I think I may have heard an explosion of some kind."
18 Is it right that this is part of your statement that
19 you had written before you saw any of the evidence that
20 you had given in 1972?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. Would it be right to say that your memory of hearing an
23 explosion is quite a vague memory?
24 A. Um, now it is a vague memory because the 30 years down
25 the line, what you got to think of, we was got put in
1 volatile situations lots of times, so, you know, if an
2 explosion is vague in my memory, it is because of the
3 time lapse that has gone from then to now.
4 Q. Can you help at all as to what kind of explosion it was,
5 in other words, what caused it?
6 A. Well, it could have been a petrol bomb or a nail bomb or
7 anything, you know, so I am not -- I cannot say that
8 now.
9 Q. Could it have been the sound of a rubber bullet gun
10 being fired?
11 A. Possibly. Possibly, you know, my recollection now,
12 I probably at the time would have known what sort of
13 explosion it was then, but because of the time lapse,
14 you know, sort of, I could not tell you one, one noise
15 from another.
16 Q. Are you sure that you did not hear gunfire when you
17 first disembarked from your vehicle?
18 A. To my recollection now, I would say I, I did not hear
19 gunfire, I would say, to my recollection now.
20 Q. Let us look again at what you said on 5th March 1972,
21 B68.015, paragraphs 5 and 6. In paragraph 5 you say:
22 "After this the whole column moved off. I was in
23 the back of my vehicle and could not see what was
24 happening in front of us. I was wearing my respirator.
25 I could see the Pigs of the platoon following us. We
1 halted in Rossville Street a few yards past the junction
2 with William Street by the derelict buildings on the
3 left of the road. I am not certain exactly when I first
4 heard the sound of firing. It was either just after we
5 had de-bussed, or a little later when we were working
6 down the back wall of the Chamberlain Street houses.
7 I do remember that as soon as I heard firing I cocked my
8 weapon."
9 Do you have any reason to doubt that this paragraph
10 is an accurate statement of what you could remember
11 in March 1972?
12 A. I would say that at that time that was in my mind and
13 that is how it, it happened and that is exactly what
14 was, you know, what would have happened.
15 Q. Can you help us as to this: when you first heard
16 gunfire, could you tell what kind of weapon was being
17 used?
18 A. Then, that many years ago, I could tell what sort of
19 small arm it would be, you know, sort of compared to
20 a pistol to a rifle. Not now.
21 Q. Can you now remember whether it was small arms fire or
22 rifle fire, or what?
23 A. I am trying hard to remember. It is, it is not in my
24 mind whether it was small arms or rifle fire or, you
25 know, I cannot exactly remember that at all, sir.
1 Q. In paragraph 6 you say:
2 "When we de-bussed I could see people milling about
3 in the open ground in front of us. I could also see two
4 Pigs drawn up in Rossville Street, which I think were
5 the Pigs of the platoon behind which had overtaken us
6 when we stopped. In the open ground on the other side
7 were the two Pigs of the leading platoon."
8 Do you have any surviving recollection at all of
9 disembarking from your vehicle and seeing people milling
10 about in the open ground in front of you or is this
11 something that has just passed from your member as well?
12 A. Well, it would not have passed from my memory. Because
13 of being in so many volatile situations, the actual
14 procedure would be the same and, again, I would say the
15 time lapse from there could not -- I could not define
16 the actual statement or that sentence because it would
17 have happened so many times. You know, we might have,
18 um, de-bussed in Belfast exactly the same way and there
19 would have been some confusion and, and things like
20 that. So, you know, I cannot define that exactly.
21 Q. Can we go on to the next page, please, the top of the
22 page. What is then written is this:
23 "The officer in charge of our force ordered us to
24 work our way round the walls on the edge of the open
25 ground and to assemble at the near end of Block 1 of the
1 Rossville buildings."
2 Do you have any memory of that happening?
3 A. No, sir.
4 Q. You carry on:
5 "As I ran around the walls at the edge of the open
6 ground I could hear the sound of firing though I did not
7 locate it precisely. I could also hear the sound of
8 riot guns being fired and there was a lot of noise.
9 There were some bangs as well, but I could not swear to
10 it that these were nail bombs are any particular sort of
11 explosions."
12 When you said in your statement to this Inquiry many
13 years later that you recalled hearing an explosion, do
14 you think that that may have reflected a distant memory
15 of the bangs that you are referring to in this
16 paragraph?
17 A. Sir, this is the first time I have read this part of the
18 paragraph, right, and I, I can relate some things that
19 are still, even though it is a long time ago, I can
20 associate what is in my mind with that sentence, but
21 cannot actually remember, um, you know, sort of doing
22 what is set down there. You know, I cannot remember
23 running, I cannot remember holding my weapon in
24 a certain position, I cannot remember where the bombs or
25 wherever the firing was coming from or anything like
1 that. This is just jogging me memory, you know, sort of
2 on a vague picture.
3 Q. Do you associate your memory of an explosion with these
4 bangs that you are referring to in this paragraph?
5 A. Um, as I say, I cannot define it again, sir, but
6 I would, I would say that was pretty much what did go on
7 on that day, you know, sort of by what I have read here
8 now.
9 Q. Let us carry on a bit:
10 "By the time we reached the end of the
11 Chamberlain Street wall the civilians had run past the
12 barricade on the other side of Block 1 and most of them
13 had left the car park off the Rossville building though
14 I could still see some moving on its far side. As
15 I moved forward I passed some of our own men in covering
16 positions along the Chamberlain Street wall."
17 Does that trigger any memory of moving along a wall
18 past other members of your battalion in covering
19 positions?
20 A. Sir, I just realised what I wanted to say there: the
21 detail I cannot remember, sir, and that is what you are
22 asking me to do. The detail is definitely very vague in
23 my mind and I cannot remember that.
24 Q. One more question about this paragraph, you say:
25 "I cannot remember seeing any of them fire. When
1 I got to the car park end of the wall I remember seeing
2 one of our men (I do not remember who) standing by the
3 Pig in the car park, fire a shot at the far corner
4 between blocks 2 and 3. As he did this I was running
5 across to the end of Block 1."
6 Do you have any memory at all of seeing one of your
7 fellow soldiers firing a shot from beside an Army
8 vehicle?
9 A. I cannot actually remember that, sir, but looking at
10 that now, that is when I would have gone into a mode of,
11 um, you know, being aware of everything that was coming
12 on. I cannot actually remember it, but I would say, in
13 my recollection as being a soldier, that would be when,
14 all of a sudden, it was not a riot, then we was, you
15 know, in danger.
16 Q. Let us have another look at the photograph, P199. The
17 sequence of events that you described at the time would
18 seem to be that you came in in your vehicle and
19 disembarked somewhere at the tip of my second arrow
20 which is close to the north end of Rossville Street and
21 that you then made your way somewhere like that, along
22 the backs of the houses in Chamberlain Street, crossed
23 over the mouth of this car park and on your way saw
24 a soldier firing in the direction of my blue arrow. Do
25 you follow what I am saying?
1 A. Yes, I do, sir, yes, yes.
2 Q. Does the photograph assist your recollection of any of
3 that?
4 A. I would not say it would, um, you know, it does not
5 fetch back no memories of me running or walking or, you
6 know, sort of taking cover along any of them red arrows
7 and where the blue arrow, where you said the man had
8 shot, I cannot actually remember that either.
9 Q. B68.016, please. Carrying on with your statement of
10 5th March 1972. The next thing you say in that
11 statement -- it is paragraph 8 -- is that a sergeant
12 sent your whole force to the William Street end of the
13 front building of Columbcille Court from where half
14 a dozen of you took a party of a about 20 prisoners to
15 a collection point.
16 If we look at the photograph, P199, we can see what
17 that probably meant. We had followed your course to
18 a position at the north end of Block 1 where my little
19 blue arrow is and Columbcille Court is the complex of
20 flats that I am indicating with my long blue arrow and
21 the tip of my long blue arrow is pointing at what could
22 be described as the William Street end of
23 Columbcille Court. Do you have now any recollection of
24 being sent there or of escorting a group of prisoners
25 from that position?
1 A. No, sir. However, after seeing the television,
2 I remember seeing prisoners run -- being -- run across
3 a road, um, but that probably has not helped my memory
4 on the actual day from, you know, the images I seen on
5 the television. So there is nothing I can do to help
6 the Tribunal in any way here, I cannot remember that,
7 you know.
8 Q. Let us, then, come to an incident of which you do appear
9 to have some memory. Can we go to B68.002, paragraph 8.
10 You recall reaching the top of a flight of steps leading
11 to the balcony of a small block of flats and having
12 looked at a map, you are able to confirm that the stairs
13 were located at the northern end of Kells Walk. You say
14 you cannot recall how you arrived there or who ordered
15 you to go there, but you vaguely remember running up
16 some stairs with a handrail on the right and bricks on
17 the left.
18 Then you say:
19 "I recall looking for somewhere safe to shelter and
20 covering another soldier on a 'one over one' basis as we
21 moved south along the balcony on the western side of the
22 building, Kells Walk, using the doorways as cover.
23 I cannot now recall who I was with on the day. By 'one
24 over one' I mean that we covered each other by
25 overlapping each other; one of us would advance forward
1 and stop in a doorway, the other would pass him by and
2 stop and so on."
3 Have you been given a list of the names of various
4 soldiers with the ciphers that are used in relation to
5 them?
6 A. Yes, I have, sir.
7 Q. I would like you to look at the list, please, and please
8 be careful not to use the names, the real names in any
9 answers that you give, but would you look, please, at
10 the second soldier on that list who is Soldier D,
11 described as a lance corporal in the Guinness Force; do
12 you see his name?
13 A. Yes, sir.
14 Q. Are you able to say one way or the other whether or not
15 he was the soldier who was moving along this balcony
16 with you?
17 A. No, I, I cannot even put a face to the name anyhow, sir,
18 so I cannot -- you know, if I cannot put a face to the
19 name I cannot remember if it was him or not anyhow.
20 Q. Paragraph 9, please. You say this:
21 "While I was somewhere between the top of the steps
22 at Kells Walk and the southern end of the balcony
23 I recall suddenly hearing the sound of automatic
24 gunfire. I cannot recall hearing any shooting before
25 this time. At first I could not tell where this was
1 coming from and I cannot recall how many shots I heard,
2 but it was close."
3 Are you really sure that you heard automatic gunfire
4 at this stage?
5 A. Yes, sir, I definitely heard gunfire at that stage, sir.
6 Q. Did you definitely hear automatic gunfire at that stage?
7 A. Well, if it was not automatic gunfire, it was a trigger
8 that would have been pulled in several, um, times. What
9 I am saying is: it would have been, the trigger would
10 have been pulled three or four times, which would make
11 it sound like automatic gunfire.
12 Q. Is the position this: it could have been automatic
13 gunfire or it could have been single shots being fired
14 in very quick succession?
15 A. To my memory now, yes, sir.
16 Q. Can you remember whether these were high or low velocity
17 shots or could you not tell?
18 A. Probably at the time I would have been able to tell, but
19 you know with the time lapse again, sir, no, you know,
20 I do not want to say something that I cannot remember.
21 Q. Let us look ahead for a moment to paragraph 12 of your
22 statement on the next page, you are dealing here with
23 the time at which you first engaged a gunman yourself.
24 A. Yes, sir.
25 Q. You say:
1 "At this time I could hear the continuous low
2 sounding cracks of automatic small arms fire. I could
3 not actually see where the shots were being fired from.
4 It was definitely not a .303 weapon or an SLR being
5 fired; it was definitely small arms fire at close range.
6 I could tell the difference between these different
7 types of fire."
8 A. Yes, sir.
9 Q. At this point you seem to be quite clear in your
10 recollection --
11 A. Yes, sir.
12 Q. -- that you heard automatic small arms fire?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. That is right?
15 A. Well, at that time, when I made that statement, that was
16 what come into my mind, yes.
17 Q. Are you still sure about that or not?
18 A. Well, the only thing is, if it was not small arms fire,
19 you know, if it was not automatic cracks, it was
20 somebody firing, um, one after one shots repeatedly. So
21 that is all I can say, um, to the question you are
22 asking me, sir, which -- I definitely heard shots being
23 fired.
24 Q. When you refer to automatic small arms fire, can you
25 give an example of the sort of weapon that you have in
1 mind?
2 A. A pistol.
3 Q. An automatic pistol?
4 A. Well, there is lots of weapons that are small arms,
5 sub-machine-guns, you know, I cannot define or detail
6 the actual weapon that it would -- would have fired.
7 Q. Are you now aware that you did not mention hearing this
8 automatic fire in either of the two statements that you
9 made in 1972?
10 A. No, sir, I did not.
11 Q. If you did not mention automatic fire in either of those
12 two statements, does that cause you to have some doubt
13 about whether you actually have an accurate memory of
14 this now?
15 A. I, I -- my memory, when I was giving that statement, was
16 going back to what I could remember at that time and
17 what had gone on and, you know, sort of, if I had have
18 gone through my other statements which would have
19 probably distorted anything that I could remember as the
20 truth on that statement, then it would not have done
21 anybody any good to read me other one and that is
22 exactly how I could remember it when I gave that
23 statement.
24 Q. Can we go back to paragraph 10 on the previous page,
25 please. You describe reaching the southern end of the
1 balcony and stopping at the top of a sloping ramp that
2 led to the south. You identify your position by
3 reference to a plan and a photograph. Then you say:
4 "I attach as attachment 4 a photograph which shows
5 roughly the number of people I saw at the rubble
6 barricade while I was at point B. I noticed that they
7 were throwing objects towards us including bricks and
8 petrol bombs and were gradually moving north towards us.
9 It was as if they were enticing us to move forward. I
10 am not sure what else they were throwing."
11 How sure are you about this memory of seeing first
12 of all bricks being thrown from the rubble barricade?
13 A. Right, with that paragraph there, sir, I can -- it might
14 be a bit distorted in a way because I have seen things
15 in television and I am trying to put my mind back into,
16 into the situation we was there and I am finding it very
17 hard and since then I made this statement on here and
18 other things in between, my first and second statement
19 have been on television and, um, in the papers and, um,
20 um, you know in the media in general. But, um, to the
21 best of my recollection, at that time that statement was
22 how I could remember it.
23 Q. Can you now be at all sure about whether you saw bricks
24 or petrol bombs being thrown at you from the barricade?
25 A. Well, sir, every riot that you go to in -- at that time
1 in Northern Ireland, was, I reiterate on what I said
2 before, was a normal run-of-the-mill day's work, as we
3 say, and I could not really give detail again -- I will
4 fetch the word up -- detail, you know, whether it be
5 a bomb, petrol bomb, whether it be bricks or anything,
6 because it was all in general.
7 Q. Let us see if we gain any help by looking at the
8 evidence you gave to Lord Widgery's inquiry. Do you
9 remember giving evidence to Lord Widgery?
10 A. Sir, I only remember one thing about Lord Widgery's
11 Tribunal, or two things: one, we went by helicopter and
12 a joke that one of the corporals had said out in the, in
13 the, you know, the Tribunal and that is, I cannot even
14 remember giving evidence, taking the oath or anything,
15 sir.
16 MR TOOHEY: Mr Roxburgh, before you take Soldier C to that
17 evidence, in paragraph 8 of the Eversheds statement,
18 about five lines from the bottom, you described it as:
19 "... moving south along the balcony on the western
20 side of the building."
21 I wonder could that be clarified with the witness?
22 MR ROXBURGH: Perhaps if we look at the virtual reality
23 spot 3 to start with. Are you able to recognise in that
24 photograph the staircase that you went up?
25 A. Yes, I am, sir. I cannot remember it in detail, but
1 that would be the staircase that I did go up.
2 Q. Having ascended that staircase, did you then turn to the
3 left?
4 A. (Witness nodding) Yes, I cannot remember turning left,
5 but that is the way I would have gone.
6 Q. I think it is the only way you can go?
7 A. Exactly, yes.
8 Q. Could we then go to virtual reality spot 7, please. I
9 am going to take the picture right round so you can see
10 the full panorama. The buildings on the other side of
11 the road that are coming into view now have all changed
12 since you were there, but do you now see the ramp?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. At the top of which you were positioned?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. And turning it full circle, does the picture now show
17 the balcony along which you came on the western side of
18 the building?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. And are those the sheds to which you refer in your
21 statement?
22 A. Yes, they are, sir, yes.
23 MR TOOHEY: Thank you, Mr Roxburgh.
24 MR ROXBURGH: I was going to show you part of your evidence
25 to Lord Widgery. Could we look at B68.029. Would you
1 have been doing your best when you gave evidence to
2 Lord Widgery, to tell the truth about all the matters
3 you were asked about?
4 A. Oh, yes, sir.
5 Q. Let us look at the foot of the page at letters F to G,
6 please. You were asked about the view that you had of
7 the man with a rifle and just below F the question was:
8 "Question: If you had a view of a man with a rifle
9 at the corner of the west side of the block of flats,
10 then you also would have had a very clear view of the
11 rubble barricade?
12 "Answer: Yes, I did.
13 "Question: But you cannot remember whether there
14 were people at it or not?
15 "Answer: I do not remember seeing people.
16 "Question: Certainly no-one with a gun, because you
17 would have noticed it?
18 "Answer: If they had fired it I would have done.
19 "Question: Certainly you did not see any people
20 throwing stones at that barricade?
21 "Answer: No.
22 [If we go to the next page, please.]
23 "Question: Or throwing bombs at that barricade?
24 "Answer: No, I did not.
25 "Question: Indeed, you did not see anyone throwing
1 bombs that day?
2 "Answer: No.
3 "Question: Nor did you hear the sound of any bombs?
4 "Answer: I could not say I did not hear the sound
5 of a bomb; I heard bangs."
6 Then you were asked about what you had heard in
7 Belfast. So do you see there that you were telling the
8 Widgery Inquiry that you saw nobody throwing bombs at
9 the rubble barricade and nobody throwing stones?
10 A. Yes, sir. At the stage that that was at, probably.
11 Q. The question you were asked towards the top of the page
12 was:
13 "Question: You did not see anyone throwing bombs
14 that day?"
15 A. No, and probably that would be the truth on that page.
16 Q. Should we go by what you told Lord Widgery rather than
17 by your recollection 30 years later?
18 A. 30 years later you could get distorted. As I say again,
19 sir, we looked -- the television was showing so much,
20 you know, from time to time and if you seen it three or
21 four times, you would not see on the last time what you
22 see on the first time.
23 Q. Let us go to B68.003, paragraph 11, where you begin to
24 describe the incident involving the first gunman. You
25 say:
1 "I can now only vaguely recall the incident
2 involving the first gunman I saw. I recall seeing the
3 dark shadow of a person in a long coat appear either
4 from behind a corner of a building or from behind
5 a door. I am not now certain where exactly I saw the
6 figure appear. It may have been at point C at the
7 southern end of Block 1 of the Rossville Flats or
8 further south towards Joseph Place at point D on the
9 map. The scale looks very different now from how
10 I remember it."
11 Can you help as to this: in what way did the scale
12 look different from how you remembered it?
13 A. Well, when you look at the pictures and the scale of
14 the, um, of the maps, um, that it looks very, very
15 distant, but the actual area was very close and I would
16 say, um, if it was, um, called in military terms it
17 would be, and the battle was going on, it would be close
18 quarter battle.
19 Q. What is your impression now of the sort of distance from
20 your position to where the gunman was?
21 A. It would not have been 100 metres, sir. It would not
22 have been 100 metres and that is, you know, sort of off
23 the top of me head, you know, I cannot actually
24 remember.
25 Q. Could we have on the screen P4, please. This is
1 a photograph, we can see it is marked "Soldier C" in the
2 top right-hand corner.
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. That was marked up in 1972 to show the trajectories of
5 the shots that you fired.
6 A. Yes, sir.
7 Q. Do you remember the circumstances in which this map was
8 marked up?
9 A. I cannot remember the circumstances, no, sir.
10 Q. Is it likely that if it was marked up at the time with
11 your assistance, then it was at least an approximately
12 accurate indication --
13 A. Oh, it was an accurate indication. With the detail,
14 sir, I would not be, I could not tell you which one --
15 which shot was fired first or the actual numbers of
16 shots fired at the targets and -- because everything was
17 happening so quickly. It was, um -- and it was all over
18 in, you know, I cannot tell you how many seconds, but it
19 did go into minutes.
20 Q. It is clear enough from what you said at the time that
21 you were indicating that the first gunman you saw was
22 somewhere approximately in the area, maybe not
23 precisely, but approximately in the area I am now
24 indicating, just by the figure 2 which was an indication
25 that you had fired a total of two shots at that
1 individual?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. If we go back to your statement at paragraph 11, B68.3,
4 you refer to a photograph which shows the line of vision
5 that you would have had. Then you say:
6 "The person seemed to be holding what I thought was
7 a Kalashnikov rifle. I cannot describe the person any
8 further; possibly this is because I was more focused on
9 the weapon because that is where the danger lay.
10 I cannot actually now recall seeing the weapon being
11 fired but I definitely can visualise the person holding
12 the weapon and lifting the gun slowly. I cannot now
13 recall firing my weapon and if so, whether I hit the
14 gunman. Petrol bombs and stones were being thrown. If
15 I did fire, it is because the man must have fired his
16 weapon. If he had not fired his weapon, I would not
17 have fired my weapon. I would not have shot someone
18 just because he was carrying a gun."
19 When you first saw this man, is it right that you
20 were at the top of the ramp that we saw in the virtual
21 reality photographs?
22 A. Yes, I was, sir.
23 Q. And when you first saw the gunman, can you remember
24 whether you were standing up or in some other position?
25 A. I cannot recall. It could have been -- I could have got
1 there, laid down, kneeled and stood up. You know, the
2 actual positions or sequence of positions, I cannot,
3 I cannot remember.
4 Q. Can you remember when you first saw the man, was he
5 standing up or was he in some other position?
6 A. He would have been standing up because his coat come --
7 I could see a coat, a dark coat come round before the --
8 this is in my recollection now, right and I am trying to
9 put myself into the position where I was looking at that
10 day and I can see in my mind's eye, the coat coming
11 round and then I can see the weapon coming up and I
12 cannot see now the, um, the magazine, right, but at that
13 time it must have gone into my mind as the weapon that
14 I said or a weapon of the same, um, you know, calibre or
15 whatever you say, the same look.
