This will drive a few mad!
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Hampton is an anagram of Phantom
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Don’t have premium, anyone able to post for a pauper?
‘It was the worst night I encountered during the Troubles. I knew if I drove on, the soldier would shoot me’
independent.ie | October 16, 2022 02:30 AM
Every one of us remembers our first date. Mine was particularly memorable for two reasons. That was the night I met my future wife, Ursula, in Ballymena where she’s from. Coming out of the disco in the town, it was the night my four finest hurls were smashed up as a bit of fun by UDR members.
That night he was there laughing with the rest of them as they searched me, opened the boot of the car, took out the four hurls and broke them into smithereens, all the while joking among themselves and enjoying our discomfort.
By then I was used to that sort of hassle. We got it going to and from matches every other week. Sometimes half our back line would be deliberately delayed and the game would have to be put back until they were finally allowed to pass on.
Those experiences were bad but were nothing like the worst night I ever encountered during the years of the Troubles. It’s an encounter I have never mentioned before, but it is a night I will never forget.
I was picked on the 1991 All-Stars team and there weren’t too many hurling All-Stars in these parts. (My fellow county men Ciarán Barr and Olcan McFettridge had been honoured in the ’80s.) As a consequence, I was invited to every dinner dance and medal presentation across Ulster. Just as the award itself was a great honour, I was similarly delighted to accept these invitations as a way of giving something back to the GAA.
One night I went to Omagh to attend their dinner dance and had a very enjoyable evening. I decided to head for the long journey back sometime after midnight. I took to the by-roads and back roads over the mountains around Cookstown. There wasn’t a sinner about on these country roads until I noticed a red light some distance ahead of me. I slowed down as I approached the light and figured out that there was a person flagging me down. It was after 1am and here I was on my own in the car, with the only other living person this silhouette between my car headlights and the pitch darkness of the night behind him.
When the guy walked over to me, I wound down my window and saw that he had his face painted in black camouflage. He made no effort to communicate other than with a one-word demand: “Licence!”
I gave him my driver’s licence and he walked to the back of the car where I could no longer see him. I didn’t know what he was doing but, in such situations, I knew I had to sit tight. Five minutes passed. Ten minutes passed. Half-an-hour went by.
I could neither hear nor see what this soldier was at. You don’t sit there in such a situation for long without your mind starting to play games with you. The fact that there were no other cars coming or going meant it was just me and him. A strange fear built up inside me.
I was sitting there for almost two hours, trying to stay calm but sweating and imagining all sorts of scenarios. I knew if I attempted to drive on, he would shoot me or even if he didn’t, it could be a case that there was a road block mounted further up the road and they’d get me as I approached.
It took everything I had inside me not to give way to the rising panic that got worse with each slow passing minute which seemed more like a lifetime.
Around three o’clock, just shy of two hours after he stopped me, he came back out of the night, stuck his hand into the car and said: “There’s your licence.”
There was still no clear instruction for me to go, so as I’m driving away, I’m wondering will I hear the crack of a bullet any moment now?
I started to move my head away from the centre of the seat, thinking if he is taking aim behind me now, at least I’ll make it difficult for him. I drove and flipped my head over and back for about half-a-mile.
I had another hour and a half on the road and by the time I got home, I decided there would be no more rounds of dinner dances for me.
Times were different then and even going to work, you had to alter your routes. I remember going to work in Guinness one morning at seven o’clock and I heard this bang which I knew was a gun shot and looked around to see what was happening.
The Mother’s Pride bakery yard next to where I worked had only a steel partition between us. The killing had taken place about 20 yards from where I was and the victim was a bread delivery man.
Even family life was affected quite regularly. You couldn’t go to Ballymena then with an Antrim jersey on. My eldest son was only three or four when we went to visit my wife’s family. There was a band marching by who began spitting at him because he had GAA gear on.
When I was growing up, you could never carry hurls. A priest used to come around on a Friday night and gather them up as he didn’t want to make us targets coming from training or matches.
The country has changed so much for the good, it’s unreal. Our new generation, fortunately, is oblivious to all of those dark times but the one constant they have with us is the same love of the game. Hurling will always win out in these parts.
The love of the game is still with me the same as ever. I look forward to going to training sessions and coaching the young lads. And I think I know where it originated. In 1981 we won our first senior hurling title and I was only 16 and still at school. It was my first year [on the team]. That win caused so much rejoicing in our village that the team bus couldn’t get in on the main road. People were gathered everywhere so we had to come in a back road.
John Delargy was one of the elder statesmen of the team and the two of us were standing at the corner of Cushendall taking it all in. The ‘bandwagon brigade’ as I called them, the fair-weather supporters, kept coming up shaking his hand and ignoring me, as they didn’t realise that I had played every minute of the drawn game and the replay. I was a regular on the seniors by then but they didn’t think I was old enough to be playing at that level.
John got annoyed at this and said: “C’mon, we’ll go up to the pub.” He took me into the pub — which incidentally is the one that I now own — and bought me a Coca-Cola and directed me down to the corner where there were six men sitting together. These were real supporters and they were crying, and I mean crying, with the emotion and the delight of what our village had just achieved for the first time.
That taught me, maybe not straight away but subconsciously it was the first seed planted in my mind about how much a club means to people. To these great men and thousands like them, it’s more than just a game. Your mates on the county team are the ones you invite to your stag and wedding but it’s your club mates who will carry you to your grave. They will be there at the start and they will be there at the end.
Ever since that year the GAA has given me a purpose and is still a massive part of my life at 58 years of age.
‘The Waiting Game I Played With Lone Soldier On Dark Country Road’ by ‘Sambo’ McNaughton features in ‘Grassroots: The Second Half’, a collection of GAA tales spanning over 150 years, compiled by PJ Cunningham. It is the second volume of stories and will be launched this week in Croke Park by GAA president Larry McCarthy.
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Great song….
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Listening to that song since a kid
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Fuck her
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Got an invite from Don to attend this/ ticket waiting for me
He’s an ex republican prisoner now dying
Runs the Cork life centre for kids with difficulty attending mainstream schools
Lots of them have serious issue’s
Self harming/ suicidal thoughts/ feeling worthless etc
Don and staff do tremendous work- Christy Moore actually pestered him to do a concert for him and the centre
Having met my mate when he played a concert for the IRA prisoners
They tape recorded it
Met Don as a teen in SF - though terminally ill he’s working with those kids daily
We travelled to Derry together in 79 or thereabouts and he wants to go up one more time- tower of strength
He got the freedom of Cork a few months ago - just deserved
Bravo Don O’Leary
Well known and respected from Cork city to Crossmaglen
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Any chance the DUP lose seats in the upcoming Election?
Are there any Unionists voters capable of seeing through the bullshit?
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One would hope so
Young loyalists aren’t as black and white as their predecessors
Lot switching to Alliance
Siege mentality waning among educated loyalists
Hope up there as long as ppl demand change
Integration
And power restoration
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Think their plan seems to be refuse to enter into current executive to deny SF First Minister position and trigger another election. Then agree voting pact with TUV and UUP for that to tilt balance of seats back in loyalist/unionist favour so they’ll get First Minister.
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Very childish
The state was built on gerrymandering, all theyve always wanted is power because they see themselves superior to catholics…all we’re seeing is a 21st century version of this same old shite. You get absolute shitheads like Riggins who tries to pin every single problem of division up north on SF, saying they’re the reason there won’t be a UI… Because he’s