16 Q. Can you remember which hand he was holding the weapon
17 in?
18 A. Well, I would say it would have been his right hand.
19 Q. When you saw him lift the gun slowly, can you remember
20 in what direction it was pointing?
21 A. Well, it was definitely coming up towards where -- I am
22 not saying it was going to come up to me or I cannot
23 remember where it had actually gone, but it was into the
24 aim position.
25 Q. Did he bring the gun right up into his shoulder or not
1 that far?
2 A. Sir, when you are looking at something like this, how
3 can I say and go back -- I cannot remember at the time,
4 but if somebody was standing in the corner on the other
5 side of this room and they come round the corner and all
6 of a sudden you felt threatened that the weapon --
7 a weapon was coming up to your, um -- to make you
8 a target and you are lifting your weapon up to make them
9 a target so that you can get the, um, advantage of what
10 was going on, then that would be, as far as I could give
11 you the detail of what happened at that time this day,
12 today.
13 Q. Are you in any doubt at all that the object that he had
14 in his hand was a firearm?
15 A. At that time, sir, no, it was definitely a weapon.
16 Q. Are you in any doubt now?
17 A. Sir, I am not in no doubt, but other things that
18 happened directly after that, that incident, um, would
19 have, um, wiped some of the memory out of what had
20 happened at that time because of something else
21 happening so quickly after.
22 Q. B68.012, please. This is the statement that you made to
23 the Royal Military Police in the early hours of the
24 morning on 31st January 1972. If we look at the final
25 paragraph, you say this:
1 "I moved on to the veranda of the maisonettes and
2 located myself [at a particular grid reference] and
3 continued my observations. I saw at an end flat of
4 Rossville Flats on the ground floor, and in an opening,
5 a male person wearing a dark coat. He was observing the
6 troops in Rossville Street. I then heard the sound of
7 a shot."
8 Pausing there, what you appear to be saying there is
9 that you saw the man first?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. And then you heard the shot?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. Can you remember whether that is right or not?
14 A. As I say, sir, to have the advantage, to pull a weapon
15 up, your sight is -- you are looking through a little
16 hole like that on a sight,(indicating). When you are
17 lining your weapon up and you are doing it very quickly,
18 you are aiming it in that position, so you are really
19 only looking one eye and focusing at the danger that is
20 in front of you.
21 So I cannot, um, go back and see through that sight
22 at this moment in time, but at that time if what I said
23 there would have been the truth, what I knew then.
24 Q. Let us go on to the top of the next page. You have
25 spoken of seeing him and hearing the shot and then you
1 say:
2 "The man disappeared. The shot came from his
3 location. I saw him with a long stick-like object which
4 he put into the aim position. I cocked my weapon. The
5 man reappeared. I fired two, 7.62 rounds at this
6 gunman. The gunman disappeared from sight. I think
7 that I may have hit him with my second shot" and you
8 give the grid reference to indicate his position.
9 Can you help about this, and please say if you just
10 cannot remember, did you see the weapon before the man
11 disappeared or did you only see the weapon after he had
12 disappeared and then reappeared?
13 A. No, I would say I see the weapon when he appeared,
14 because I have still got an image in my mind of what
15 happened on that day. I am finding it hard to detail
16 again, you know, I know I said it once but 30 years down
17 the line and going through this again, the detail is
18 very, very, um, very vague and all that I can say is, if
19 I was in the same position, because once you have been
20 taught to be a soldier, then it ain't something that you
21 lose. All right, you might lose the -- which is what
22 I have said, the sound of the cracks and knowing what
23 weapons are being fired because time goes by and you
24 cannot do it, but I can still remember the image of the
25 man coming round with the coat, like the Crombie coat
1 on, and the weapon coming out of the coat as if it was
2 being hid under the coat.
3 This is what I recollect now. At that time it was
4 probably -- where it happened so quickly, you know, it
5 might be a different case. But I am trying to go back
6 and help the Tribunal and remember every single point
7 that I can do and detail it as best I can.
8 Q. Is it right to say this: once you had seen the weapon in
9 his hand --
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. -- you would have watched him like a hawk; would you
12 not?
13 A. (Laughing) You would not have took your eye off the
14 ball, put it that way.
15 Q. So, if he fired a shot --
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. -- you would have seen it once you had noticed the
18 weapon?
19 A. Yes. I am saying yes. For me to have fired at that,
20 I would have seen the shot, even though I cannot
21 remember seeing a flash or a jerk back or something like
22 that, I, I would say, at this moment in time, yes, he
23 did fire a shot.
24 Q. You do not actually say anywhere in this statement we
25 are looking at now that you saw him fire a shot. You
1 say that you saw him with a rifle or an object that he
2 put into the aim position and you say that you heard
3 a shot, but you do not say that you saw him fire a shot.
4 A. And I would say that that would be because of something
5 happening directly after -- what you got to thing of,
6 these are things going on in your mind that you do not
7 have time to think about, you have either got to make
8 a decision or not, and to make a decision is a fraction
9 of a second, the smallest amount of time you could ever
10 get and something happening directly after this would
11 take your attention away from that.
12 I am trying to put myself back into the position
13 where I was at that time. I do not mean the kneeling
14 position, standing position, I mean the actual position
15 of the seriousness of what was going on that day.
16 Q. Let us look, then, at what you said in March 1972,
17 B68.016, paragraph 9, please, where you say:
18 "As I watched the Rossville building I saw a man.
19 What caught my attention was the sound of a shot. The
20 man was at the far end of Block 1 and I think he had
21 come out of an opening at the end of the building or
22 round the corner. He was in the aim position and
23 I could see what looked like a weapon in his hands.
24 I could distinguish the shape of the magazine and think
25 it was a Kalashnikov or a weapon of that kind. My
1 weapon was already cocked and I came into the aim.
2 Before I could get a shot at him he went back."
3 Do you see in this statement you are saying that the
4 sound of a shot caught your attention and then you saw
5 the man.
6 A. Yes. I tell you what, that would have been exactly what
7 happened. Even though I cannot remember the sound of
8 the shot now or seeing the shot fired, that paragraph
9 there, because I have not read it before, has come back
10 to me in my mind as what I had seen at that precise
11 time.
12 Q. Then you go on:
13 "Then he came out a second time. I took aim at him
14 but did not immediately fire. Then he fired two shots
15 and I fired two rounds at him."
16 In this statement you are saying that the man fired
17 two shots; do you see that?
18 A. Yes, yes.
19 Q. But in the statement that you had made immediately after
20 the event to the Royal Military Police, you did not say
21 that he had fired two shots. Can you explain why that
22 was?
23 A. Well, sir, I cannot remember the detail again, as I say,
24 back and probably when we done this, um, um statement
25 here, and again the time lapse between that statement
1 and what had gone on at the Tribunal, you know, I,
2 I would say this would be the one that would be the
3 nearest to the truth than the one probably that went on
4 to the next one.
5 Q. Why would you have had a better memory on 5th March than
6 you had on 31st January?
7 A. Well, sir, so that would only be three months down the
8 line or approximately. I would not have had a better
9 memory, but because of the situation you was in, you was
10 focused. You -- your mind would be, um -- when you go,
11 like today, you come here, you are nervous, your mind is
12 on this, but when you are in a life-threatening
13 situation, it is completely different. You know exactly
14 what you should be doing because you have been trained
15 to do it.
16 With this it is not as, the seriousness of this is,
17 is the utmost thing what we are here for today, but what
18 I am trying to say to you is going back into a volatile
19 situation, a dangerous situation, you do not think the
20 same here today as what you do at that time and I would
21 say that what I writ down on my very first statement was
22 the actual truth of what had happened that day.
23 Q. This is not your very first statement, the one we are
24 looking at at the moment.
25 A. Let us go back to the first statement and you will find
1 out that --
2 Q. Let us do that, B68.012. We looked at the passage at
3 the foot of the page, where you described seeing the man
4 and hearing the sound of a shot; do you see that?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Then over the page we see again the passage: the man
7 disappeared and then he reappeared?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. "I fired two, 7.62 rounds aimed shots at this gunman."
10 A. That is the main point that I would say that happened,
11 the two shots and that would be the point of the
12 seriousness it would have happened.
13 Q. Was it not also rather important to say, if it was the
14 truth, that this man had fired two shots himself just
15 before you shot him?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. Why did you not say it if that was the truth?
18 A. Well, I, I cannot go back and, you know, sort of say,
19 I did not say it for any reason, but the point is
20 I fired the two shots and I do not know, you know, sort
21 of, my mind now is blurred to that situation, but I can
22 honestly say that that man come round the corner with a
23 gun and what we are trying to do is detail a second and
24 if we could write a full paragraph on what happens in
25 less than a second, then we could probably get it, but
1 my mind would not, would not go back that far or
2 remember all that.
3 Q. May we look now at P264. Do you recognise that as
4 a photograph of the ramp at the top of which you were
5 positioned?
6 A. Yes, I do, yes.
7 Q. Is it right that you were on the flat deck somewhere
8 just before the ramp begins to descend?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Can you remember whether you were right in the middle of
11 the ramp or tucked up against the wall on one side or
12 the other?
13 A. I cannot remember this. I remember at the Tribunal --
14 what I can remember about this part we are going through
15 now is, um, the, I do not know who he would be, but he
16 was somebody who was, you know, doing the same job as
17 you probably, and he was, he made a bit of a fuss about,
18 you know, that I could not have seen this, um, the
19 trajectory of where this person was standing, but what
20 they made is -- what I could not explain to him is I did
21 not know whether I was lying, kneeling, standing,
22 crouching or in what position I was.
23 Q. We will look at that in just a moment. Let us look at
24 another photograph, P271. This is looking the other
25 way, from the top of the ramp down; do you see?
1 A. Yes, sir.
2 Q. If we look at the line of the skirting on the left, we
3 can see that this is just at the very top of the ramp
4 before it begins to go down.
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. So you must have been somewhere very close to the
7 position that the photographer was in when he took this
8 picture; is that not right?
9 A. Yes, I would have been.
10 Q. If we look at B68.006, paragraph 43, you are referring
11 to what happened at the Widgery Inquiry. You say:
12 "At page 68 Mr Hill asked me whether I had been
13 standing or lying on the ground on the ramp. At the
14 time I probably did not explain myself very well.
15 I probably lay down during the sound of incoming fire
16 and then rose to a standing position when I was ready to
17 shoot back. To get from a lying to a standing position,
18 I had to kneel. He was trying to make out that my
19 evidence was unreliable and that I was a liar. It is
20 only now that I realise what he was trying to do."
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. If we can look, please, at the evidence that you gave to
23 Lord Widgery, B68.025, we can see the questions that
24 Mr Hill asked you. He asked you, first of all:
25 "Question: Were you standing or lying or what was
1 your position on the ramp?
2 "Answer: I was lying, sir.
3 "Question: On what?
4 "Answer: On the floor of the ramp."
5 Then he established that you were up at the top of
6 the ramp and asked a rather quaint question about ladies
7 wheeling a pram and Lord Widgery asked:
8 "LORD WIDGERY: At the top?
9 "Answer: Yes.
10 "MR HILL: Do I understand that that is a part where
11 ladies might wheel a pram?
12 "Answer: Yes."
13 Are you now saying that when you gave those answers,
14 you did not explain yourself clearly enough and that in
15 fact there came a point when you stood up?
16 A. Well, for me to, to fire at the target that I was
17 firing, I would have to have been, not lying on the
18 floor as you can see. You cannot get the trajectory now
19 unless you was lying on the other side of the walkway
20 and you could see over there. But I cannot exactly
21 detail that part again, sir.
22 Q. Can you remember whether you did stand up for a bit and
23 then go down again or whether you were standing up for
24 some length of time or has it just gone from your mind?
25 A. Well, put it this way, if I was going there now, I would
1 have had to have been standing up at one time because
2 I probably run to the end of that, the end of that
3 alleyway to reach the top of the, um, the ramp. I do
4 not know -- now I do not know whether I was fired,
5 ducked down behind the wall, fired on, ducked down
6 behind the wall. The sequences, I cannot remember at
7 this time. Everything went to quick, everything
8 happened so fast.
9 Q. You see, the problem is this; if we look at B68.28, we
10 can see some more answers that you gave towards the foot
11 of the page at letters E to G. Lord Widgery asked you:
12 "LORD WIDGERY: On the face of it, if you are
13 surrounded by a three-foot wall and you are lying down,
14 you cannot see or shoot over the wall?
15 "Answer: Yes, but I was lying on this side of the
16 balcony which is in, say, this side. The wall comes
17 down and it gives me a clear view across to the flats.
18 "Question: You are saying that you are lying here
19 on the level, you have got a three-foot wall on either
20 side of you, but the wall goes down with the ramp so
21 that you can fire across it like that? Is that it?
22 "Answer: Yes."
23 Is it not clear that you were telling Lord Widgery
24 at that stage that you were lying down when you opened
25 fire and that you had a clear view across to the flats
1 because of the way that the wall descended with the
2 ramp?
3 A. Right, sir, go through that again because, hold it,
4 there is -- say that exactly how you said it just then,
5 sir, please.
6 Q. Is it not clear from these answers that what you were
7 telling Lord Widgery is that you were lying down when
8 you opened fire and that you had a clear view across to
9 the flats because of the way that the wall beside you
10 descended with the ramp?
11 A. Yes, right, now then --
12 Q. First of all, do you understand the question?
13 A. I do understand the question, but there is a little bit
14 in the middle that I do not and I am trying to get my
15 mind round it so I can answer your question, sir.
16 Q. Take your time because it is quite important.
17 A. He you see, what it is, I am going back to what I have
18 not read before. (Pause). Right, if you dissect that,
19 sir, I have not told -- I have not said anybody in that
20 bit there that I fired in the lying position. I was
21 asked if I could see or shoot from that position. I was
22 not, I cannot remember the detail, but I am trying to go
23 through the words where it says that I said I was lying
24 down and shooting, but I cannot remember the detail
25 about it, you have got to remember this, but I am trying
1 to, you know, sort of help the Tribunal the best way
2 I can by trying to answer these questions, you know,
3 that are a bit vague in my mind.
4 Q. Let us look at another bit that might help you in the
5 transcript, which are the questions that you were asked
6 by counsel for the Ministry of Defence, B68.022. At the
7 foot of the page, please, letters F to G, you were asked
8 about the man with the Kalashnikov or whatever it was.
9 Right at the foot of the page the question was:
10 "Question: What did you do?
11 "Answer: He came out, fired another two shots.
12 That is when I fired.
13 [Over the page, please.]
14 "Question: He came out and he fired a couple of
15 shots?
16 "Answer: Yes.
17 "Question: And you fired?
18 "Answer: Yes.
19 "Question: Were you standing or kneeling or what?
20 "Answer: I was laying, sir."
21 Is that not a clear answer that you were lying down
22 when you fired the shots?
23 A. In that scenario, yes, and possibly that was the right
24 answer to give at the time because that is how
25 I remembered it at the time, but I definitely did fire
1 two shots after he, you know. I cannot remember him
2 firing the shots at me now, but I would say that would,
3 um, you know the lying down bit or the kneeling down,
4 the point is I did fire and I was fired upon.
5 Q. Let us look again at the photograph at P271. We have
6 agreed, I think, that you must have been somewhere very
7 close to where the photographer was when he took this
8 picture, whether you were standing up, lying down or
9 whatever it was.
10 A. Yes, I was right in this spot. There is a wall that
11 comes up there, so I would have used that wall for a bit
12 of cover. There were some flats over there. So at some
13 stage I was lying down. Some stage I was crouching.
14 Some stage I was kneeling and some stage I would
15 possibly be standing --
16 Q. When you say that you were using one of the walls as
17 cover, were you using the wall on the left or the wall
18 on the right?
19 A. Well, both walls in a way because I was aware of, of
20 other flats on this side. So I would have been using
21 both walls for cover, but the detail on it now is
22 completely, you know, if it happened 10 minutes ago
23 I could remember the detail, but, you know, a long
24 time ...
25 Q. I want to proceed for the moment on the assumption that
1 you were lying on the ground as you told Lord Widgery.
2 A. Yes, sir.
3 Q. If you were lying on the ground, you cannot have been
4 any higher up than the photographer was when he took the
5 picture.
6 A. Your head would probably be about 1, 2, 3, say the
7 fourth brick up because he has laid down on the floor
8 and, um, done his -- put his camera along the floor as
9 you can see there, but if you was laying down, you would
10 probably be up before them bricks, that would only be --
11 them three bricks would be, say, from that point to that
12 point would be about a foot. So at this moment in time
13 I cannot remember whether I fired them shots lying down,
14 kneeling or standing.
15 Q. If you were lying down, it must be right, must it not,
16 that the view you would have had would have been very
17 similar to the view that is shown in this photograph?
18 A. Well, I would say now that this wall would probably be
19 down, but I cannot remember, sir, you know. You are
20 asking me to remember something that was a long time ago
21 that, you know is completely not blank in me mind, the
22 only time I remember it is because when I was in the
23 Widgery Tribunal the man made a fuss of it then.
24 Q. I am only just at the minute asking you to agree almost
25 as a matter of common sense, that if you were lying
1 down --
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. -- the view you had must have been very similar to the
4 view that we see in this photograph.
5 A. No, sir, I would not say that because we are looking at
6 this from a ground level, where the man has put his
7 camera on the ground and took the picture across there.
8 I am saying somebody's head would be up on the
9 right-hand side and could possibly have seen that part
10 of the building if the trajectory was, was going up
11 there and going wider towards the other side of the
12 wall. I do not think we are getting the full, true
13 picture out of that photo.
14 Now, I am not saying that I fired the actual, the
15 actual rounds from there, whether I would be kneeling,
16 standing or lying, but I definitely fired the two
17 rounds, you know.
18 Q. Can you actually remember now how much you could see of
19 the area around Block 1 of the Rossville Flats and
20 Joseph Place when you fired your shots?
21 A. Well, if anybody had ever been in the position like it,
22 there is lots of things that you got to be aware of and
23 to, to keep them as a photographic memory in your mind
24 is absolutely impossible. You know, there was so much
25 going on, you could not, you know, and because there was
1 so much you can only define the most serious things that
2 happened, the life threatening things, not the throwing
3 of petrol bombs or nail bombs or missiles, you just had
4 to be on the ball for your life.
5 Q. Could we keep this photograph on the screen, please, and
6 put beside it P4. The photograph on the right which we
7 have looked at before is the one that shows the
8 trajectories of the shots that you fired?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. I want now to move on to the second gunman that you
11 engaged. We can see the line of fire that is marked,
12 ending up at a position in the block of the
13 Rossville Flats that was across the street from you.
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. You see where I am pointing?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. How confident can you be about the accuracy of the
18 position that is indicated there, in terms of where the
19 shots ended up?
20 A. 30 years later very hard, you know, sort of, um, my, um
21 memory would be of that building going back on to the
22 wasteground now, you know, sort of, but the distance was
23 not, was not that far. It looks quite a long way from
24 where you look at where I was kneeling or lying or
25 standing to the window. That would not have been
1 75 yards, but it looks a lot longer there.
2 The only reason I know that is because when I looked
3 at this and I see the map, the map was scaled so that is
4 how I found out the distances because I was trying to
5 get it back into my mind, the actual -- what had gone on
6 on the day and it was a bit distorted because it looked,
7 the distances did not look the same.
8 Q. Can you remember whether at the time you were confident
9 in being able to identify a particular window in that
10 block or was it just an approximation of where you
11 thought the window was?
12 A. From my memory now, it would have been the window, it
13 would not have been an approximate window, it would have
14 been the window that I was looking at.
15 Q. It appears from the photograph that was marked up that
16 the position you were indicating was a flat on the third
17 floor of the block, you can just see the first floor,
18 second floor, third floor?
19 A. I see that, sir, yes.
20 Q. A position on the third floor slightly to the north of
21 the midpoint of the block, this is the north end. So
22 slightly to the north of the midpoint?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. Looking at the photograph on the left of the screen, is
25 it not clear again that if you were lying down -- and we
1 have heard your evidence about whether you were or
2 not -- you could not possibly have seen into a window on
3 the third floor somewhere to the north of the midpoint
4 of that block.
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Do you agree with that?
7 A. Yes, if you was lying down you could not, there is no
8 way. Not in the windows, I would beg to differ on the
9 first one, but on the second one, definitely no way.
10 Q. Can you now remember at all whether you were in fact
11 standing up or lying down or kneeling or crouching or
12 what when you engaged the second gunman?
13 A. No, I cannot exactly remember, but I would say the
14 second gunman I would have to have been kneeling,
15 standing, and I would have been against this wall, here,
16 with the door behind me.
17 Q. Sorry, are you indicating the wall on the left or the
18 right of the picture?
19 A. Yes, I would say if it was now and we was under fire
20 that is exactly where I would be, right against this --
21 not the wall on the right-hand side, the wall on the
22 left-hand side and just behind where that photo is being
23 shown, there is a wall that goes up to the roof. So
24 I probably would have been taking cover behind that
25 wall.
1 Q. B68.3, please, paragraphs 13 to 15. You say here that
2 you can recall the second incident more clearly than the
3 first?
4 A. Yes, because it happened quickly after.
5 Q. Something caught your attention, you say, either the
6 glint of a window opening in the sunlight or the flash
7 of a gun and you saw a long-haired person holding
8 a pistol in his or her left hand at a window and then,
9 in paragraph 14, in the second sentence you say:
10 "I could see the person's wrist jerking as the
11 pistol recoiled. The shooter was probably holding
12 either a 9mm or a Luger pistol and seemed to be firing
13 indiscriminately with his left hand. He must have
14 emptied his magazine and fired about 9 to 12 shots
15 although I cannot recall the actual number of rounds he
16 fired. He seemed to be firing towards other soldiers
17 positioned at the northern end of Rossville Street."
18 If you can, I would like you to be careful to
19 distinguish what you can remember and what you cannot.
20 A. Yes, sir.
21 Q. Can you in fact remember seeing this man fire several
22 shots with his pistol?
23 A. I can remember now the recoil of the wrist and I cannot
24 remember if it was a man or a woman. So we are
25 surmising it is a man, it could have been a woman, from
1 what I could see from the actual position I was in.
2 Q. Can you remember, judging as you were from the recoil,
3 whether you had the impression that this man or woman
4 had fired as many as nine to 12 shots?
5 A. There was so much going on I cannot actually put
6 a number on the shots fired at all. You know, when I go
7 back I am trying to put myself in the situation now and,
8 no, all that I can actually remember is the recoil and
9 the arm holding the window open.
10 Q. Is it possible that it was not as many as 9 to 12 shots?
11 A. Possibly, yes.
12 Q. Let us go on to paragraph 15, where you say that you
13 fired one shot which hit the wall and then a further two
14 rounds which had the effect of stopping the gunman
15 firing. Can you now remember whether you hit the gunman
16 or the gunwoman or not?
17 A. The body -- I cannot remember now, you know, sort of.
18 I can only remember, you know, what I have gone over in
19 the statement that I have done, I can remember going
20 back, you know, I cannot remember seeing anybody, um,
21 you know, anything -- no blood or anything like that,
22 you know, or anything to distinguish that the target had
23 been hit.
24 Q. If you had hit somebody and if you believed at the time
25 that you had either wounded or possibly even killed
1 someone, is that something that would stick in your
2 memory, do you think?
3 A. Oh, most certainly, but if you are firing a weapon, you
4 do not -- you cannot actually see the person that you
5 hit because, by the time your eye comes away from that
6 sight, if the bullet has gone on and it has hit
7 somebody, you would not have seen it anyhow. So it is
8 a bit of a -- I could not tell whether I had hit him or
9 not.
10 Q. You might have seen --
11 A. A jerk or something.
12 Q. -- someone jerk back and fall to the floor, or something
13 like that?
14 A. I did not see nobody fall to the floor but they might
15 have jerked back in the way, to get out of the way of
16 the bullet or have been hit.
17 Q. Would you remember seeing whether any of the glass in
18 the window was broken?
19 A. I cannot remember that. I do remember it now because
20 I have seen a picture of the, the hole in the window.
21 But I cannot go back at the time.
22 I tell you what I can remember, I can remember the
23 dust coming off of the wall when the first shot hit the
24 wall.
25 Q. Would it be more accurate to say that you have seen
1 a picture of a hole in a window?
2 A. In a window, yes.
3 Q. Were you able to tell by anything in the photograph
4 whether that was the window in question?
5 A. Oh, no, not by that photograph, no.
6 Q. Let us look next, please, at B68.013, part of your
7 statement to the Military Police. Your description of
8 this incident is as follows:
9 "I continued observations and saw on the third
10 storey at the fourth window to the right, where I stood
11 and [at a particular grid reference] a window being
12 opened. This caught my attention.
13 "I then heard a shot fired. I saw the flash of
14 a weapon being fired from inside the room. I saw a male
15 person holding a pistol in his left hand. I believe
16 that he fired it at the troops in Rossville Street.
17 "I fired one, 7.62 round aimed shot at the gunman.
18 This round missed. I saw it strike the wall outside.
19 "I was joined by D of my unit. I informed him of
20 where I had fired. We kept observations together on the
21 window.
22 "I saw the gunman reappear, he fired two shots at
23 the troops in Rossville Street. I fired two, 7.62
24 rounds aimed shots at the gunman. He appeared to be
25 thrown backwards and disappeared out of sight. When
1 I fired D also fired one, 7.62 round at the gunman.
2 I did not see the gunman again. He was dressed in
3 a blue jumper with fairly long dark hair. I think I hit
4 him in the chest or arm."
5 A number of matters about that: first of all, do you
6 see that you speak here only of three shots being fired
7 by the gunman?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. One when he first appeared?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. And two after you had fired one shot at him?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. And he had reappeared?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. So three shots in total; is that more likely to be
16 correct than what you have put in your present
17 statement?
18 A. Yes, because your mind gets distorted. If you can go
19 back and -- if you have seen it on the television or if
20 anybody has seen this on the television, there was lots
21 of cracking and, um, you know, gunfire going on before
22 the ceasefire was ordered.
23 So it might be in my mind that that is why the shots
24 have gone up into, say, eight shots or how many shots
25 I could have possibly said.
1 Q. It appears that at the time you were able to identify
2 this as a man and, indeed, to give a description of the
3 clothing that he was wearing.
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. Would that have been accurate if you said it at the time
6 or may it be that you could not really have known, even
7 when you made this statement?
8 A. No, all that he had, I knew he had long hair and if you
9 look at the angle of where he was, he or she could have
10 had long hair. At that time fashion was in and loads of
11 people had long hair, you know, sort of, so I just did
12 not want to define whether it was a man or a woman.
13 Q. In this statement you did say it was a man?
14 A. A man, yes.
15 Q. Is that what you believed at the time?
16 A. Yes, that is what I believed at the time.
17 Q. You also say in this statement, right at the end, that
18 you think that you hit him in the chest or the arm?
19 A. Because he, he went back, yes.
20 Q. Is that what you believed at the time?
21 A. And that is what I believed at the time, yes.
22 Q. In order, that you had wounded him or maybe even killed
23 him?
24 A. No, I had stopped him firing. I did not know -- he did
25 not fire no more.
1 Q. Well, you say here "I think I hit him."
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. And that means that you think you either wounded him or
4 maybe even killed him?
5 A. Killed him, yes.
6 Q. Is that right?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. Looking back on it now, you just cannot remember whether
9 you hit him or not, is that --
10 A. I go back and say, when you fire a rifle or a weapon and
11 you are aiming at somebody, it happens so quickly and
12 you have only got the split second from your weapon,
13 your weapon cocks up when you fire so it takes your
14 direct line of sight away from where the bullet is
15 going.
16 How can I say, you know, I have never fired a weapon
17 and actually seen somebody hit as such, you know,
18 actually seen a bullet go into him and I should not
19 think anybody else has. You know, if you aim the weapon
20 and it goes that way, you know, unless somebody is
21 walking towards you or -- I cannot explain it because,
22 you know, I have not been in that situation.
23 Q. Did you think you hit the first gunman you saw?
24 A. When they disappear you think you have hit them, you
25 hope you have took them away from being a danger,
1 whether they duck back out of the way or you do hit
2 them. You do not fire a gun willy-nilly, you have got
3 to have, you have got to have a reason to fire it and
4 a target to fire it at.
5 Q. Let us look at your statement of 5th March at B68.016,
6 just dealing here with the first gunman, right at the
7 foot of the page, in paragraph 9, after referring to the
8 shots that you fired you said:
9 "The man jerked backwards and his weapon went into
10 the air as he did so. I saw him clearly at that
11 moment."
12 A. Yes, that was my, my, I can see him coming round,
13 whether it be coming round the corner on the way there
14 or on the way back is when I see the coat come round,
15 the long part of the coat which is like a cloak coming
16 round. It was either before the shot or after the shot.
17 But I cannot give you the detail on that, sir.
18 Q. Do you now have any surviving memory of that man, the
19 man with the Kalashnikov, fall backwards and his weapon
20 going up into the air after you had fired at him?
21 A. (Pause). No, I am trying me hardest, sir, and no, no,
22 I cannot, sir.
23 Q. Do you remember seeing what happened to his weapon after
24 you had fired your shots?
25 A. No, sir, no. Because the next scenario started directly
1 after that, so from one to the other it wiped out, you
2 know, anything that I would have took notice of.
3 Q. In paragraphs 10 and 11 of the statement we have on the
4 screen you go on to deal with the second gunman.
5 A. Yes, sir. What I will say, sir, everything happened so
6 quickly, you know, it is not a -- if it had -- if you
7 was in a battle for 20 minutes you could put more detail
8 on different things, but when it happened in such
9 a short time and you come under fire so quick, your mind
10 is focused on staying alive mainly.
11 Q. I follow that, but it is the position that in this
12 statement that you made in March 1972, you actually gave
13 quite a bit of detail about these incidents.
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. And I am seeking any help you can give us about how
16 accurate those details might be?
17 A. Yes, I will, sir, as much as I can remember it, you can
18 take me back and I will tell you everything that I know
19 now.
20 Q. Thank you. In these paragraphs you are describing the
21 second incident. You say:
22 "As I continued observation I saw the flash of
23 a window being opened in Block 1, in the position shown
24 approximately on the photograph and marked 3. The
25 window was pivoted upwards as it opened. I saw a man
1 holding the window open with his right hand. He placed
2 his left forearm across his right arm and appeared to me
3 to be aiming a pistol held in his left hand. I heard
4 a shot being fired and corresponding with that shot
5 I saw his hand kick as if he had just fired. I could
6 not at that stage distinguish the weapon very clearly
7 and I did not see a muzzle flash. I am however quite
8 certain that he was not holding a camera, not even the
9 kind of camera that has a pistol grip. I fired one
10 round at the man with the pistol, this shot hit the wall
11 just above the top right-hand corner of the window,
12 I remember seeing a puff of dust from the masonry.
13 After I had fired the gunman vanished from sight and
14 I think the window closed some way but not completely.
15 "11. Corporal D came up to me and I told him what
16 I had been firing at. He watched the window with me.
17 I saw the window move again. I am sure it was the same
18 window. The window opened and I saw the gunman again.
19 I immediately aimed and fired at him and as I did so he
20 fired two quick shots himself. My first round went
21 through the window missing the gunman. I fired again
22 and this time I think I hit him in the chest or arm.
23 The gunman was standing partly behind the half-open
24 pivot window and his left side was behind the glass.
25 I saw a hole in the glass in the area behind which his
1 left arm or chest would have been and I think my bullet
2 went through the glass and hit him in this area."
3 Once again, it is clear, is it not, that you were
4 saying that this man had fired three shots and only
5 three shots with his pistol while you were observing
6 him?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. Do you remain sure that it was a pistol and not a camera
9 or some other harmless object?
10 A. No, sir, it was definitely a pistol.
11 Q. Once again you said in this statement that you thought
12 you had hit him in the chest or the arm. So would that
13 have been what you believed in March 1972?
14 A. At that time, yes, it would have been, sir.
15 Q. Do you see the reference right at the end to having seen
16 a hole in the glass?
17 A. Yes, yes, sir.
18 Q. Does that bring back any recollection of seeing
19 a smashed window or a broken window?
20 A. No, only from the picture I see the, the hole in the
21 window, that is -- I have no memory of that at all, sir,
22 only from the picture.
23 Q. Can we look at B68.025, please, again part of your
24 evidence to Lord Widgery where at letter B, you were
25 asked the question:
1 "Question: Did you see any effect on the glass from
2 your shots?
3 "Answer: Yes, I saw two holes."
4 Can you help us as to whether at the time you
5 believed you had seen one hole or two?
6 A. I could not tell you now, sir.
7 Q. Can we go back to B68.013, please. As we have already
8 seen, in your statement to the Military Police you gave
9 quite a precise indication of the position of the window
10 where this person with the pistol was located. You
11 indicated it was the third storey, fourth window to the
12 right.
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. And that corresponds precisely with what is marked on
15 the photograph?
16 A. Yes, sir.
17 Q. You told the Tribunal a little earlier this morning that
18 you thought that that would have been a precise
19 indication of the window at which you fired; is that not
20 right?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. Not just an approximation?
23 A. No, I would say it was precise where the target was
24 firing from.
25 Q. The flat in question, fourth to the right on the third
1 floor, was in fact number 8 Garvan Place and the lady
2 who lived there was a housekeeper named
3 Eileen Gallagher. She is now dead, but at the time she
4 made a statement in which she said that she had been at
5 home that afternoon with visitors and she described
6 various things that she had seen from her window, but
7 she said nothing about any shots being fired at the
8 window or about any glass breaking and certainly nothing
9 about anyone in the flat being wounded.
10 Is it possible, do you think, that you were simply
11 wrong in identifying that particular flat as being the
12 one at which you fired?
13 A. (Pause). Can I go back to the photo then?
14 Q. Yes. P4, please.
15 A. I would say most definitely not, it was not fired at the
16 wrong ... we are trying to determine here the window
17 that the shots went through, are we not?
18 Q. Yes. What I am really asking you is whether you can be
19 confident that the position marked on this photograph
20 back in 1972 was precisely accurate or whether it was
21 just a general indication of approximately where the
22 window was?
23 A. Well, sir, 30 years later I am, I would say that, being
24 a younger man then, my mind would have been, that is to
25 say again, on the ball and I would say that that was
1 correct, true and a positive target, sir.
2 Q. It is a large block of flats with a large number of
3 windows in it?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. You have said a number of times that everything happened
6 very quickly and it was a tense and a volatile
7 situation; is that not right?
8 A. Yes, yes.
9 Q. Did you really have time to make a mental note of
10 precisely which window it was?
11 A. I reiterate on what I was saying before: when you come
12 under fire your mind all of a sudden, you are focused,
13 you are, you are like a robot. As I say, you would --
14 everything that was in your mind would be on staying
15 alive, just to protect yourself and your fellow
16 soldiers, your fellow people that are -- and what I can
17 say to you there is that there would not have been
18 a mistake made at that time because what we are trained
19 to do was to, um, be positive and, um, professional and
20 precise.
21 So I would say that that information that was given
22 in 1972 would be the more accurate, I would say, you
23 know, I am talking about 1972 in the January and
24 the March, even though there might be some slight
25 discrepancies, the, the basically it was the truth that
1 come out in them two scenarios and I am only trying to
2 help 30 years later on, to reiterate what I said what
3 happened that day.
4 Q. Next can we go to B68.4, please, paragraph 20. You
5 refer there to the order that was given by Major Loden
6 to cease fire which you heard and you say "I had stopped
7 firing by that stage."
8 Are you quite clear that all the shots that you
9 fired were fired before that order was given?
10 A. Oh, yes, sir, every one of them.
11 Q. Can you remember what happened after you withdrew from
12 your position on the ramp?
13 A. Um, I am trying to go back now, sir, to after the, after
14 the event. We are coming out of a danger zone now. I
15 am trying to think, you know, what would have been in me
16 mind. I cannot actually remember what we did do after,
17 um, after the ceasefire, you know, obviously we went
18 back down the balcony, still aware of, um -- gunfire
19 could come, but once we hear the "cease fire", that was
20 the order to stop firing and the next thing it would
21 have been retreat.
22 So it would have gone in in the same stage that you
23 would have been taught it.
24 Q. Did there come a point when someone -- do not mention
25 anyone by name, please -- asked you to say how many
1 rounds you had fired?
2 A. I was asked that question and I can remember the
3 question being asked to me now, even though I have not
4 read or anything on there and even though I know that
5 I fired five shots on that day, is -- I think it was
6 five shots, was it -- I can remember somebody asking us
7 how many shots we had fired.
8 Q. Without mentioning the person's name, can you just say
9 yes or no: do you remember who it was who asked you that
10 question?
11 A. No, sir, I cannot say as I know who that was.
12 Q. Do you remember where you were when you were asked that
13 question?
14 A. That question would have been asked a few times so I am
15 not quite sure, you know, I am only trying to go back
16 and try to remember exactly the stages where we would
17 have come back and, you know, we would have, um, had
18 a debrief and everything and everything would have come
19 out then, but I cannot remember the first time if -- who
20 asked us how many shots we had fired.
21 Q. Could we have on the screen, please, page B1982. This
22 is part of a statement that was made to the Royal
23 Military Police on 5th February by the officer
24 commanding Guinness Force. He says, just where my blue
25 arrow is:
1 "When Guinness Force returned to the harbour area in
2 Clarence Avenue, I immediately ordered an ammunition
3 check and preliminary questioned all those who had fired
4 their weapons. Guinness Force fired 14, 7.62 rounds and
5 two rubber bullets. The 7.62 rounds were fired as
6 follows:"
7 And one of the soldiers listed is yourself,
8 Soldier C, and it gives details of the rounds that you
9 fired?
10 A. Yes, sir.
11 Q. Looking at that, does that help you to remember the
12 circumstances in which you were asked to explain --
13 A. No, I still cannot remember who asked us, sir, no.
14 Q. Do you remember Major Loden, he is one officer whose
15 name we can use?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. Do you remember whether you were ever asked to give an
18 account either to him or to somebody else on his behalf
19 concerning the number of rounds that you had expended
20 that day?
21 A. I cannot remember it, but it would have definitely come
22 up, you know, there was very -- whatever rounds you
23 signed out, you had to sign back in, you know, you was
24 not just given, given weapons or ammunition willy-nilly,
25 it was, um, everything had to be accounted for, sir.
1 Q. In just a moment I am going to send you the name of
2 another soldier and once again, please do not say his
3 name, but just read it to yourself on the screen to your
4 right, please. Do you remember that individual?
5 A. (Pause). The name I can put a, a recollection of
6 something about him, but not, um, you know, nothing
7 special; he was not, you know -- you know, going back
8 30 years is a long time so it is hard for me to remember
9 exactly anything about him.
10 Q. The soldier whose name I have sent you is someone who is
11 known in this Inquiry as INQ449. Can you remember
12 whether you were with him at any stage on Bloody Sunday?
13 A. No, no, no, sir.
14 Q. He has made a statement to this Inquiry in which he
15 names a soldier who he says was with him that day. The
16 name that he gives has the same surname as you, but he
17 gives a different first name; do you follow?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. Despite that, it does appear that he may be meaning to
20 refer to you, but he has just got your name wrong; do
21 you understand?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. I would like to show you some of what he says. In his
24 statement, because of the problem with identifying who
25 he is talking about, you, if it is you, are referred to,
1 not as Private C but as UNK541. So when we see
2 a reference to UNK541, it may be that this soldier is
3 meaning to refer to you.
4 Can we start, please, with page C449.3. I should
5 say, that this soldier was, like you, a private serving
6 at the time in the Guinness Force. He talks about going
7 in --
8 A. Excuse me, sir, can I ask one question? Who is this
9 statement made to, is this the very first statement that
10 he made when --
11 Q. No, it is the only statement that he has made, but it is
12 a statement that he made to this Inquiry --
13 A. Was there a statement taken --
14 Q. He did not make a statement at the time?
15 A. Everybody that was on, on that day had to make
16 a statement.
17 Q. Well, the fact of the matter is that no statement signed
18 by him has survived, so this is all we have.
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. It may well be that he has problems with his
21 recollections just as you and others have, but what he
22 says in paragraph 13, he has described getting into his
23 vehicle and he says:
24 " I cannot be sure where we de-bussed. I think
25 C Company were there already; we were the last to arrive
1 because we were in a soft-top lorry and needed cover
2 from the other soldiers. I de-bussed with UNK541 [that
3 possibly is you]; we were not given any specific orders
4 as we de-bussed. We kicked open the doors of the truck
5 and as we jumped out of it, I could hear people shouting
6 'gas'."
7 Then he goes on to talk about the use of respirators
8 and putting on tin hats and so on and talks about where
9 you went after that. Do I take it from what you have
10 said so far that you do not have any memory of
11 de-bussing with this particular soldier?
12 A. No, sir, nor about the gas.
13 Q. Okay. Then if we go on to the next page, he gives
14 a long description of his position and movements and so
15 on, but he is still describing events soon after
16 de-bussing. He says in paragraph 16:
17 "I then heard a single live shot followed by five
18 other live shots. I thought it was high velocity enemy
19 fire. As soon as I heard the shots, I told UNK541 to
20 take cover. UNK541 and I took cover at the northern end
21 of Rossville Street. We both got down on one knee.
22 I held my SLR in an aimed position ready to fire,
23 although I was not pointing it at anything in
24 particular. I just looked around the area and in
25 particular checked the windows on the eastern side of
1 the maisonettes at Kells Walk. I thought at the time
2 that the shots were being fired west of my position, in
3 the area to the west of Kells Walk."
4 Again, do you have any recollection of taking cover
5 with this soldier and hearing a number of high velocity
6 enemy shots?
7 A. No, sir, no.
8 Q. We can pass over paragraph 17. Paragraph 18 he says:
9 "The next thing I remember is hearing a soldier
10 shout from my right near Columbcille court 'Watch for
11 the acid and sugar from the roofs'. Civilians
12 frequently threw bottles of acid and sugar at us; the
13 sugar made the acid stick to us. I thought that someone
14 may have been hit by acid so UNK541 and I held back from
15 advancing from [the point he has mentioned] to
16 Columbcille court for a short time."
17 Do you remember hearing any warning being given
18 about acid being thrown from the roofs?
19 A. No, no, sir, no.
20 Q. In paragraph 19 he talks about men from C Company going
21 through the alleyway north of Kells Walk and it is fair
22 to say that that does not fit in with other evidence
23 before the Tribunal.
24 A. What paragraph are we looking at now?
25 Q. Sorry, paragraph 19 on the screen. He talks about
1 hearing gunfire from that area. Then he says:
2 "I was worried about going into Columbcille Court in
3 case it was an ambush. UNK541 and I stayed at point A
4 for one or two minutes."
5 When he speaks of point A, he is still talking about
6 a position close to where you de-bussed.
7 "I then relayed the message that UNK541 and I were
8 going to cover C Company at Columbcille Court. By this
9 time the organisation of companies had broken down and
10 1 Para were all in it together."
11 Does any of that make any sense to you?
12 A. No, nothing at all, sir.
13 Q. Paragraph 20, he says that he crossed Rossville Street
14 to the northern end of Kells Walk. That is the block of
15 flats where you went up the staircase.
16 A. Yes, yes.
17 Q. He says:
18 "UNK541 stopped at the northern end of
19 Kells Walk ... I told UNK541 to cover the C Company
20 patrol and I ran up the steps at the northern end of
21 Kells Walk which led to the first floor balcony.
22 [Passing over the next sentence]. I intended to observe
23 the Columbcille Court area from the balcony. I told
24 UNK541 that I would try to find an open door so that
25 I could get into one of the maisonettes to observe the
1 eastern side of Rossville Street as well, because
2 I could have called for support from there. I tried to
3 get into some of the maisonettes along the balcony but
4 the doors were closed."
5 Do you have any memory of this soldier telling you
6 to cover C Company while he ran up the steps at
7 Kells Walk?
8 A. None whatsoever, sir.
9 Q. Do you think there is any accuracy in any of this?
10 A. Well, it is a bit detailed, you know, sort of, he must
11 have a good memory to remember all them things because
12 there is no way, I have tried my hardest to remember and
13 go back and detail things like there that is on there,
14 he must have a photographic memory or he is trying to
15 make a film or something, but it is so hard to remember
16 all them things. You know, I am not saying he cannot
17 remember them all, but I just cannot, you know, it is
18 a good memory he has got.
19 Q. Let us go on to paragraph 22 to see how good it is. He
20 starts by saying:
21 "I then noticed a window opposite me in
22 Columbcille Court flash open. [He is talking about when
23 he is up on the balcony at Kells Walk.] It was difficult
24 to see through the window because the sunlight was
25 reflecting on the glass, but I saw an arm stretch out of
1 the window. At first I thought it was someone looking
2 out of the window to see what was going on but then
3 I noticed that the hand was holding a pistol. I cannot
4 remember anything now about the arm. The person holding
5 the pistol fired two shots in quick succession towards
6 the north end of Kells Walk. I am not sure who the
7 gunman was aiming at; whether the target was me or
8 C Company, but I do not think he was firing at me
9 because no shots hit the wall above my head."
10 A. Excuse me, sir, have you got a picture of where he is
11 firing from because --
12 Q. I am going to come to that. Let us look at it now. Let
13 us look at page C449.10. He is saying that he went up
14 on to the balcony at Kells Walk, just where my blue
15 arrow is; do you follow?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. Moved along the balcony and that he saw this person with
18 a pistol at a window marked Y; do you see that?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. I do not know if you have got your bearings on this
21 photograph?
22 A. Yes, I have, I know exactly where we are, yes.
23 Q. Your evidence is that you were there?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. And firing across --
1 A. That is right, yes.
2 Q. -- to Block 1 of the Rossville Flats over there?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. Clearly he is talking about a completely different
5 location --
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. -- from the one that you are talking about?
8 A. Yes, completely different.
9 Q. But apart from the location, your description of the
10 incident in which you fired is not dissimilar to his
11 description of the incident in which he fired; do you
12 follow that?
13 A. Yes, yes, he is, he is seeing the same thing as me but
14 from a different, a different area.
15 Q. Can you help us at all as to whether he was anywhere
16 near you when you fired towards Block 1 of the
17 Rossville Flats?
18 A. Well, from where I was in that position, sir, if you can
19 go back to a picture, you will see a wall on this side
20 and I was covered from any fire on that side. So there
21 is nothing there I would have seen and I do not, I have
22 got no idea, you know, um, whatever happened there, this
23 is the first time I have ever, you know, it has been
24 brought to my mind.
25 Q. I follow the point that from the position where you were
1 you would not have been able to see the position that he
2 describes?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. But one possibility that we have to consider is that he
5 has made a mistake about the location of the window at
6 which shots were fired and that in fact he was somewhere
7 near you when you opened fire and that he has a confused
8 recollection of the incident in which you opened fire;
9 do you understand that?
10 A. I understand where you are coming from, yes.
11 Q. What I am asking you is whether you have any memory of
12 him being anywhere around when you opened fire?
13 A. No, sir, nothing at all on that side of the -- you know,
14 firing from that way, nothing at all.
15 Q. Let us go back to what he says at C449.5 because the
16 account develops. He says this just where I am
17 indicating with my arrow:
18 "I heard someone from C Company shout to me 'seen
19 anything?' I whispered to him quietly 'across' and
20 gestured to the open window opposite me. UNK541 fired
21 his rifle towards the open window but the shot was too
22 low and it missed; it hit the windowsill and I saw
23 a piece of brick chip off. I shouted at him 'You stupid
24 bastard'."
25 Can we stick with that piece of text, please, do not
1 turn the page. Do you follow what he is saying? He
2 appears to be saying that you, if you are UNK541, fired
3 at the window in question, missed and hit the windowsill
4 and then he shouted "You stupid bastard" and your memory
5 is that your first shot towards the window in the
6 Rossville Flats missed and hit some part of the building
7 around the window.
8 A. Yes, the top left-hand side.
9 Q. Do you have any recollection of any other soldier around
10 you shouting "You stupid bastard" at you after that had
11 happened?
12 A. No. (laughing)
13 Q. Let us go on. The next page he says:
14 "The window flashed open again and the arm reached
15 out with the pistol and fired a further two shots
16 although, again, I did not notice any bullets hit the
17 walls near me. The gunman had not seen me so I fired
18 a shot at the target. The window shattered but did not
19 smash completely."
20 I think you are aware that a different soldier,
21 Lance Corporal D, has given evidence of firing at the
22 same target that you fired at, is this the first you
23 have heard of any other soldier firing at the same
24 target as you, apart from Lance Corporal D?
25 A. Well, this were not the target I was firing at.
1 Q. He is describing a different position, but he says that
2 someone who has the same name as you was firing at the
3 target he is describing; do you follow?
4 A. (Laughing) no, I do follow, but, you know, I am trying
5 to think, you know, um, has he heard this or made this
6 up, you know, this, he is completely out of, you know,
7 he is -- if he has done that, you know, he has done it
8 on his own and I did not know nothing about it, I did
9 not fire at that window, I fired at the window which
10 I told you.
11 Q. If we go on to paragraphs 26 and 27, please. He then
12 says that after all this had happened, he and UNK541
13 went back to point A, that is again the point where you
14 de-bussed. What he goes on to say, is this:
15 "From there, we shouted to the troops on the western
16 side of Rossville Street 'Where are we going? Where are
17 we trying to clear?' one said in reply 'We are going to
18 the flats to clear the area'."
19 He talks about continuing shooting, hearing the
20 double tap of a low velocity rifle mixed with sporadic
21 shots of high velocity fire. Then he continues to
22 describe going with UNK541 (who may be you) across the
23 wasteground past a couple of burnt-out cars and taking
24 12 or 15 minutes to cross the wasteground, getting down
25 on your stomachs and, if we go over the page, he goes on
1 to give a description of seeing a priest coming
2 hesitantly out of a door at the north end of Block 1 of
3 Rossville Flats, wearing a black robe with a white
4 collar and carrying a stick.
5 Do you have any recollection of any of that
6 happening when you were there?
7 A. No. I have seen since the priest who was waving a white
8 flag, but I only seen that on the television, I have
9 not -- you know, I cannot remember seeing it on the day.
10 Q. In the middle of paragraph 28 he says:
11 "UNK541 and I were lying flat on our stomachs
12 pointing our weapons at this time but we did not shoot
13 the priest. I was not sure that he was lifting a weapon
14 and I did not want to kill him without good reason."
15 You have made clear a number of times the
16 difficulties that you have of recollection, but would
17 you remember, do you think, if there had been an
18 occasion when you were lying flat on your stomach
19 pointing your weapon at a priest and concerned that the
20 priest might have a weapon?
21 A. No.
22 Q. If that had happened, is it something you would
23 remember?
24 A. I would have remembered that, yes.
25 Q. And so are you able to say to this Tribunal that nothing
1 of this kind happened so far as you are concerned?
2 A. I, I cannot remember anything happening like that,
3 nothing at all.
4 Q. The final part of his statement I want to show you is
5 paragraphs 30 to 32. He describes seeing people at the
6 rubble barricade and after that he says:
7 "UNK541 and I retreated back to the abandoned cars
8 on the wasteground. While there, we were shot at twice
9 by a high velocity weapon. The shots passed over us,
10 two or three inches above our heads. I presumed that
11 the shots came from a height because of the angle they
12 appeared to be travelling in."
13 Do you have any recollection of coming under fire
14 when you were in a position near some abandoned cars on
15 the wasteground?
16 A. (Witness shaking head) I cannot remember that, sir.
17 Q. At paragraph 32 he says:
18 "UNK541 and I returned to Con Bradley's pub and from
19 there we went to get into the truck. I travelled back
20 with the men I had arrived with. UNK541 and I wanted to
21 know who had fired at us while we were near the
22 burnt-out cars. We were told unofficially that snipers
23 had fired at us, mistakenly thinking we were civilians.
24 At the time I thought it unlikely that terrorists would
25 have been in that position."
1 Did anybody ever tell you that it was believed that
2 Army snipers had opened fire at you in the mistaken
3 belief that you were a civilian?
4 A. No, nobody has ever told me that and I would have known
5 if anybody was, was -- if I was under fire.
6 Q. As far as you are concerned, would it be fair to say
7 that this account is just nonsense?
8 A. Well, I cannot say it is nonsense, sir, because I was
9 not in that position, you know, it is, it is very well
10 detailed and me being one of the soldiers, being there,
11 if everybody could remember that much detail, there
12 would, um, the Tribunal would be over quite simply
13 quickly, but I cannot remember none of that, sir.
14 Q. I am not so sure about that!
15 We can leave it there. There is one final matter,
16 Private C: is it right that in November 1996 you were
17 convicted in the Crown Court on a charge of obtaining
18 property by deception?
19 A. Yes, sir.
20 Q. Did you plead guilty to that charge?
21 A. Yes, sir.
22 Q. What was the property that you were convicted of
23 obtaining by deception?
24 A. Twelve thousand pounds.
25 Q. What was the nature of the deception?
1 A. It was a building job which was said to be overpriced.
2 Q. Is it right that you were sentenced to three years
3 imprisonment for that offence?
4 A. Yes, I was, sir.
5 Q. How long did you serve in prison?
6 A. Eighteen months.
7 MR ROXBURGH: Have you told the truth in the evidence that
8 you have given to this Tribunal about the events of
9 Bloody Sunday?
10 A. Everything to me memory and the best of my knowledge and
11 truthfulness, everything that there is.
12 Questioned by MR ELIAS
13 MR ELIAS: Soldier C, I am over to your right. I appear for
14 a number of former soldiers. My name is Elias, I want
15 to ask you about two aspects of your evidence, if I may.
16 A. Yes, sir.
17 Q. I am looking really for your help in relation to the
18 timing of what you did at a particular point. May
19 I take you, please, first of all to the statement that
20 was made for you, prepared for you for the purposes of
21 the Widgery Tribunal. We find it at page 51. I want to
22 remind you of what you said at the time. I understand
23 your memory now will be --
24 A. Excuse me, sir, would I find that paper in here?
25 Q. You will, I think. Page 51 at the bottom?
1 A. If you do not mind me taking your time up, sir. Yes,
2 sir.
3 Q. I want to go to paragraph 6 at the foot of the page.
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. What I am seeking to do is just to take you through what
6 you said happened. I understand you may not remember at
7 all now, this is what you said happened on the day when
8 you were to give evidence to the Widgery Tribunal, do
9 you see. At paragraph 6 you talk about de-bussing,
10 seeing people milling about in the open ground in front
11 of you. You cannot remember that today; can you?
12 A. No, sir, not distinctly, no.
13 Q. "I could also see two Pigs drawn up in Rossville Street,
14 which I think were the Pigs of the platoon behind which
15 had overtaken us when we stopped. In the open ground on
16 the other side were the two Pigs of the leading
17 platoon." We go over the page:
18 "The officer in charge of our force ordered us to
19 work our way round the walls on the edge of the open
20 ground and to assemble at the near end of Block 1 of the
21 Rossville buildings."
22 Do you see?
23 A. Yes, sir.
24 Q. You go on to say in paragraph 7:
25 "As I ran around the walls at the edge of the open
1 ground I could hear the sound of firing, though I did
2 not locate it precisely. I could also hear the sound of
3 riot guns being fired and there was a lot of noise.
4 There were some bangs as well..."
5 You go on to talk about bangs. I take you four or
6 five lines further down, you talk about most of the
7 people having left the car park of the Rossville
8 building:
9 " ... though I could still see some moving on its
10 far side." Do you see that?
11 A. Um.
12 Q. It is about four lines down from "There were some bangs
13 as well".
14 "Most of them had left the car park of the Rossville
15 building though I could still see some moving on its far
16 side. As I moved forward I passed some of our own men
17 in covering positions along the Chamberlain Street wall.
18 I cannot remember seeing any of them fire. When I got
19 to the car park end of the wall I remember seeing one of
20 our men (I do not remember who) standing by the Pig in
21 the car park fire a shot at the far corner between
22 blocks 2 and 3. As he did this I was running across to
23 the end of Block 1" which is what you had been
24 instructed you should do?
25 A. Yes, sir.
1 Q. There, "One of the sergeants sent the whole force..."
2 just note those words, that means the section you were
3 with, does it?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. "... the whole force to the William Street end of the
6 front building of Columbcille Court. From there half
7 a dozen of us took a party of about 20 prisoners back to
8 a collection point."
9 I stop there, if we could have your own plan on the
10 screen, please, at 68.007, you indicated to the Tribunal
11 when Mr Roxburgh questioned you, if we could highlight
12 the central area. The blue arrow is now at about the
13 point that you de-bussed; do you follow?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. And then with red arrows now, just follow the line?
16 A. Yes, sir.
17 Q. We saw it on the photographs, did we not, that
18 Mr Roxburgh showed you, down to the end of
19 Chamberlain Street?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. As you then crossed to the Rossville Flats gable end,
22 a final arrow being put in place, that is where you saw
23 the soldier firing across the car park; correct?
24 A. Yes, sir.
25 Q. It is the next bit that I am particularly concerned
1 with, I will show with another arrow, from there you
2 went north and up past Kells Walk?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. Ultimately to go to pick up arrestees and take them
5 further back?
6 A. Yes, sir.
7 Q. Can you remember, before leaving the gable end at
8 Rossville Street to go back up north to take the
9 arrestees, whether there were any Army vehicles, Pigs at
10 the gable end?
11 A. I cannot remember, sir, no, I am sorry, it is just --
12 only from when I see things on the telly -- on the
13 television.
14 Q. I am going to show you something on the telly, if I may.
15 I am going to show you a snatch of video, it is a very
16 small passage, it is in Video 3, four minutes 49
17 seconds. What I am going to do, Soldier C, if I may,
18 I will play it through for you straight through and then
19 we will go back to the beginning and take it frame by
20 frame so I can point certain things out to you.
21 Before it is played, let me tell you what it seems
22 to show: it shows the gable end of Rossville Flats; do
23 you see. There are some Army vehicles there and it
24 shows what I might call a troop of men running north?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. I am going to ask whether that troop of men may be the
2 troop that you were with?
3 A. I was with, yes.
4 Q. If you are in it, perhaps you will be able to identify
5 it but I doubt it. We will play it straight through, it
6 is a very short clip.
7 (Video Played)
8 There is the gable end of Rossville off to the left.
9 Do you see the soldiers running now north, a group of
10 them?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. Running up -- stop it there and can we take it back to
13 the beginning of that. Run it back frame by frame,
14 I will show you again, if you need to see it again, just
15 say so. This is an earlier and disjointed clip, so do
16 not worry about this bit.
17 Pause the film there for a moment, please, can we
18 take it back a frame or two. You have your bearings --
19 A. Yes, I have got my bearings, yes.
20 Q. And there we can see some Pigs and Army vehicles?
21 A. Some Ferrets, yes.
22 Q. In the lee of the gable end; do you follow?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. If we roll it on slowly, please, frame by frame, you can
25 see these men. They are in fact, are they not, taking
1 the path, more or less, that you took from the gable end
2 coming north?
3 A. Quite possible, sir, I, I cannot remember that, though,
4 sir.
5 Q. It does not bring anything back in seeing this film,
6 does it?
7 A. I am trying hard now to go back.
8 Q. They are following the path that you described in that
9 statement, let me put it that way to you, and I am going
10 to suggest it might very well be the section that you
11 were with. If we keep rolling it on frame by frame,
12 please.
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. I think it is probably impossible to identify anybody
15 from that, but can we -- you now see more of the
16 Rossville Flats, do you see, and the vehicles are
17 somewhat hazy, but they are there?
18 A. What I can recollect, sir --
19 Q. Pause it there for a moment --
20 A. Is I knew, and I am going back, I knew there were
21 soldiers, they would either be at the bottom of
22 Kells Walk here, in my mind's eye, which is what I am
23 trying to get to. I would be at the bottom of
24 Kells Walk at the top of the ramp when this was going
25 on, I think.
1 Q. I suggest that maybe you are right about that and that
2 there were soldiers running north at a later stage too.
3 I was simply going to ask you to look at this -- where
4 the video has now stopped, not so much for you, but so
5 that others will take note of it. There does not
6 appear, does there, to be, on the right-hand pavement of
7 Rossville Street at this stage, that is to say in the
8 area where those troops are or slightly south of them,
9 there plainly is no Pig on the pavement. At a later
10 stage we know there is video showing two Pigs on that
11 right-hand pavement in the area where those troops are
12 or perhaps a little further south of them; do you
13 follow?
14 A. Yes, sir.
15 Q. Can we roll that on to the end again, please.
16 (Video Played)
17 We can take it this far, can we, Soldier C: that
18 those soldiers were making their way in the sort of
19 direction that you have described in your statement?
20 A. (Witness nodding)
21 Q. When you left Rossville Flats gable end?
22 A. Yes, sir.
23 Q. And there is nothing in that clip that suggests it could
24 not have been you?
25 A. No.
1 Q. Thank you.
2 The other matter is quite a separate one. Could we
3 have back on the screen, please, hot-spot 7. If we
4 could rotate it to the left, please and just stop it
5 there. This is a more modern-day photograph; do you
6 follow?
7 A. Yes, sir.
8 Q. So the flats would be where the red brick houses are?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. And it looks, does it not, as though that is
11 a photograph, part of the panorama, if you like, taken
12 from someone standing at the top of the ramp more or
13 less where you would have been?
14 A. Yes, sir.
15 Q. If we put the computer panorama on for a moment, that is
16 a reconstruction of the view as it would have been; do
17 you follow?
18 A. Yes, sir.
19 Q. If we go back to the photograph, please, and if we go
20 round, please, 180 degrees, still going to the left, if
21 we pause there, please. You told the Tribunal in answer
22 to Mr Roxburgh of a wall, a higher wall you said to your
23 left where you think in fact you would have been?
24 A. Yes, sir.
25 Q. Does that show the wall that you were referring to?
1 A. Exactly, yes, sir.
2 Q. Can you tell the Tribunal, if you cannot remember, how
3 you believe you would have been in the firing position
4 on that corner when you fired down towards the
5 Rossville Flats?
6 A. Well, sir, what would have happened is I would have gone
7 in and out of the doorways because of the, um, you know,
8 being shot at from --
9 Q. To get to that position. I understand, from there --
10 A. I get to that position, you see where your spot is in
11 the brick?
12 Q. Yes.
13 A. That is roughly where my head would have been to look
14 round or, if not there, sir, I could have possibly knelt
15 down and looked across there as well to get the maximum
16 amount of cover.
17 Q. I wanted to ask whether you would have used the lower
18 wall in front for any purpose?
19 A. Possibly to rest on if, you know, to get an aim or, you
20 know, but, no, I cannot remember that, sir, it is
21 absolutely impossible.
22 Q. The position is that you could have been, could you,
23 entirely concealed around that corner except for the
24 time when you were firing?
25 A. Yes, from Rossville Flats, yes.
1 LORD SAVILLE: Mr Harvey, it is midday, I think we will stop
2 for lunch now.
3 We are going to stop for lunch now, we will come
4 back at 12.50, please. As I say to all the witnesses,
5 Soldier C, please do not discuss the evidence you are
6 giving until you have finished giving it this afternoon.
7 A. No, sir.
8 (12.00 pm)
9 (The Short Adjournment)
10 (1.05 pm)
11 Questioned by MR ARTHUR HARVEY
12 MR HARVEY: Soldier C, my name is Arthur Harvey and I appear
13 on behalf of a number of the families of the deceased
14 and injured.
15 You have been asked in detail about a number of
16 incidents and it is not my intention to go over the
17 detail. I would like firstly to try and work out with
18 you the sequence of events that you described in your
19 statements 31st January 1972, 5th March 1972 and your
20 evidence to Lord Widgery.
21 Could we start perhaps with me showing you a video.
22 This video is of Support Company de-bussing, that is
23 from the two four-tonne vehicles in William Street
24 (sic). Could we look at video 48 and could we play it
25 from there, please.
1 (Video 48 played)
2 Could we stop there for the moment. What you are
3 seeing at the moment in fact is the first vehicles enter
4 Rossville Street. The vehicle you can see to the
5 right-hand side of the pavement in Rossville Street is
6 Sergeant O's vehicle that is one of the leading vehicles
7 that went in there from Mortar Platoon. The vehicle
8 behind it is, if we play it on, that is the command
9 vehicle; a Ferret car, there are a number of arrests now
10 being made.
11 Can we stop it there for a moment. You can see that
12 a number of individuals are being taken and they are
13 being taken from the southerly position where the
14 arrests have occurred and they are actually being taken
15 down towards the southern end of Rossville Street and
16 William Street. Can we play it on.
17 (Video 48 played)
18 Could we go back to the previous frame of the
19 individuals against the wall. The individuals that we
20 saw on the previous clip being taken from the south to
21 the north are now being placed against this wall which
22 is at the junction of William Street and
23 Rossville Street. It is not very clear on that
24 particular video, but do you recognise yourself as any
25 of those soldiers?
1 A. No, sir.
2 Q. You have been pointed out who Soldier D was by way of
3 name, he is the individual who claims to have been with
4 you on the veranda when you discharged the five shots,
5 two at a person who you allege is a gunman at the corner
6 of Block 1, that is the southwest corner of Block 1 and
7 then up at the windows; do you recognise him in those
8 photographs?
9 A. No.
10 Q. Could we play it on. Could we stop here for a moment.
11 This is a four-tonne lorry. From it there are
12 disembarking quite a number of individuals. These, we
13 are told, are the members of Composite Platoon.
14 Behind it there is another four-tonne lorry. Could
15 we play on.
16 (Video 48 played)
17 If we go back. By the time Composite Platoon have
18 de-bussed, you can still see on this particular
19 photograph there are the vehicles in front which are the
20 empty vehicles that had formerly been occupied by
21 Anti-Tank Platoon. There is still the vehicle which is
22 the command vehicle and the Ferret car.
23 On the wasteground there is a vehicle which was
24 commanded by Lieutenant N, which is to the right if one
25 sees the telegraph pole between the four-tonne lorry and
1 the Pig, over to that direction and to the south, in the
2 mouth of the flats, that is Block 1, Block 2 and
3 Block 3, there is the vehicle which was occupied and
4 commanded by Sergeant O.
5 Could we play that on.
6 (Video 48 played)
7 At this stage you can see there are still soldiers
8 disembarking from the forward four-tonne vehicle. You
9 can also see from this clip and the previous clip that
10 the soldiers who have moved forward along
11 Rossville Street are not in the picture; do you see
12 that?
13 A. Yes, sir.
14 Q. Could we play it forward just a little. What you see is
15 one individual who is running across. Your evidence
16 that you supplied by way of statement, which was either
17 prepared by you or for you, was taken on 5th March. It
18 appears that it was taken by a Mr Heritage and it also
19 appears it was taken in the presence of a Major 1385.
20 Can you recall a major being present when you made your
21 statement?
22 A. I cannot, no.
23 Q. What you in fact have said is that when you de-bussed
24 from one of these vehicles, can you recall whether it
25 was the first vehicle or the second vehicle?
1 A. No, I cannot remember that now.
2 Q. That you moved east across the wasteground and moved
3 along the back of the houses in Chamberlain Street?
4 A. I cannot remember moving there, no.
5 Q. If you want to look at it, if we could go to your
6 statement and it is at 68.15, and at paragraph 5:
7 "After this the whole column moved off. I was in
8 the back of my vehicle and could not see what was
9 happening in front of us. I was wearing a respirator.
10 I could see the Pigs of the platoon following us. We
11 halted in Rossville Street a few yards past the junction
12 with William Street by the derelict buildings on the
13 left of the road. I am not certain exactly when I first
14 heard the sound of firing. It was either just after we
15 had de-bussed or a little later when we were working
16 down the back wall of the Chamberlain Street houses.
17 I do remember that as soon as I heard firing, I cocked
18 my weapon."
19 As you moved down the houses in Chamberlain Street,
20 at the back of Chamberlain Street, Lieutenant N claims
21 to have fired five shots -- or three shots across the
22 junction of the wasteground at Eden Place into
23 Chamberlain Street. Did you see or hear any of that?
24 A. I cannot remember that now.
25 Q. It would appear, in 1972, you neither heard nor saw it
1 nor reported it; is that so? You make no mention of it
2 in any statement that is made prior to giving evidence
3 to Lord Widgery and no mention of it to Lord Widgery?
4 A. Well, I cannot remember.
5 Q. As troops from Lieutenant N's vehicle moved south along
6 the wall, because their view and in fact some of their
7 mobility was obstructed by a fence, some moved along the
8 wall, others moved out across the wasteground to the
9 west.
10 As they moved along the wall, there was a woman
11 called Peggy Deery who was shot and had to be moved and
12 carried to a house at the top of Chamberlain Street.
13 Did you see any of that?
14 A. No.
15 Q. As they moved further up into the mouth of the car park
16 at Rossville Flats, a young boy called Jackie Duddy was
17 shot dead and his body was attended to by a priest and
18 a number of other individuals. Did you see any of that?
19 A. No, I have not -- I have seen it on the television
20 since, but I cannot remember seeing it then. I can
21 remember seeing the priest waving the flag, you know,
22 his handkerchief in the air, yes.
23 Q. But you did not see that on the day?
24 A. No, I did not see that on the day.
25 Q. Did you see anyone in the car park?
1 A. No, not ...
2 Q. You see, after Jackie Duddy was shot there was a man
3 called Michael Bridge who stepped to the forefront and
4 he can be seen in a photograph, if we could go to it at
5 518, he stepped forward in protest against the murder of
6 Jackie Duddy and he was shot. Did you see any of that?
7 A. No.
8 Q. The vehicle that can be seen on this photograph, is that
9 the position in which you saw a soldier fire towards the
10 direction of the exit between Blocks 2 and 3?
11 A. I cannot remember that now, sir. It is not an angle
12 that I would have, you know, that I can associate with.
13 Q. Could we go back to photograph 628. That is
14 a photograph of Jackie Duddy as he lay in the car park.
15 If you moved up the back of these houses very shortly
16 after de-bussing, all of this action must have taken
17 place and the body removed for you not to have seen it;
18 is that not right?
19 A. Could you repeat that question, sorry?
20 Q. If you de-bussed in the manner in which you describe, if
21 you made your way up the back of Chamberlain Street
22 houses, then all of the action which led to the death of
23 this young man and the removal of his body, must have
24 occurred before you arrived on the scene?
25 A. Sir, I could not remember seeing any of that.
1 Q. If you had seen it, you could not have failed but to
2 record that in your statements; could you?
3 A. No, you would have had to have said, you know, mentioned
4 it, but I did not see that.
5 Q. Because he did not just lie there, if we look at
6 photograph 630, you can see in fact there was quite
7 a considerable crowd gathered around him and the person,
8 again, on the right-hand side of that photograph is
9 Michael Bridge; the person just going out of camera
10 shot?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. If we look at photograph 631, that is the body being
13 carried across the car park. Could it have been that
14 you did see any of that?
15 A. No, I did not see none of that either, sir.
16 Q. You say as soon as you heard shooting -- perhaps if we
17 could go back to your statement of 5th March, and could
18 we go to paragraph 5, the final line:
19 "I do remember that as soon as I heard firing
20 I cocked my weapon."
21 Why would you have done that if you had not seen
22 a target?
23 A. The reason being, is because if I had heard firing, it
24 could have possibly been towards me, I would say.
25 Q. This action that I have just showed to you, was a result
1 of some 32 shots that were fired by the Mortar Platoon
2 on the wasteground. When you de-bussed, did you not
3 hear something in excess of 30 rounds of SLR cartridges
4 being discharged?
5 A. Not that I can remember, sir, no.
6 Q. What you then did, it would appear, if we go to
7 paragraph 6:
8 "When we de-bussed I could see people milling about
9 in the open ground in front of us. I could also see two
10 Pigs drawn up in Rossville Street, which I think were
11 the Pigs of the platoon behind which had overtaken us
12 when we stopped. In the open ground on the other side
13 were the two Pigs of the leading platoon. The officer
14 in charge of our force ordered us to work our way round
15 the walls on the edge of the open ground and to assemble
16 at the rear end of Block 1 of the Rossville buildings."
17 Do you have any recollection of that happening now?
18 A. No, I cannot remember that either, sir.
19 Q. The clip of footage that was shown to you this morning
20 by Mr Elias actually shows a position where the Ferret
21 car and the command vehicle have drawn up behind the
22 gable end of Block 1. If you are one of those soldiers
23 running back, it simply means that not only has everyone
24 in the Rossville Street car park been shot and wounded,
25 but it is highly probable that everyone behind the
1 barricade has been shot and wounded at that stage, which
2 means there was further shooting coming from the
3 direction of your west, from Rossville Street. Do you
4 recollect hearing any of that shooting?
5 A. No, sir, I cannot.
6 Q. If we then go just down:
7 "There were some bangs as well, but I could not
8 swear to it that these were nail bombs or any particular
9 sort of explosions. By the time we reached the end of
10 the Chamberlain Street wall the civilians had run past
11 the barricade on the other side of Block 1."
12 How would you have known that if you were at the end
13 of Chamberlain Street and the barricade was on the other
14 side of Block 1 where you would not have a view of it?
15 A. I am sorry, I could not remember being actually in
16 Chamberlain Street.
17 Q. No, you were not on Chamberlain Street, this is the
18 backs of the houses. Perhaps if you care to look at
19 photograph 200. That is not so good. Perhaps if we go
20 to photograph 199. If you were in the area of the
21 houses at the back -- could we enlarge the area around
22 the wasteground. You can see the barricade, it is on
23 the western side of Block 1. If you were making your
24 way down the backs of the houses in Chamberlain Street,
25 you simply would not have been able to see that?
1 LORD SAVILLE: Well, I quite agree, by the time you got to
2 the end you could not see it, but I think, from say
3 Eden Place, you might see a bit of the barricade.
4 MR HARVEY: To the right. What you actually said was:
5 "By the time we reached the end of
6 Chamberlain Street wall the civilians had run past the
7 barricade."
8 I am asking you, how would you have known that; is
9 that something that you were told; is it the
10 incorporation of a piece of information that you
11 acquired from others?
12 A. No, I cannot actually remember running around that side.
13 The only part I can remember, you know, sort of, um, is
14 running up the stairs and at the back of the flats.
15 I cannot actually remember that, maybe because that
16 would be just an ordinary run-of-the-mill, um, you know,
17 sort of procedure or to, um, deal with a riot and it
18 would not have really took any point in my mind to
19 remember it.
20 The only part I remember, sir, is when the firing
21 started.
22 Q. The point is, the civilians, by the time you reached the
23 end of Chamberlain Street, are still running and have
24 crossed the barricade?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. It simply means that you must have seen the dead body of
2 Jackie Duddy lying in the car park?
3 A. I did not see no bodies, no bodies at all.
4 Q. It also would mean that if you were still moving at that
5 time, you must have seen soldiers shooting
6 Michael Bridge and another man called Michael Bradley?
7 A. No, I did not, sir, no.
8 Q. Could we go back to your statement and it is at 68.16,
9 if one goes to paragraph 8. This is after you have left
10 the corner of Block 1. You have gone back down
11 Rossville Street in the direction of William Street and
12 you there say:
13 "There one of the sergeants sent the whole force to
14 the William Street end of the front building of
15 Columbcille Court. From there half a dozen of us took
16 a party of about 20 prisoners back to a collection
17 point."
18 Do you see that?
19 A. Hold it, I can remember the, um, prisoners being taken
20 back, but me mind is distorted on whether I see it there
21 or on the television, because there was, um, it showed
22 you certain things of, um, of that actual day on the
23 television.
24 Q. Yes, but this statement was made on 5th March?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. It was made in the presence of a major, I take it who
2 was there to give you support?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. It was made to a solicitor or an officer acting on
5 behalf of the Tribunal of Lord Widgery and it is
6 evidence that you then gave to Lord Widgery?
7 A. Yes, and I would say -- I cannot actually remember that,
8 because my mind has been distorted by the television,
9 did I see it on the television or did I see it there?
10 After reading this I would say, yes, I did see it there.
11 Q. You saw it there, that is at the time?
12 A. Yes, to my recollection, that is.
13 LORD SAVILLE: I think, Mr Harvey, what the witness is
14 trying to say, tell me if I have got it right or
15 wrong: you cannot now say whether you have a memory of
16 what you wrote down here on paragraph 8 of this
17 statement because of what you have seen on the
18 television and so you are not clear in your mind whether
19 you can remember this --
20 A. No.
21 LORD SAVILLE: -- or whether you are thinking you can
22 remember it because of what you have seen on the
23 television.
24 A. Exactly, sir.
25 LORD SAVILLE: When you did have this interview with
1 Mr Heritage, this is what apparently you told
2 Mr Heritage at the time; do you have any reason to
3 believe that it is inaccurate?
4 A. No, I have not. Not at all. The reason that I am
5 finding it hard is, what I go back to when we first
6 started off: I have not read that for the reason of not
7 trying to put too much information into my mind so that
8 the information that comes out is the straight
9 information that I can actually remember --
10 LORD SAVILLE: I follow that.
11 A. -- today.
12 LORD SAVILLE: Sorry to interrupt, Mr Harvey. That was my
13 understanding --
14 MR HARVEY: That is my understanding.
15 LORD SAVILLE: -- of what the witness is trying to say.
16 MR HARVEY: That is also my understanding.
17 Just deal with this point for a moment: before you
18 came to give evidence today, I take it you had
19 consultations with legal advisors?
20 A. Oh, yes, sir.
21 Q. And for the purpose of those you would have read the
22 previous statements that you made to the RMP and to
23 Lord Widgery and also the evidence that you gave; did
24 you not?
25 A. No, I did not read none of that evidence, from the first
1 time I went there, I did not read none of it. I started
2 to read it and then it was going to become very -- it
3 come very clear to me that I knew the next stage, I did
4 not want to remind myself, I wanted it to stay fresh in
5 any mind.
6 Because when I went for the legal people --
7 Q. I think that is enough for my purposes, I only wanted to
8 know whether you had heard it -- read it or not.
9 LORD SAVILLE: It may be the witness is slightly confused
10 between his own legal advisors and the Eversheds
11 episode, you might try and clarify that. I understood
12 him to say that he had not read these statements before
13 he was at least initially interviewed by Eversheds, but
14 I think your question was relating to a rather different
15 theory.
16 MR HARVEY: Indeed, when you saw your own legal advisors,
17 not the persons who took the statements on behalf of
18 solicitors to this Inquiry, but your own legal advisors,
19 did you not read the RMP statement, the statement to
20 Mr Heritage and your evidence to Lord Widgery for the
21 purpose of assisting them?
22 A. No, because what happened when I went to see my legal
23 advisors, I think that I give 'em all the information
24 that I could remember before anything was, you know --
25 Q. Irrespective of whether it was before, did you at some
1 stage, for the purposes of assisting your legal
2 advisors, read this material?
3 A. I have not read that, no, I am reading it now as we go
4 through it, sir.
5 Q. There are a substantial number of photographs which show
6 20 prisoners or thereabouts being taken from exactly the
7 position which is described in this paragraph of your
8 statement of 5th March. I wonder could we look at those
9 for a moment. Could we go to photograph 493. That is
10 a group of prisoners who have been arrested at the gable
11 wall of Glenfada Park North. Do you know where that is
12 or would you like to see it on a map?
13 A. No, if I could see it on the map.
14 Q. Could we have Q8. They have been arrested from this
15 gable wall and have been marched down through
16 Columbcille Court and are about to be taken out on the
17 photograph. Can you see Glenfada Park North?
18 A. Yes, I know where I am now, sir.
19 Q. Can we go back to the photograph, 493. Could we go to
20 photograph 494. Again this is coming out on to
21 William Street. Could we go to 495 -- Rossville Street.
22 This is a group of prisoners who have been marched
23 across from Rossville Street to William Street. That
24 group -- there is approximately 20 and they were taken
25 over to a collection point just, in fact, as is
1 indicated in your statement.
2 Seeing those photographs, does that bring back any
3 recollection to you?
4 A. No, because I have not seen that from that photograph
5 angle, but I cannot actually remember that either, sir.
6 Q. Perhaps there are some other photographs. Could we go
7 to 1078. 1079. 1080. That again is those prisoners
8 being taken across William Street, and they are being
9 taken towards Little James Street?
10 LORD SAVILLE: These are all Glenfada Park people; are they
11 not?
12 MR HARVEY: They are.
13 These are the only group of prisoners other than the
14 four we saw against the wall in the video who were taken
15 from that direction. Do these bring back any memories
16 for you?
17 A. Not from that angle, sir, no, I cannot say that I have
18 seen that.
19 Q. You told Lord Widgery in your evidence exactly the same
20 thing. If we go to that, at 628.21, paragraph C:
21 "Question: Then, when you got to the north end of
22 the flats, the corner there?
23 "Answer: Yes, sir.
24 "Question: Were you told to proceed somewhere else?
25 "Answer: Yes, sir, we were told to proceed across
1 to the low rise flats, I think.
2 "Question: Did you go across the road to the low
3 rise flats?
4 "Answer: Yes, sir.
5 "Question: Were there any prisoners there?
6 "Answer: Yes, sir, there was. Well, I could not
7 say the exact number, but I was told to take 20, you
8 know, a number of roughly about 20, back to a sort of
9 point where the prisoners were kept.
10 "Lord Widgery: Where did you collect them?
11 "Answer: At the end of this block, sir, which would
12 be the low rise flats.
13 "Mr Underhill: That is where the prisoners were?
14 "Answer: Yes, sir.
15 "Question: Where did you take them to?
16 "Answer: To around here, sir.
17 "Question: To a point there?
18 "Answer: Yes, sir.
19 "Question: Did anybody help you with that
20 operation?
21 "Answer: Yes, sir, there were about five men, sir,
22 that I can remember.
23 "Question: Then did you go back the way you had
24 come?
25 "Answer: Yes.
1 "Question: Where did you go?"
2 That is a fairly graphic recollection of describing
3 not something that you witnessed on television, but
4 something in which you were a prime participant, is that
5 not right?
6 A. Yes, but I could not recognise that on the photos that
7 you showed me, but I possibly -- definitely if that is
8 the pictures showing them people, I probably was there,
9 that is --
10 Q. The difficulty that creates, perhaps you could assist me
11 with it, is this: by the time those persons had actually
12 been arrested, everyone who had been shot and killed on
13 Bloody Sunday had already been shot and killed. The
14 bodies of people who had been shot at the barricade had
15 already been collected. Those prisoners were eventually
16 arrested by the persons or the group of persons who
17 fired the last shots, including F. F was a man who
18 fired across from the gable end of Glenfada Park North
19 where those persons were arrested and shot in the
20 direction of where four persons were wounded or
21 killed: Barney McGuigan, Paddy Doherty, Danny McGowan
22 and a man called Williams.
23 You say that it is after all of that has happened
24 you actually go up on to a veranda in the company of --
25 or associated with, if not exactly in the company of D
1 and that you come upon a position where there is a
2 gunman at the corner, the southwest corner of Block 1
3 and at the southwest corner of Block 1 at that time was
4 the body of Hugh Gilmore, the body of Barney McGuigan
5 and they were being attended to by a number of persons
6 in a very distressed state.
7 Do you recall any of that?
8 A. No, sir.
9 LORD SAVILLE: I think, to be fair, Mr Harvey, would that
10 necessarily have been in the view of this witness if
11 indeed he was where he said he was?
12 MR HARVEY: No.
13 LORD SAVILLE: It would be around the corner, would it not?
14 MR HARVEY: The only matter is, I intend to come -- you may
15 not have seen any of that, but those bodies were
16 actually taken out and attempts were made to take them
17 out in an ambulance when shots were fired. I want to
18 show you some of the photographs first.
19 Firstly, could we look at a photograph EP26.25.
20 That shows a scene which would have been out of your
21 sight. If we could --
22 LORD SAVILLE: To help you, this is a scene at the southern
23 gable end of Block 1; do you understand?
24 A. Yes, sir.
25 MR HARVEY: Before we come to that scene, could we go to
1 photograph 441. 441 shows a photograph of a young man
2 called Hugh Gilmore who has been shot and fatally
3 wounded. What he does is, he proceeds along the face of
4 Block 1 and he comes to the corner of Block 1, the
5 southwest corner. If we go to photograph 442, he simply
6 gets round the corner; he collapses; he is lying just
7 below this man who is bent over him. The man who has
8 bent over him is a man called Danny McGowan who is later
9 shot. In this scene is also a man called
10 Barney McGuigan; he is later shot dead.
11 If we go to photograph 444, that shows the position
12 of those two persons after they have been killed and
13 what you can see, just moving up Rossville Street at
14 this stage, is an Army Pig.
15 If we go to photograph 445, 445 shows the vehicle
16 has further advanced, has further come up and
17 individuals are moving over towards it; that is the
18 vehicle that has picked up three bodies from the
19 barricade.
20 I wonder could we look at a clip of video. It is
21 video 1 and it is at the end, at seven minutes. Could
22 we play it from there.
23 (Video 1 played)
24 Again, just stop there. This is a number of persons
25 who have been wounded and injured being taken from
1 behind Block 1 in Joseph Place; do you know where that
2 is?
3 A. No, not ...
4 Q. Could we play this on and I will show it to you in
5 a moment.
6 (Video 1 played)
7 Stop here for a moment. This is the body of
8 Mr McGuigan as he is lying on the ground and there are
9 a number of people standing around. Could you play it
10 forward.
11 (Video 1 played)
12 What you can see is those persons have made their
13 way in a southerly direction. Just play it from here.
14 (Video 1 played)
15 You can see a number of persons lying down. Here is
16 the position of a priest called Father Mulvey, taking
17 cover behind an ambulance and the body eventually being
18 brought out.
19 That is the scene that occurred after everyone had
20 been arrested at the gable end of Glenfada Park North
21 and that is the scene that someone who was on the
22 veranda who had taken prisoners and actually moved into
23 that position must have seen?
24 A. Sir, I can vaguely remember the, the priest with the
25 handkerchief and that is, in my memory now, that is all
1 I can remember.
2 Q. In other words, you do have a recollection of seeing
3 a similar scene to this --
4 A. I have a recollection of the, the priest with the, um,
5 handkerchief.
6 Q. Let us have a look at another photograph, EP26.26.
7 Could we highlight the photograph, please.
8 What you can see is a priest. This priest, we
9 believe, is Father Irwin, moving across from
10 Glenfada Park North to where you can see there are
11 a number of persons who are just peeping round the
12 corner where you alleged you saw a gunman?
13 A. (Witness nodding)
14 Q. In sequence, this is at a time when the bodies are being
15 attended to behind people. Could we highlight the area
16 around -- expand the area around the pram ramp. That is
17 the area where you say -- initially said you were lying?
18 A. Sir.
19 Q. Do you recall that scene?
20 A. I cannot recall it from this way, but that is exactly
21 where I was.
22 Q. If we go back to the full photograph, please?
23 LORD SAVILLE: Is this before the Pig came through, as far
24 as you know, Mr Harvey?
25 MR HARVEY: I think it was after the Pig.
1 LORD SAVILLE: I would have thought it was after, because
2 you would see the bodies, otherwise. So the Pigs have
3 come through and gone back.
4 MR HARVEY: You see, the problem with your evidence --
5 perhaps you could assist me with it -- is this: by the
6 time 20 prisoners have been taken to William Street, in
7 effect all of the deceased and injured have already
8 occurred, but if your evidence is right, you actually
9 shot and killed someone at this position when there were
10 a substantial number of photographers there and
11 a substantial number of civilians there.
12 LORD SAVILLE: I am sorry, Mr Harvey, I am not sure that is
13 an entirely fair question. According to the RMP
14 statement, he only says he hit, he thinks he may have
15 hit a person.
16 MR HARVEY: Your other statement, that is the statement
17 5th March and to Lord Widgery is you saw the person
18 actually go backwards, the rifle go up into the air out
19 of his hands and at that time you were conveying the
20 belief in your mind that you had actually killed
21 someone; is that not right?
22 A. Oh, no, I did not -- not the belief I had killed
23 someone; I just, from what I can remember from making me
24 first initial statement and then going to the Widgery,
25 I was being -- trying hard to remember, you know, sort
1 of everything that had gone on.
2 Everything happened so quick and I cannot quite
3 understand the sequence of events which you are fetching
4 up.
5 Q. It is the sequence of events that you provided in your
6 testimony and in your statement to the Tribunal. So the
7 difficulties do not arise from the sequence that I am
8 putting to you, they arise from the sequences that you
9 gave?
10 A. The ones you are putting to me do not seem to tally up
11 with the ones that I can now remember.
12 Q. What you now remember, though you have, I think, gone --
13 certainly reconsidered, I think, is a neutral word, the
14 position that you had in paragraphs 10 and 11 of your
15 current statement was that there was a riot going on;
16 there were petrol bombs and stones being thrown. You
17 know, it would appear, upon reflection, you think that
18 that is something that you have incorporated either from
19 television or from previous experience?
20 A. Or from previous experience. Normal run-of-the-day --
21 the actual, the most serious point of this, what has
22 happened here is when we come under fire. It was an
23 every day sort of occurrence, just a different place as
24 a different time.
25 Q. With the greatest respect to you, you have put yourself
1 at a position where you are alleging that you shot at
2 a person when you were under fire when in fact what must
3 have been happening at that time was people trying to
4 clear away the deceased and injured?
5 A. No, sir.
6 Q. In order to get them attention?
7 A. (Witness shaking head). No.
8 Q. If we go back to your first statement, that is the RMP
9 statement. If we could go to that, it is at 68.12.
10 I wonder could we go to the penultimate sentence, you
11 can see:
12 "I saw at an end flat of Rossville Flats on the
13 ground floor, and in an opening, a male person wearing
14 a dark coat. He was observing the troops in
15 Rossville Street. I then heard the sound of a shot."
16 Could we turn over the page:
17 "The man disappeared. The shot came from his
18 location."
19 You had not -- you had seen the man; you had heard
20 a shot, but what you had not seen in relation to this
21 man was any weapon at this stage; that is correct, is it
22 not?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. Then you have got:
25 "I saw him with a long stick-like object which he
1 put into the aim position. I cocked my weapon.
2 "He then disappeared. [The man disappeared].
3 I fired two 7.62 rounds at this gunman. The gunman
4 disappeared from sight. I think that I may have been
5 hit him with my second shot."
6 Up and until this, you knew that particular evening
7 when you were making this statement or in the early
8 hours of the morning that you were being interviewed,
9 firstly, because you had discharged shots?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. And, secondly, not only because you had discharged
12 shots, but those shots may have been responsible for the
13 deaths of others?
14 A. Quite possible, sir.
15 Q. And, therefore, if you fired a shot which could have
16 killed someone, you were only entitled to fire a shot
17 which was justified?
18 A. Yes, sir.
19 Q. The person that you fired at at this stage, when you
20 were making this statement, you knew it was important
21 from your own point of view to be accurate in what you
22 were telling the Royal Military Police; did you not?
23 A. Say that again, sir?
24 Q. You knew, when you were being interviewed by the Royal
25 Military Police, it was important to be accurate in your
1 own interests?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. Because if you had fired without justification you could
4 leave yourself open to a charge of murder?
5 A. Oh, yes.
6 Q. So it would be important when you first saw them to
7 record in as much detail as you considerably could, what
8 actually happened?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. I wonder could we look at F24.5. That is a Kalashnikov.
11 How could you have described that to a Royal Military
12 Policeman, who would be familiar with weapons, familiar
13 with their design and their appearance, as being
14 a stick?
15 A. A "stick-like object," is what I said, sir.
16 Q. We will go back to it --
17 A. If you was to see just the front part of that coming out
18 from underneath a coat, that could possibly be a stick.
19 Q. If that is all you saw, you certainly did not see any
20 magazine that you later claimed in your Treasury
21 Solicitor statement, nor in your evidence?
22 A. When he came back out the second time I did see it.
23 Q. Let us go back to your statement, then. If we go back
24 to 68.13:
25 "I saw him with a long stick-like object which he
1 put into the aim position. I cocked my weapon. The man
2 reappeared. I fired two 7.62 rounds aimed shots at this
3 gunman."
4 Firstly, there is absolutely no mention of seeing
5 a handle, a magazine or a butt of a weapon; is that not
6 right?
7 A. Yes, sir.
8 Q. And this is at a time when you would be conscious to be
9 as accurate as you conceivably could; is that not right?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. And there is absolutely no mention of that man having
12 fired at you at all, but that you fired two rounds at
13 a man who came round a corner?
14 A. Yes, sir, but on that statement that I made with the
15 Military Police, the detail was not pulled up as much as
16 what your detail is now and what subsequently detail,
17 from what I can remember, from that date.
18 Q. The real problem that I still have, and perhaps you
19 could assist me with it?
20 A. Yes, sir.
21 Q. If when you first saw it you were justified in firing,
22 and firing to kill another person and what you saw
23 resembled a Kalashnikov, it would have been the simplest
24 thing in the world to have told the Royal Military
25 Police, "What I saw resembled a Kalashnikov"?
1 A. I cannot remember how the interviews or the statements
2 were given, but they was not in as much detail as what
3 you are trying to do now. They was asking us what had
4 happened on the day.
5 Q. Why tell them it was a "stick-like object"?
6 A. Because that is what it was. I just see the part come
7 out from underneath the coat and it looked like a stick
8 at first.
9 Q. Is it the case when it came to making your Treasury
10 solicitor's statement on 5th March, that is basically
11 just over a full month later, that you had been advised
12 that if you did not say the man had fired at you and you
13 did not say you had actually seen a gun, there may be
14 a possibility that you could be charged with murder?
15 A. No, nobody said that to me, no.
16 Q. Nobody said that to you?
17 A. I cannot remember anybody saying that.
18 Q. Did you think that?
19 A. No, not at all.
20 Q. You have said in your current statement to this Tribunal
21 that you would not dream of shooting a man simply
22 because he was carrying a weapon?
23 A. No, unless I was threatened.
24 Q. Why would you shoot a man who had a stick?
25 A. Well, I said at first it looked like a stick, but when
1 it come into the hand position, I knew it was not
2 a stick.
3 Q. No, you did not say that?
4 A. No, I did not say that --
5 Q. No, you did not, therefore when you thought it over,
6 after 31st January, before you saw the Treasury
7 Solicitor, did it strike you that if you were not more
8 positive in asserting that you had seen
9 a Kalashnikov-type weapon and that you were fired at,
10 that you would leave yourself vulnerable to prosecution?
11 A. Not in any way whatsoever, sir, not in any way
12 whatsoever. I fired at a gunman.
13 Q. D was with you throughout these proceedings?
14 A. I do not know if he was with me on the first time -- the
15 first shots that were fired.
16 Q. You say he joined you --
17 A. I did not say I was joined, I cannot remember that.
18 Q. Let us look at what Soldier D says. I wonder could we
19 go to B69. If we go to the bottom of the page:
20 "About 10 minutes later ..."
21 The important thing with D is he, like you, he had
22 been handed over a prisoner; he had looked after that
23 prisoner; he had taken the prisoner to the holding point
24 and therefore, you can see he says:
25 "About 10 minutes later I handed this man over to
1 the battalion provost staff and rejoined the section at
2 the maisonettes of Columbcille Court, Londonderry.
3 Whilst rejoining my section I heard the sound of
4 shooting."
5 Ten minutes later in fact is after all the shooting
6 is over -- after, rather, all of the persons have been
7 shot and killed. He then goes, go to the final
8 sentence:
9 "From the veranda I was observing the
10 Columbcille Court area when C of my unit passed me and
11 located himself at the end of the veranda at [he gives
12 the grid reference].
13 "Whilst observing the court area I heard the sound
14 of pistol shots. I joined C and he informed me that the
15 shots had been fired from a window on a right side of
16 the third storey of number 1 block Rossville Flats
17 [again he gives the grid reference].
18 "I kept observations on this area. I saw the window
19 open and a hand clutching a pistol appear out of it.
20 The pistol fired."
21 What he says is, he was there and you passed him.
22 He does not mention one shot being fired from
23 a Kalashnikov rifle, nor does he refer to you firing two
24 shots from your rifle before his attention is drawn to
25 the window; do you see that?
1 A. No.
2 Q. If he was there on that veranda, the first time he heard
3 you shooting should have been at a person at the corner,
4 at the southwest corner of Block 1; is that not right?
5 A. Possibly, I cannot, you know, sorry --
6 Q. The veranda is not exactly is million miles long, is it?
7 A. No, but I was at the veranda, the front of the veranda,
8 the very first person there.
9 Q. That is not what he says?
10 A. Well, he is -- he is mixed up there somewhere, because
11 that is how I can remember it.
12 Q. That is how you remember it?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. What he in fact goes on to say in relation to the
15 window, if we look at it:
16 "I was armed with an SLR which had a magazine of 20
17 rounds affixed. I cocked my weapon and fired one 7.62
18 round aimed shot at the pistol. I saw the round strike
19 the framework of the window above the pistol."
20 That is what you claim to have done, is it not?
21 A. No, I did not hit the framework, I hit the wall.
22 Q. "I saw the round strike the framework ... above ..."
23 You say you struck the wall above it?
24 A. The wall, yes.
25 Q. You hit the wall and he hits the frame?
1 A. Well, I cannot say about his shot, I -- I was only
2 concentrating on myself.
3 Q. It must have been very close, his is at the framework
4 above the pistol?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. The hand with the pistol withdrew?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. He does not mention you firing at all at this stage:
9 "The hand with the pistol withdrew. A couple of
10 minutes later I saw a male person appear at the window.
11 I saw him holding a pistol in a hand. I saw him fire
12 the pistol towards troops in Rossville Street,
13 Londonderry.
14 "I fired one 7.62 rounds at the gunman at the same
15 time that C fired.
16 "The man appeared to be thrown backwards. He
17 disappeared out of sight. The window closed. I did not
18 see this gunman again."
19 He also, when he was making his Treasury Solicitor's
20 statement, refers to this. I wonder could we go to
21 that, it is at D76, paragraph 7:
22 "C pointed out a window in Block 1 indicated on my
23 photograph at X. I was positioned at the other end of
24 the line marked 2. As I watched I saw the window open
25 a little from the bottom and a hand with a pistol come
1 out. I saw the kick of the pistol firing and heard the
2 sound but could not distinguish a muzzle flash. It was
3 not aimed at us, but was aimed at the ground below.
4 I cocked my weapon and fired one round which struck the
5 framework or wall near the pistol to one side of the
6 window.
7 "8. The pistol withdrew but a couple of minutes
8 later at the same window I saw a man through the glass
9 holding a pistol in his hand. I cannot remember if it
10 was his left or his right hand. I saw him raise the
11 pistol again and heard him fire. C and I fired one
12 round each almost at the same time. The man appeared to
13 be thrown backwards and vanished from sight. I saw the
14 glass of the window had been broken and think our rounds
15 went through it and hit him."
16 That does not accord with the account that you give
17 because you say at this stage you fired two shots?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. And you say that you were the person who fired the first
20 shot that actually struck the wall?
21 A. The first shot that I fired hit the wall. I do not know
22 the sequence of events there and it is -- I cannot
23 remember it, but from what I writ down on that, um, on
24 my Royal Military Police statement, that is what
25 I remember that as it was. Everything was going so
1 fast, and I am not saying that to confuse anybody, it
2 is, um, we was --
3 Q. The difference is, so far as D is accounting for you
4 firing one round, and you say you fired five rounds?
5 A. Altogether.
6 Q. Yes?
7 A. That is two different targets and this is where I can
8 confirm that I was the first one to be there, because
9 I see the very first gunman come round from the bottom
10 of the flats, Rossville, and I also see -- which took my
11 attention from that -- with the, the -- my attention
12 went to the window.
13 Q. What I suggest to you: if the sequence that you gave at
14 the time in these statements and to Lord Widgery is
15 right, there was no gunman at the corner of the block,
16 there were only good Samaritans, people trying to
17 assist?
18 A. No, sir --
19 Q. -- the deceased and injured?
20 A. There was a gunman there, sir.
21 Q. And there was no-one firing from windows?
22 A. There was, sir.
23 Q. That was a time, I suggest to you, when the Army were in
24 control of the area, but above all there were ambulances
25 and other persons around and the shots that were fired
1 were fired at them in the course of the decent, good
2 work that they were trying to undertake. Did you fire
3 at them?
4 A. No, sir.
5 Q. It would be a wicked, appalling action; would it not?
6 A. Yes, sir.
7 Q. But someone appeared to have done that?
8 A. Sir, I can assure you, sir, it was not me; I fired at
9 two positive targets.
10 Q. I do not intend to go over all of the matters dealt with
11 this morning by Mr Roxburgh, but when you were being
12 questioned at Widgery, you were absolutely adamant,
13 adamant, that you were lying on the ground when you
14 fired those shots. In spite of rigorous questioning by
15 Mr Hill, your answer was simply to him, "I was lying
16 there; I say I saw what I saw and tough on you," in
17 effect; you recall that was your attitude, was it not?
18 A. The only thing that probably was over the top was the
19 bit about lying on the floor and I probably was lying on
20 the floor and explained to the Tribunal this, that the
21 sequence of lying, kneeling and arriving at the, um, at
22 the top of the ramp would, would be distorted maybe in
23 some way or other, but the point is, I did fire at the
24 first gunman and fired at the second gunman.
25 Whether I was lying on the floor or on my knee,
1 standing up --
2 Q. The truth of the matter is you did fire five shots?
3 A. Yes, sir.
4 Q. What I am trying to work out is where you fired them and
5 when you fired them. Perhaps if you just bear with me.
6 A. Yes, sir.
7 Q. You do accept you were over the top when you were being
8 examined by Mr Hill because you were just ruthlessly
9 determined to stick to your story although it was
10 profoundly silly?
11 A. No, no, no, that was not the case at all. He was
12 brow-beating me and probably as a young man, not
13 retaliating, just putting and stating my case as firmly
14 as he was trying to make -- not state it.
15 Q. All that he was trying to do was to make you see sense?
16 A. Yes, sir, but the way he was saying it, it made me speak
17 forcefully as well. Now, being older, I can manage to,
18 um, relate to the way you are speaking to me, I can
19 speak back exactly the same way.
20 Q. Let us go and see at page B68.28, if we go to letter C.
21 He has already pointed out to you in fact that the
22 photograph that you produced, it was not relied upon by
23 any other person in this Inquiry, it did not show the
24 three-foot wall around the location where you were. He
25 then, at letter C:
1 "Question: On the model I am now pointing to the
2 place where you were lying; is that right?
3 "Answer: Yes.
4 "Question: On this model before my Lord there is no
5 wall shown around the pram ramp? Is that not correct?
6 "Answer: No, there is not.
7 "Question: On the model which you have previously
8 seen is it also true to say that there is no wall around
9 the pram ramp?
10 "Answer: Yes.
11 "Question: There is no wall on the other model
12 which you have seen?
13 "Answer: No.
14 "Question: But you have seen close-up aerial
15 photographs which I have put to you?
16 "Answer: Yes.
17 "Question: Not the photograph which illustrates
18 your own evidence?
19 "Answer: Yes.
20 "Question: But other photographs representing other
21 people's evidence. I have shown you the wall from an
22 aerial photograph?
23 "Answer: Yes.
24 "Question: Might it have been that you have picked
25 your position out from a model somewhere else but not in
1 fact given us the real position where you were that day?
2 "Answer: No."
3 Is it that you were rehearsed before you came in to
4 give evidence at Lord Widgery using a model and
5 photographs, but unfortunately the model and the
6 photographs did not accurately reflect the physical
7 position of the wall on that day?
8 A. I cannot remember that, sir. I cannot remember the
9 models or being, as you say, coerced into doing
10 something, I cannot remember that.
11 Q. I am not saying coerced, I am saying rehearsed?
12 A. Rehearsed, then.
13 Q. It is quite obvious now that you could not have been
14 lying on a ramp and discharged the shots that you now
15 claim; you accept that now, do you not?
16 A. I do not accept it fully because, um, at one time
17 I was -- I might have fired one shot, then come up into
18 the kneeling position, then into the standing position
19 or crouching position. I cannot tell you now, sir, the
20 way, that the sequence of events -- this all happened so
21 quick, in a matter of seconds. If I arrived there
22 I might have been lying down because of fire going off
23 first of all, to determine where the fire was coming
24 from. Then into the kneeling position. When you are
25 under fire --
1 Q. Yes, thank you. If you were lying when you fired
2 a shot, that is lying down, it was a cowboy shot?
3 A. No.
4 Q. Because you could not see where you were firing and what
5 would have happened is, if you were lying down and fired
6 towards the southwest block of block No. 1, it would go
7 well over the heads of persons who were in and around
8 that vicinity?
9 A. Sir --
10 Q. We have seen that on the photographs this morning. It
11 is not my intention to go over it again, but would you
12 accept that? If you were lying down and fired a shot
13 from that position, it would go well over the heads of
14 persons who were at that southwest corner?
15 A. I cannot accept that at this moment, because I am not
16 there and if I was there or if we was back in that same
17 position, then laying down we could -- you cannot get
18 the angle of that, um, wall going down and see how far
19 it was from your head height. Really, if it was to go
20 back to the Tribunal, we should go back and say, "Let us
21 see it at head height".
22 Q. Let us deal with a soldier then who was known as SA8, to
23 this Inquiry as soldier 200, that is the officer in
24 command of Composite Platoon. I wonder could we go to
25 B2006. He is being examined at this stage by
1 Mr Gibbens. If we go to letter C and the second
2 question:
3 "Question: Going back then to the time you arrived
4 at the north end of number one block, Rossville Flats,
5 when you got there were there about four Pigs in and
6 about that vicinity?
7 "Answer: There were at least three, perhaps four,
8 yes.
9 "Question: Including the company commander's Pig?
10 "Answer: Yes."
11 A. Excuse me, sir, whereabouts are we up to here?
12 Q. I wonder could we highlight it, it is at letter D now:
13 "Question: Including the company commander's Pig?
14 "Answer: Yes.
15 "Question: Was he busy on the radio when you got
16 there?
17 "Answer: Yes, he was.
18 "Question: Did you speak to him?
19 "Answer: Once he was finished on the radio I did,
20 yes.
21 "Question: Did you make any observation about the
22 firing that was occurring at that time?
23 "Answer: I cannot remember the exact words, but
24 I did express concern at the amount of firing going on
25 at that time and he agreed with me.
1 "Question: What sort of firing were you referring
2 to?
3 "Answer: I was just referring to the general
4 firing, including ourselves. I was not expecting our
5 soldiers to fire.
6 "Question: Was there any, except military firing,
7 that you observed?
8 "Answer: I am not experienced in hearing the
9 weapons fired by the IRA. At that time I had only been
10 out in Ulster for two months. I heard a lot of bangs
11 and I could not tell what they were.
12 "Question: Did you at that time see a Pig with two
13 bodies in the back, or three?
14 "Answer: I remember seeing a Pig draw up with
15 bodies in the back; the exact moment I am not sure.
16 "Question: Did the company commander then shout
17 orders for cease firing?
18 "Answer: He called across to the soldiers on the
19 west side of Rossville Street to stop firing. He might
20 have said something else. I remember him saying those
21 words, anyway.
22 "Question: At that time did you put your head round
23 the corner of the Rossville Flats to look down
24 Rossville Street?
25 "Answer: Yes.
1 "Question: The direction of Free Derry Corner?
2 "Answer: I did.
3 "Question: When you peered round the corner like
4 that what did you see?
5 "Answer: I was looking at the barricade and I saw
6 one person behind the barricade. He was quite an old
7 man, his head was popping up and down and at one time he
8 did raise one arm.
9 "Question: Did you see whether he was injured or
10 not?
11 "Answer: I did not know at that time whether he was
12 injured or not.
13 "Question: At the time when you saw him there
14 raising an arm from time to time was any shot fired at
15 him from the military, that is to say, from your right,
16 that you heard?
17 "Answer: No, there was a lull in the firing.
18 "Question: When did you go to see what your men
19 were doing?
20 "Answer: I made use of the lull in the firing and
21 dashed directly across Rossville Street at speed to this
22 area here. I cannot remember exactly the sequence of
23 events from then on, but I do remember looking up to the
24 Rossville Flats area, Block 1, the windows, and
25 I remember before moving across Rossville Street the
1 company commander's operator saying, 'Beware, sir, there
2 is a gunman shooting out of the Rossville Flats'.
3 "Question: Having walked across?
4 "Answer: Ran.
5 "Question: -- at some time -- and you say you
6 cannot clearly remember the exact sequence of events --
7 did you look up in the direction of the Rossville Flats?
8 "Answer: Yes.
9 "Question: Did you see anything unusual from there?
10 "Answer: One or two windows were opening and
11 shutting again. I was looking all over the flats.
12 I did see a glimpse of one arm extended outside the
13 window. I do not know whether it was the left arm or
14 right arm of a person because I could not see much of
15 the body behind that arm because of the window.
16 I assumed it was the left arm. He had something in his
17 hand.
18 "Question: Did you hear anything?
19 "Answer: I did not hear any firing and I cannot
20 definitely say it was a pistol or any other weapon. It
21 was a small object.
22 "Question: A small something held in his hand?
23 "Answer: Yes.
24 "Question: Did you stay to watch it for any time?
25 "Answer: It was just a glimpse and it went in
1 again.
2 "Question: Where did you go after that?
3 "Answer: I came towards Columbcille Court and then
4 I heard firing coming from our direction in the low rise
5 flats, one or two shots firing at the flats.
6 "Question: Coming from your direction or to your
7 direction?
8 "Answer: From our direction.
9 "Question: To the Rossville Flats. Did you see who
10 was firing from there?
11 "Answer: I did not, no. It was only about two or
12 three shots. By the time I had come round the end of
13 Columbcille Court again there was nobody else firing.
14 I saw two of our soldiers up on the top of the ramp
15 leading up to those low rise flats at Kells Walk.
16 "Question: But you did not see what they were
17 firing at?
18 "Answer: No.
19 "Question: At about this time did you go to
20 Glenfada Park?
21 "Answer: Not Glenfada park, no.
22 "Question: Nor did you give any orders for any of
23 your officers to go to Glenfada Park?"
24 Let us just deal with that. This soldier was the
25 officer commanding Composite Platoon and basically what
1 he is saying, I have gone down through it in some
2 detail, is that he saw an open window; he saw a hand and
3 an arm; he saw an object; he could not possibly identify
4 it as a weapon, but he heard no firing apart from the
5 location that you were in?
6 A. (Witness nodding)
7 Q. There was no firing from any window in the
8 Rossville Flats when you fired; was there?
9 A. Yes, there was, yes. Yes, there was, he was probably
10 looking from a different angle, but there was definitely
11 fire coming from the Rossville Flats.
12 Q. He was looking at the Rossville Flats as he crossed over
13 and, not only was he looking at the flats, he was
14 listening, and the only shots he heard came from the
15 position or the location that you were in and that was
16 after concern was being expressed about the amount of
17 firing?
18 A. Sir, the firing was coming from both sides, sir, so --
19 Q. After the cease fire order had been given?
20 A. No, cease fire had been given -- once the cease fire was
21 given, there was no firing.
22 Q. That is also not so. We have heard the tape of the
23 first order to cease fire and there was firing after it,
24 in fact three shots.
25 The window that you saw in these flats, it had six
1 shots in it, but you did not fire six shots at a window;
2 did you?
3 A. No.
4 Q. You, according to your account, fired three, one of
5 which missed?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. Two of which entered it?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. According to the evidence of D, he fired two shots, one
10 of which missed; one of which went in?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. So when you looked at the window and you saw two shots,
13 if there were three shots that went through it, the
14 shots being fired simultaneously, how did you miss that?
15 A. Because you could not see nothing behind your weapon,
16 sir, I answered this to the Tribunal before --
17 Q. You told -- before you start to go on: you have told the
18 Tribunal, as you told the Widgery Tribunal, when you
19 looked through, you could see two bullet holes in the
20 window. If three shots went through it, why did you not
21 see three bullet holes?
22 A. I did not notice three, sir, it is not of, um ...
23 Q. You also say that what you saw was in fact the right
24 hand holding the window open with the left hand placed
25 over it --
1 A. Under it.
2 Q. Under it; "across his right arm," not under it?
3 A. Well, across the right arm.
4 Q. Not under it?
5 A. I would say it was under.
6 Q. If you placed it across it --
7 A. All I can remember, sir. (Indicating)
8 Q. If the shot had gone through, if the person was a
9 gunman, holding the window up with his right hand and
10 his left hand across it, he would have shot through the
11 window?
12 A. No.
13 Q. It would have had to have been under it?
14 A. It was under it, his arm was under it.
15 Q. You see, I suggest to you again your timings do not fit
16 in with any sequence of known shots, apart from towards
17 the very end, when someone fired into the window of
18 a house that was occupied by people called McCrudden and
19 that those shots were fired by F and G and there were
20 six shots they claim to have fired and six shots hit
21 that window. There is no evidence of any other window
22 being fired at.
23 I want to ask you this question: are you prepared to
24 tell this Tribunal today actually when you did fire?
25 A. Sir, when I, when I writ down -- going back to remember,
1 I fired at -- when there was danger to other soldiers
2 and when I see a positive target.
3 Q. But you did not fire five shots from that veranda?
4 A. Yes, I did. I fired two shots at the corner of the
5 flats, Rossville Flats and three shots at the window
6 that was open with the gunman sticking out of the
7 window.
8 Q. And I suggest to you if you did, they were simply
9 reckless shots?
10 A. No, sir, these were positive shots at a positive target.
11 Q. Reckless in the sense that they were motivated by
12 a wretched attitude to the people in Derry that day?
13 A. No, sir, no, sir, no, not whatsoever.
14 Q. They are not accounted for, I respectfully put to you,
15 by the story that you invented to justify them?
16 A. Sir, I did not invent a story. Everything that was
17 written down and given to -- the only problem is here,
18 that the Royal Military Police statement is probably not
19 enough detail in there because --
20 Q. The problem about that is also you never told the Royal
21 Military Police about taking 20 prisoners to a location
22 in Little James Street or anywhere else. So is it,
23 Soldier C, that in fact you were in the action a lot
24 earlier than the sequence of events that are related in
25 in your subsequent statements in evidence would actually
1 lead one to believe and that you fired your shots at an
2 earlier stage than when you were on that veranda?
3 A. No, sir, them shots were all fired from that veranda at
4 that point.
5 Q. You have said that the failure lies in your RMP
6 statement --
7 A. Not failure, sir, I am not saying it is a failure,
8 I mean to say the detail has come on from this
9 statement, from the statements consequently coming on
10 and on and on and now, 30 years down the line, you are
11 wanting details that I have to remember from 33 years
12 ago -- 32 years ago, sorry.
13 Q. The failure does not come from the RMP statement, the
14 failure comes from the detail you supplied later in your
15 testimony to the Widgery Tribunal and provided to the
16 solicitor acting on behalf of the Tribunal in obtaining
17 statements; that is the real problem, do you not see
18 that?
19 A. The problem is, is, as it goes further on, the Inquiry,
20 from the Widgery Inquiry to this Inquiry, the detail has
21 got more into depth and time has gone by so really
22 things get distorted.
23 But what you got to look at, my statement has not
24 lied about anything that has been done, anything that,
25 um, could have gone on that day, there is no untruths
1 about it.
2 Q. Soldier 200 actually relates hearing the sound of firing
3 coming from the location that you were in when
4 Mr Alex Nash was behind the barricade. Did you shoot
5 him?
6 A. No, sir, I cannot -- no, sir.
7 Q. Is that the person whom you have described as being
8 behind the actual wall, because he had to come out from
9 that direction and walk towards that barricade?
10 A. Sir, the person that I fired at had a long coat on or
11 a longish coat with a gun, with a gun underneath it.
12 Q. I suggest to you that fundamentally you did not tell the
13 truth in 1972 when you were offered an opportunity to do
14 so by Mr Hill and you have persisted over a period of
15 30 years in denying the truth --
16 A. No, sir.
17 Q. -- and access to information which could shed real light
18 on how 13 people came to be killed and 14 people came to
19 be injured on that day; do you understand?
20 A. Yes. No, sir.
21 Questioned by MR GLASGOW
22 MR GLASGOW: Soldier C, just to try to clarify two matters
23 with you: first of all, it has been suggested to you
24 this afternoon by Mr Harvey, who has just sat down, that
25 you have either lied to this Tribunal by putting your
1 firing too late or too early; do you understand that?
2 A. Yes, sir.
3 Q. Both those suggestions are being put to you?
4 A. Yes, I understand that.
5 Q. Can you simply help the Tribunal again to the best of
6 your current recollection: what did you see going on in
7 Rossville Street when you first looked down and saw what
8 you have described as the gunman coming out?
9 A. A dark shadow of a coat flowing round.
10 Q. Did you see anything else, any other activity in
11 Rossville Street that you have a recollection of?
12 A. Not now. Not at this moment, you know, just I could
13 see -- in Rossville Street and Rossville Flats. The two
14 things that are sticking out in my mind are the two most
15 important things. The gunman at the corner of the flats
16 and the gunman that was in the window, or gun woman,
17 whatever; that is the two things that I know I am
18 positive of, because that was where I was focused and
19 knew exactly what was going on, sir.
20 Q. Secondly, can we come to the suggestions made about the
21 dishonest story that you told the Royal Military Police
22 from the outset. Can we look at your statement which --
23 you have the hard copy in front of you -- it is at
24 page 44, 45 and 46; do you see those pages, the bottom
25 right-hand corner. I would like, if I may, to look at
1 page 46 first, if we could have that on the screen,
2 please.
3 At some time we are told, and no-one seriously
4 doubts that someone may have been doing their best, that
5 this map was marked up.
6 Did you have any part in the marking of it, can you
7 remember, Soldier C?
8 A. No part of that whatsoever.
9 Q. If I can have control of it. I take it very
10 shortly: what somebody is trying to do here is point out
11 where you were and they have got an arrow going to the
12 bottom right, in fact it goes to the bottom right-hand
13 corner of that Kells Walk block?
14 A. Yes, that is where I was.
15 Q. Did you put that arrow there?
16 A. I cannot remember that, sir.
17 Q. Do you recall ever seeing this document, because we have
18 only got a rather faded copy. Somebody has put a cross
19 on the other side of the building, if you can see, just
20 there and you have been telling, if I may, I hope,
21 helpfully lead you on this without any dispute; you have
22 been describing to the Tribunal that in fact you were on
23 the other corner?
24 A. On the other corner, exactly, sir.
25 Q. To be exactly technical. Where the cross is, in other
1 words, you were closer to that corner there; do you see?
2 A. Yes, closer to the corner away from that faded cross,
3 yes.
4 Q. Did you have any part at all in the marking of the
5 plan --
6 A. No.
7 Q. Can you recall whether anybody ever showed it to you
8 after they had marked it up for you?
9 A. No, no, I cannot recall that at all, sir.
10 Q. The positions of the gunmen are described as being
11 approximately a third of the way along the
12 Rossville Flats on the west side; do you see that?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. And at the extreme corner, right on the extreme corner,
15 bottom left-hand corner?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. Are we right in thinking those are the positions,
18 certainly, that you would have marked if you had been
19 asked to mark this map?
20 A. Most certainly, sir.
21 Q. Can we look at what was written down for you in the
22 early hours of the morning by, as we know, the young
23 corporal who took your statement, among many others that
24 morning.
25 Do you happen to remember anything about the young
1 corporal who took your statement?
2 A. No, sir.
3 Q. Do you even remember the process by which it was taken?
4 A. Not at all, sir, nothing.
5 Q. We will go back to the start, I will take it very
6 shortly. Page 44, please. What the young man wrote
7 down, and I think you signed to, the description of you
8 having moved from the veranda. Follow it with me, the
9 last three lines, will you. What is written down is:
10 "I saw at an end flat of Rossville Flats on the
11 ground floor, and in an opening ..."
12 If those are the words that you spoke, do you
13 remember anybody asking you what you meant by, "on the
14 ground floor and in an opening," or do you remember
15 speaking those words, or if you did speak them, anybody
16 asking you what they meant before they simply wrote them
17 down?
18 A. No.
19 Q. You go on to say the person was wearing a dark coat:
20 "He was observing troops in Rossville Street.
21 I then heard the sound of a shot."
22 Can you remember --
23 A. Could you say that again, sir, I am sorry?
24 Q. The last line we have there, I am sorry, I am going too
25 quickly:
1 "He was observing the troops in Rossville Street.
2 I then heard the sound of a shot."
3 A. Yes, sir.
4 Q. All right, those are the words written down. Over the
5 page. What is written down is:
6 "The man disappeared. The shot came from his
7 location."
8 If you spoke those words that have been written
9 down, do you recall whether you spoke them in that
10 order?
11 A. I would have spoken them in that order, yes, sir.
12 Q. You said, "The man disappeared" and the next sentence:
13 "The shot came from his location."
14 Do you have any recollection of the way you put
15 this?
16 A. It might be one way or the other, sir, I cannot actually
17 remember that. What you got to think of, we had been
18 out all night and we was tired and, you know, sort of
19 everybody had been -- so maybe the grammar is a little
20 bit mixed up or something here.
21 Q. Did you actually recall that this was at 1.30 in the
22 morning?
23 A. I remember we was all tired, it was, you know, we had
24 a long journey there, a long journey back.
25 I will say, sir, with that, when we was doing the --
1 taking the statements, you know, doing the statements
2 with the military police, it was not, it was a statement
3 as such to try and get a picture of what was going on
4 that day, what had gone on that day and the detail is
5 not as conclusive as what it should be on there, sir.
6 Q. Yes. Were you asked about anything other than the shots
7 that you yourself fired, can you recall?
8 A. No, I cannot remember none of that, sir, no.
9 Q. It has been perfectly correctly pointed out to you that
10 you do not appear to have volunteered to the Royal
11 Military Police in the statement that you made at 1.30
12 that morning the fact that you had taken any part at all
13 in helping with the shepherding the arrested people to
14 the collection place; do you remember?
15 A. I cannot remember that, but maybe that was because of --
16 partly it was an everyday thing to shepherd them, sir.
17 Q. Let me ask you this: did you have any reason at all to
18 conceal from the police that you had played a role in
19 the arrest procedure, had any suggestion been made to
20 you that perhaps you should not admit to that for any
21 reason?
22 A. No, sir, no.
23 Q. Looking at the top five lines we have, you have been
24 read them many times, I want to give you this last
25 opportunity, seeing the sequence in which they are put.
1 "The man disappeared. The shot came from his
2 location. I saw him with a long stick-like object which
3 he put into the aim position. I cocked my weapon.
4 "The man disappeared."
5 LORD SAVILLE: I think, "reappeared".
6 MR GLASGOW: "The man reappeared. I fired two ... rounds."
7 Did anybody, did the policeman or anybody else ask
8 you whether anything happened between the disappearance
9 and the reappearance of the man to cause you to fire?
10 A. No, sir.
11 Q. Did anybody suggest to you that night that there was
12 some importance in you describing why you had not fired
13 on the first occasion but did fire when he reappeared?
14 A. Not at all, sir, no.
15 Q. Did you appreciate there was any significance in that
16 yourself?
17 A. Yes, I do, yes.
18 Q. The last matter that has been put to you in respect of
19 this is that you must have agreed to give similar
20 stories with Soldier D. You will not of course mention
21 his name, but you will refresh your memory, if you need
22 to, from the list, the corporal.
23 A. Yes, sir.
24 Q. We of course know from the list that his statement was
25 taken on the same night, shortly after yours, by the
1 same man; did you in fact get together with Soldier D?
2 A. No.
3 Q. Did you even appreciate that you were not precisely
4 corroborating one another?
5 A. Did I appreciate the fact --
6 Q. Did you appreciate the fact that Soldier D was telling
7 a slightly different story to yours?
8 A. I did not really know what he had written.
9 Q. Did anybody ever suggest to you, either a policeman or
10 a lawyer who also took statements from you on the same
11 day, on the 5th March, that you should in some way put
12 your heads together to iron out the differences between
13 you?
14 A. Not -- no, no, categorically, no.
15 Q. In view of the allegations that have been put to you,
16 I would like to ask you this on oath: is anything that
17 you have said to this Tribunal today a lie?
18 A. No, sir, not one part of it, sir.
19 Questioned by MR ROXBURGH
20 MR ROXBURGH: May we have on the screen, please, page
21 B68.016. Soldier C, we have looked at this statement
22 a number of times now, it is the statement
23 5th March 1972 and in paragraph 8 you will recall that
24 you gave the description of one of the sergeants sending
25 your force over to the end of the front building of
1 Columbcille Court and you being part of a group of half
2 a dozen soldiers who took a party of about 20 prisoners
3 back to a collection point and then you said:
4 "I then returned to the Columbcille Court building
5 ..."
6 And you went on to describe the two incidents of
7 firing at a gunman; you remember that?
8 A. Yes, sir.
9 Q. So it is quite clear from this statement that, on
10 5th March, you were saying that the episode in relation
11 to the prisoners took place before you went up to the
12 balcony and took part in the incidents of shooting
13 towards the gunman; is that not right?
14 A. Yes, I cannot remember the sequence of events, but if
15 I have said that then, that was probably right, but
16 I cannot remember the sequence at that time, sir.
17 Q. Is it just that it was probably right if that was what
18 you said on 5th March or can we be fairly sure that if
19 that is what you said on 5th March it is right?
20 A. I would say you could be sure on that, sir, I would say.
21 Q. Do you think there is any possibility that you made
22 a mistake on 5th March and you got the order of events
23 wrong?
24 A. No, sir, I am going back to try and remember the
25 5th March. I am pretty certain there was no mistakes.
1 I cannot be 100 per cent because, you know, sort of,
2 I just cannot go back that far and remember.
3 Q. The next thing I would like to do is to play you a clip
4 of another video. What you are going to see on the
5 screen is some footage of a group of individuals who had
6 been arrested, being brought into Rossville Street past
7 the staircase that you at some point went up to take you
8 on to the balcony of Kells Walk; do you understand?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. After I have shown you the footage -- it is video 3 at 8
11 minutes 50 seconds -- I am going to ask you whether
12 anything that you see in the footage enables you to say
13 one way or the other whether that is the group of people
14 you were responsible for shepherding; do you understand?
15 A. Yes, sir.
16 Q. Let us play the footage now.
17 (Video 3 played)
18 Here they come, past that staircase. Here is some
19 footage of some people being put into the area under the
20 stairs. Can we go back and play that footage once more,
21 please.
22 (Video 3 played)
23 Having seen that, can you help as to whether or not
24 that is the group of people you were involved in
25 shepherding?
1 A. I cannot remember, sir. I cannot, it is, it is very
2 vague. I cannot -- you know, I am trying to look for
3 something there to see if I can relate to it and
4 I cannot.
5 Q. Without mentioning any soldier's name if you know it,
6 did you see any soldier in that footage who you
7 recognised?
8 A. One person, the very first one.
9 Q. The very first one. Let us go back to the beginning,
10 please. Do you mean that one?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. That is Colonel Wilford.
13 A. Mmm.
14 Q. Could we just go, finally, to the second half of that
15 footage once more, please, when we get the second group
16 of prisoners. What you will see is an individual who
17 moves across the screen from left to right, I just ask
18 you to look at him, can we play forward, please. There
19 he comes, do you see, walking across. Go back a few
20 seconds, please, and play it again.
21 Do you have any idea who he was?
22 A. No, sir.
23 Q. Thank you very much.
24 LORD SAVILLE: Mr Roxburgh, I am addressing my remarks to
25 everybody, we do have a clip of a video of a group of
1 soldiers coming across from roughly the William
2 Street/Rossville Street direction down by the derelict
3 building and then along the back of the houses at
4 Chamberlain Street. I am not sure we are certain who
5 those soldiers are. I am really asking for everybody's
6 assistance on that short clip of video.
7 Mr Harvey, can you help at all?
8 MR HARVEY: It is on video 48, segment 10.34. Really
9 I cannot really assist as to who the soldiers are.
10 LORD SAVILLE: I am wondering since, on this witness's
11 account, that would be the direction he and some of his
12 platoon would have gone, whether it is worth showing
13 this to him to see whether he can recognise himself or
14 any of the people he might have been with during the
15 day.
16 MR HARVEY: Indeed, it would be worthwhile, I believe, in
17 doing that.
18 LORD SAVILLE: This is a clip of a video showing some
19 soldiers running more or less in the direction you said
20 you were running when you got to and then went down the
21 back of the Chamberlain Street houses. We will show it
22 to you; if you can see yourself or anyone you think
23 might have been with you on the day, could you tell us
24 to stop.
25 A. Yes, sir.
1 (Video 48 played)
2 MR HARVEY: It is further back, in fact we have passed it
3 now.
4 LORD SAVILLE: Try playing it from there.
5 (Video 48 played)
6 This may not be the one.
7 Mr Elias, you drew attention to the fact that in the
8 background you could see various vehicles moving; do you
9 have a reference?
10 MR ELIAS: We think it is video 1, 5 minutes and 16 seconds.
11 LORD SAVILLE: Can we try that. I think that was it, was it
12 not? Run it frame by frame from there. These soldiers,
13 if you look at them carefully.
14 (Video 1 played)
15 A. If you could freeze-frame that, go back and come forward
16 again a touch more. That is it. Stop. (Pause).
17 LORD SAVILLE: Does that ring any bells with you?
18 A. (Pause). I cannot think of his name, sir.
19 LORD SAVILLE: I beg your pardon?
20 A. I cannot think of his name, I can --
21 LORD SAVILLE: The soldier on the left in the picture?
22 A. Yes.
23 LORD SAVILLE: Not to worry at the moment about his name;
24 was he one of those who was with you, do you remember?
25 A. Oh, no, I do not think so, I am only going back from
1 what I remember, you know, about the soldiers, you know,
2 that I was in the Army with, sir.
3 LORD SAVILLE: Do not tell it out loud, but do you have his
4 name in mind or think what it might have been?
5 A. Sir, I cannot remember. I have even gone through all of
6 these and I do not even know none of them, sir.
7 LORD SAVILLE: Well, thank you for trying.
8 A. It is just he looked familiar.
9 LORD SAVILLE: So you really cannot help us with this shot
10 of soldiers coming across?
11 A. No, sir, not unless there is some more to come out of
12 here.
13 LORD SAVILLE: I think that is probably it, but we will run
14 it on a little bit.
15 (Video 1 played)
16 I think that is probably about as far as we go.
17 Again, that does not ring any bells?
18 A. No, sir, no.
19 LORD SAVILLE: What I think is --and I am addressing myself
20 to everybody at the moment -- is perhaps of some
21 importance in that clip is that if you look into the car
22 park as those soldiers are going down the wall of
23 Chamberlain Street, where Jackie Duddy fell there does
24 not appear to be a group there at that time.
25 Mr Roxburgh, if you want to ask anything further?
1 MR ROXBURGH: No, sir.
2 LORD SAVILLE: Soldier C, thank you very much indeed for
3 coming here to give evidence to us. Thank you.
4 (The witness withdrew)
5 We will take a break now to give our LiveNote writer
6 a short rest.
7 (2.45 pm)
8 (A short break)
9 (2.55 pm)
10 INQ1318, sworn
11 Questioned by MS McGAHEY
12 LORD SAVILLE: If you look across to your left, I am the
13 Chairman. I say this to all the witnesses: the
14 questions will come from the barristers, they are the
15 people in front of me. Could you move that microphone a
16 little closer towards you, you can pull it towards you
17 if you like, and then we will all be able to hear what
18 you have to say.
19 MS McGAHEY: INQ1318, do you have with you, please, a copy
20 of the statement you made to this Inquiry and signed on
21 25th January 2000?
22 A. I have.
23 Q. I understand that you have had a chance to reconsider
24 some of the information that you gave in that statement?
25 A. That is correct.
1 Q. In the statement, if we could have, please, paragraph 3,
2 you say at 30th January 1972 you were a colour sergeant
3 in HQ Company of 1 Para, and that made up part of
4 Guinness Force. You also say at paragraph 4 that
5 because you were a colour sergeant on 30th January 1972,
6 you were the platoon commander of 1 platoon of
7 Guinness Force.
8 Is it right now that on reflection you believe you
9 were probably an acting colour sergeant but holding the
10 rank of sergeant on the day?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. And that when you say you were in command of a platoon,
13 what you in fact meant to say was that you were the most
14 senior bandsman among the men who made up
15 Composite Platoon on that day?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. So if a group of bandsmen within Composite Platoon were
18 together, you would take command of that group?
19 A. I would.
20 Q. However, when the Composite Platoon were split, as we
21 will see it was, into half platoons, the relevant NCOs
22 would take command of those platoons and one of those
23 commanders was not you?
24 A. No, that is correct.
25 Q. Subject to those corrections, are the contents of your
1 statement true to the best of your knowledge and belief?
2 A. It is.
3 Q. I would like to ask you a little more about the make-up
4 of Composite Platoon or Guinness Force on
5 30th January 1972. Can I ask you to look first at part
6 of a statement known to the Inquiry as Captain 200. He
7 was in fact the officer commanding Guinness Force on the
8 day. Please, do not give his name, but do you remember
9 who he was?
10 A. No.
11 Q. Do you have a list in front of you?
12 A. I have.
13 Q. Is that name familiar to you?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. I should have said before I started asking you any
16 questions, as I am sure you are aware, not only you but
17 many soldiers in this Inquiry have been granted
18 anonymity, so please do not give the names of any in the
19 course of your answers?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. Do you remember that officer being in command of
22 Guinness Force on 30th January 1972?
23 A. No.
24 Q. I would like to ask you to look at a portion of the
25 statement he has made to this Inquiry, could we have
1 2022.001, please, paragraph 6. He said, talking in
2 general terms about the organisation of Guinness Force:
3 "There was never any problem with raising volunteers
4 for Guinness Force duty and I would have been assisted
5 considerably in this by my two colour sergeants INQ147
6 and Soldier 002, who were both experienced soldiers."
7 Could you please have a look at the list that you
8 have with you and look at the names of INQ147 and 002?
9 A. Can you bear with me. Yes, I have got them here.
10 Q. Do you remember either of those two men?
11 A. I remember INQ147.
12 Q. Do you remember him being in charge of any part of
13 Guinness Force?
14 A. No.
15 Q. On the day. Do you remember 002?
16 A. No.
17 Q. I would like to ask you to look at another part of the
18 material provided by Captain 200. Could we have
19 B2022.012, please. Could we have the top two entries.
20 This is a list of documents that Soldier 200 has
21 provided to the Inquiry. The first document is
22 described as:
23 "Typed list of members of Guinness Force attached to
24 Support Company with manuscript annotations."
25 He then gives a description:
1 "This is a list of the personnel to be deployed as
2 Guinness Force. The platoon was split into two call
3 signs. Manuscript additions show what weapons were
4 issued to some of the men on 30th January 1972. 'RUC'
5 refers to a batten gun V to a visor. Soldier 200 does
6 not know precisely when this document was prepared or
7 when the manuscript annotations were made."
8 Below that he refers to a manuscript list of
9 personnel in Guinness Force on 30th January 1972. He
10 believes he prepared it and that it was written shortly
11 after the event.
12 Those documents, the typed list and the manuscript
13 list, are in the possession of the Inquiry.
14 Sir, I am sorry to say they are both still
15 undergoing redaction and have not yet been made
16 generally available to the parties. However, in order
17 to assist this witness's recollection, they have been
18 made available to him.
19 I understand you have with you at the moment a copy
20 of the typed list. Is it right that that list is split
21 into two halves, one half entitled "CS call sign 71" and
22 the other "call sign 71A"?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. It appears from that list that Captain 200 was in
25 command of the group, the half platoon with the call
1 sign 71 and Sergeant 002 was in command of the half
2 platoon with the call sign 71A; is that right?
3 A. That is correct.
4 Q. If you look down the list you will see your name appears
5 about halfway down in the left-hand list, under call
6 sign 71?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. It appears from that, does it not, that you were in the
9 half platoon under the command of Captain 200 on the
10 day?
11 A. It does.
12 Q. If you look at that list and see the names of others who
13 were there with you, does that bring back any
14 recollections at all of --
15 A. No.
16 Q. Who you were with on the day?
17 A. No.
18 Q. Or who was commanding you on the day?
19 A. No.
20 Q. It is right, is it not, that on this list your rank is
21 given as sergeant?
22 A. Correct.
23 Q. And that, in addition to Captain 200, there is, in the
24 group given the call sign 71, a colour sergeant, who is
25 INQ147, and a company sergeant major, INQ1710?
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. It appears that all three of those would have been
3 senior to you if it came to the question of who should
4 take command of this half platoon?
5 A. That is right.
6 Q. Before we leave these lists, I would like to ask you
7 about one member of Guinness Force in particular.
8 I would like to ask you to look not only at the list,
9 but at your statement to this Inquiry, C1318.3,
10 paragraph 14. You are talking there about the events of
11 Bloody Sunday and having heard a drainpipe being
12 shattered by a shot. What you say at the bottom of that
13 paragraph is:
14 "The only person who I can remember being with me
15 was [blank]. I remember him because he used to play the
16 French horn in the band with me. He was under my
17 command that day."
18 If you look at the list that you have, do you see on
19 the list the name of the man whom you named in your
20 statement?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. It does appear, does it not, that he was not in the same
23 half platoon as you were?
24 A. That is correct.
25 Q. He was in the platoon with the call sign 71A?
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. So when you say in this paragraph that he was under your
3 command, do you simply mean that because he was
4 a bandsman and junior in rank to you, that had you been
5 together as a group of bandsmen, he would have come
6 under your command?
7 A. That is correct.
8 Q. But operationally on that day, he was not under your
9 command, was he?
10 A. No.
11 Q. I would like to turn now to the events of the day
12 itself. Everybody here has had a chance to read your
13 statement so I am not going to ask you about every
14 incident that you describe in it, and I am not going to
15 ask you more about the drainpipe shot.
16 You say earlier in your statement -- it is
17 paragraph 7, we do not need to turn to it -- that you
18 recall receiving a briefing. Do you remember being told
19 at any time that the purpose of your deployment to
20 Londonderry that day was to make arrests?
21 A. No.
22 Q. Could we go on in your statement, please, to paragraph
23 15 and 16. You have spoken earlier in your statement of
24 hearing a drainpipe shot and of getting into the
25 four-tonne lorry. You say:
1 "We then went through an Army barrier, although from
2 looking at the attached map [you could not work out
3 which barrier it was]."
4 You then describe going 50 to 100 yards past the
5 barrier before coming to a halt. You said:
6 "After we got out of the lorries, we were instructed
7 to secure the housing estate to our right-hand side,
8 although I cannot recall by whom I was given this
9 instruction. We were only given this instruction once
10 we had de-bussed. As we got out and looked around at
11 the housing estate to my right-hand side, I could see
12 for the first time the crowd, who were on the left-hand
13 side; that is, the opposite side of the road to the
14 housing estate."
15 You go on in paragraph 17:
16 "As I looked further along the road from where we
17 had de-bussed, with the housing estate on our right-hand
18 side, I could see the top six or so storeys of a block
19 of flats ahead of me at the other end of the road.
20 I think I was approximately 400 yards away from the
21 flats."
22 You were shown a photograph and you could not
23 recognise from it the housing estate that you were asked
24 to secure?
25 A. No.
1 Q. I would like you to look at another photograph if you
2 would, please. Could we have P199. Could we have from
3 the top of the Rossville Flats downwards. There is
4 evidence from Captain 200, the officer in command of
5 Guinness Force, that the four-tonne lorries in which
6 Guinness Force were travelling stopped somewhere towards
7 the north end of Rossville Street. You say that you
8 have a recollection of seeing a housing estate on your
9 right-hand side?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. Do you remember, as you looked at that housing estate,
12 seeing the Rossville Flats, they are very big flats that
13 you can see on the top left of this picture, immediately
14 ahead of you?
15 A. I believe so.
16 Q. Because you say in your statement that when the housing
17 estate was on the right you could see the top six or so
18 storeys of a block of flats ahead of you at the other
19 end of the road; what was blocking your view from seeing
20 the bottom of the flats?
21 A. I cannot answer that one.
22 Q. Is it possible that you were looking at the flats from
23 within a housing estate and so looking over the lower
24 houses of that housing estate?
25 A. I cannot remember.
1 Q. This photograph shows, on the right-hand side, the
2 houses on the right-hand side of Rossville Street as we
3 look at this picture. Does that still bring back no
4 recollections of the housing estate in which you found
5 yourself?
6 A. No.
7 Q. Were you definitely surrounded by modern buildings?
8 A. I cannot remember.
9 LORD SAVILLE: It is a long time ago, try another tack: do
10 you have any recollection as to how far this housing
11 estate was from the truck from which you had de-bussed,
12 was it a long distance or very short distance?
13 A. Very short distance.
14 MS McGAHEY: Is it possible that when you de-bussed you went
15 left on this picture?
16 A. I cannot remember.
17 Q. Towards some rather older housing?
18 A. I cannot remember now.
19 Q. The evidence of Captain 200 in 1972 was that he split
20 Guinness Force into two and ordered one half on
21 de-bussing to go right and one half to go left. If the
22 list that you have seen is correct and all the men
23 stayed in their halves, you were in the same half as
24 Captain 200.
25 His evidence, in 1972, was that his half went to the
1 left, towards the buildings I have indicated with the
2 red arrows, buildings at the back of William Street and
3 then Chamberlain Street. It is also right to say that
4 he says, by the time his men reached the north end of
5 the Rossville Flats, which they did eventually, he had
6 about ten men with him. Your half platoon shows 18 men,
7 so it may well be that a portion of them went elsewhere.
8 Does that now bring back any recollections at all of
9 the platoon being split in two before going to the left?
10 A. No.
11 Q. Do you remember seeing any arrests being made?
12 A. No.
13 Q. Captain 200 has also given a statement to this Inquiry
14 although he has not yet given evidence. His
15 recollection now is that he sent half of his force to
16 the right and told the other half to remain in cover
17 somewhere in the region of the corner of William Street
18 and Rossville Street, behind a wall.
19 Does that bring back any recollections?
20 A. No.
21 Q. I would like to ask you to look at a video, please, to
22 see whether this helps to jog your memory at all. Could
23 we have, please, Video 1 from 5.15.
24 (Video 1 played)
25 Can we hold it there, please. That footage has
1 shown men running down the side of the old buildings on
2 the left-hand side of the picture, the aerial photograph
3 that you saw a moment ago and running towards the
4 Rossville Flats. I would like to ask for it to be
5 played again, if it could be played this time more
6 slowly and I would like to ask you whether you recognise
7 anyone or whether it brings back any recollections to
8 you of what you did.
9 (Video 1 played)
10 If you do recognise anyone, could you say so and we
11 will stop the video. Could we stop the video there for
12 the moment, please. This shows men who have run to the
13 left. If you see the lorries facing down towards the
14 Rossville Flats, they have run to the left across the
15 wasteground. At the back of this picture, in the
16 background, is a building called Kells Walk, which is
17 part of a modern housing estate.
18 Do those buildings look at all familiar to you?
19 A. No.
20 Q. Could we keep running the video, please. Do you
21 remember at any stage running with a wall to your left
22 and the Rossville Flats immediately ahead of you?
23 A. No.
24 Q. Do you recognise any of the people in the film?
25 A. No.
1 Q. Thank you very much, we will leave the film there.
2 Do you recall at any time taking cover behind a low
3 wall?
4 A. No.
5 Q. I would like to show you a few photographs to see
6 whether this brings back any memories at all. Could we
7 have EP2.8, please. This shot does show the right-hand
8 side of Rossville Street, assuming the lorries would be
9 facing south. Does that scene look familiar at all?
10 A. No.
11 Q. EP23.8, please. This photograph is now taken from the
12 left-hand side of Rossville Street looking back up
13 towards the right. The lorries from which you de-bussed
14 would be off the picture to the right.
15 Does any of that look familiar?
16 A. No.
17 Q. Could we go back to your statement, please, and on to
18 paragraph 20, 1318.4. You say:
19 "I then recall seeing a man who kept moving up and
20 down behind a pile of rubble like a jack-in-the-box."
21 You then describe what you saw.
22 Do you remember where you were when you saw this?
23 A. No.
24 Q. Do you remember whether you were even anywhere along the
25 big wide street known as Rossville Street that you have
1 seen in the pictures?
2 A. No.
3 Q. How close were you to the pile of rubble?
4 A. I cannot remember.
5 Q. Were you -- was the pile of rubble straight ahead of you
6 or to your right or to your left?
7 A. To my left.
8 Q. Were you with any other soldier?
9 A. At the time, yes.
10 Q. Please do not give any name, but do you remember who was
11 with you?
12 A. No.
13 Q. Do you recall this pile of rubble being near the tall
14 flats?
15 A. No.
16 Q. I would like to ask you to look at another video clip to
17 see if this brings back any memories. Could we have
18 video 48, please, from 10.35.
19 (Video 48 played)
20 The film can be played again more slowly, but what
21 you saw was --
22 LORD SAVILLE: Stop there and take it frame by frame --
23 MS McGAHEY: The camera first goes to the Rossville Flats,
24 past Army vehicles and then to a rubble barricade and
25 you can see a man behind that barricade who is waving.
1 The barricade is just coming into view now. Can you see
2 the man?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. Keep going, please. Can you stop it there for a moment.
5 Does that scene look familiar to you at all?
6 A. I cannot remember.
7 Q. Is there anything in this scene that is inconsistent
8 with your memory of what you saw?
9 A. No.
10 Q. If we continue to the end of this scene, please.
11 (Video 48 played)
12 Do you recall seeing any soldier approach the man?
13 A. No.
14 Q. You have said in your statement that you remember seeing
15 a priest going to the man. Do you remember seeing any
16 other civilian activity around the barricade?
17 A. No.
18 Q. Looking at this picture now, do you recall the
19 Rossville Flats being on the left-hand side of the
20 barricade?
21 A. No.
22 Q. Do you recall seeing any soldiers in the area around the
23 barricade?
24 A. No.
25 Q. Could we go back to your statement, please, at C1318.4,
1 paragraph 20. You say you think the man must have been
2 shot in the left shoulder because the priest who led him
3 away seemed to be holding him by his right shoulder.
4 You say earlier in this paragraph that the man shouted
5 out that he had been shot in the shoulder.
6 Did you see him being shot?
7 A. No.
8 Q. Do you know whether you first saw him before or after he
9 had been shot?
10 A. No.
11 Q. You said you could hear shooting, you refer to a lull in
12 it. You have said that you do not know whether this was
13 Army or civilian fire. Do you know how close the fire
14 was to you?
15 A. No.
16 Q. Could you at that time distinguish between high and low
17 velocity fire?
18 A. No.
19 Q. Would you have recognised the sound of a pistol being
20 fired?
21 A. No.
22 Q. Did you see any soldier fire that day?
23 A. No.
24 Q. Do you have any idea who may have shot the man behind
25 the barricade?
1 A. No.
2 Q. Did you see any civilian with a weapon that day?
3 A. No.
4 Q. Finally, could I ask you, please, to look at
5 Captain 200's typed list again. You will see on that
6 list, firstly, the bottom of the left-hand list, the
7 name of a soldier who is known to us as Private C; do
8 you have his name?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Is that name familiar to you?
11 A. No.
12 Q. Would you have recognised him?
13 A. No.
14 Q. On the right-hand list, halfway down, you will see the
15 name of a man known to the Inquiry as M. Did you know
16 that man?
17 A. No.
18 Q. Three entries further down, a man known as L?
19 A. No.
20 Q. And a man known as D; do you see the name?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. At the very bottom of that, a man known as K?
23 A. No.
24 Q. Did you see any of those soldiers fire on
25 30th January 1972?
1 A. No.
2 Q. Thank you very much. Those are all my questions.
3 LORD SAVILLE: Do we have any more questions for this
4 witness?
5 Questioned by MR McCARTNEY
6 MR McCARTNEY: Just one matter, Mr Chairman. Could the
7 witness be shown video 48, 12.35, please.
8 (Video 48 played)
9 Could we play it back just before that.
10 LORD SAVILLE: Which particular section were you interested
11 in?
12 MR McCARTNEY: The section I have it noted at is 12.35.
13 There may be some difference between it and the digital
14 version.
15 LORD SAVILLE: Showing?
16 MR McCARTNEY: It shows the arrival of the four-tonners,
17 Mr Chairman.
18 LORD SAVILLE: Can anyone help, I cannot remember what order
19 this is in.
20 MR McCARTNEY: Just before that.
21 LORD SAVILLE: I think I know the one you have got in mind.
22 MR McCARTNEY: Yes.
23 (Video 48 played)
24 If we pause there. You have been shown on the map
25 the arrival of the two four-tonners within which you
1 arrived. I think you understand yourself to have been
2 in the second one?
3 A. No, I was in the first one.
4 Q. You were in the first one --
5 LORD SAVILLE: That is what the witness says in his
6 statement, that he was in the first one, because he
7 could see the second one behind it.
8 MR McCARTNEY: There is no issue on it, I do not intend to
9 highlight it. In any event, it is believed that the
10 image that you are about to see -- it is a very short
11 image -- will give you some indication of the arrival;
12 do you understand?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. And I wonder, would you be kind enough to look at that
15 and see if that helps your memory any.
16 (Video 48 played)
17 If you stop there. That is both four-tonners which
18 delivered Composite Platoon into Rossville Street. Your
19 memory is, when you were making your statement to
20 Eversheds, that you made your way to the right of the
21 street; is that right?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. And along what appeared to be some council houses; is
24 that right?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. Ms McGahey has very carefully taken you through both of
2 those routes and none of the images which you have seen
3 ring a bell; is that right?
4 A. That is correct.
5 Q. When you were making your statement you were almost sure
6 that the side of the street along which you progressed
7 was the westerly as opposed to the easterly side of the
8 street; is that right?
9 A. That was.
10 Q. You have no recollection from that point onwards where
11 you went within that street; is that right?
12 A. That is correct.
13 Q. Were you ever asked to make a statement about this in
14 1972?
15 A. No.
16 Q. Can you tell the Tribunal why you were never asked,
17 someone who was directly involved in the events of that
18 day?
19 A. No.
20 Q. Did you ever discuss the events or what you saw that day
21 with any of the other soldiers who were present?
22 A. No.
23 Q. Never?
24 A. Never.
25 Q. Not even that day in the back of a lorry or in the weeks
1 that followed when the controversy surrounding this
2 incident began to emerge?
3 A. No.
4 Q. You never discussed it with anyone?
5 A. No.
6 Q. In any event, when you were making the statement, your
7 next recollection is potentially the image which you
8 were then shown by Ms McGahey of a man waving from
9 behind the barricade?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. You said that that seemed to gel with your recollection
12 of the events at the time.
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. But they are the only two images that you have in mind
15 regarding the events of this day?
16 A. That is.
17 Q. You were close enough to that man to hear him shout;
18 were you not?
19 A. I cannot remember.
20 Q. I can refer you to your statement, if you want me to:
21 "He shouted out that he had been shot in the
22 shoulder."
23 Paragraph 20. You were close enough to hear that;
24 were you not?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. You were close enough to see the events that occurred in
2 the vicinity of that barricade?
3 A. I was close enough, but I did not see it as I was
4 concentrating -- after that, I turned my head when
5 I heard him shout and concentrating on keeping the
6 houses secure.
7 Q. You see, members of your platoon, five of them,
8 discharged no less than 14 shots whilst they were
9 present in Rossville Street while you were there.
10 Altogether somewhere between 30, 38 shots were fired in
11 that location. Six people were shot dead in the
12 vicinity of that barricade; one person was wounded.
13 Ambulances came and went. At least 50 people were
14 arrested. Thirteen people in total died; 14 were
15 wounded, but yet you, as a ringside-seat-holder, did not
16 see one of those incidents?
17 A. No.
18 Q. Is it a bit like going to a boxing tournament, getting
19 the best seat in the house, right beside the ring, and
20 you cannot talk about the fight as soon as you walk out
21 because you cannot remember a thing; that is really your
22 evidence; is it not?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. Could it be that the horrific nature of the events that
25 day were such that you have deliberately blocked the
1 imagery of those events from your memory because of the
2 shame it would bring upon you to be even remotely
3 associated with it?
4 A. No.
5 Q. Then how can you explain how someone who was there,
6 throughout all of these events, yet comes to this
7 Inquiry under oath and says, "I never saw or heard
8 a thing beyond what I have included in my statement";
9 how do you explain that? The most controversial
10 shooting incident in the history of Northern Ireland's
11 troubles, you had a ringside-seat to it all and you
12 remember nothing; is that what you are seriously telling
13 this Tribunal?
14 A. Yes.
15 MS McGAHEY: I have no further questions, thank you sir.
16 LORD SAVILLE: INQ1318, it is the Chairman again. Thank you
17 for coming to give evidence to the Tribunal, thank you.
18 We will start again at 9.30 tomorrow morning,
19 please.
20 (3.35 pm)
21 (Proceedings adjourned until 9.30 am
22 on Wednesday, 2nd July 2003)
23
24
25
1 INDEX
2 SOLDIER C, sworn ............................. 1
3 Questioned by MR ROXBURGH .................... 1
4 Questioned by MR ELIAS ....................... 83
5 Questioned by MR ARTHUR HARVEY ............... 93
6 Questioned by MR GLASGOW ..................... 144
7 Questioned by MR ROXBURGH .................... 152
8 INQ1318, sworn ............................... 159
9 Questioned by MS McGAHEY ..................... 159
10 Questioned by MR McCARTNEY ................... 177
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25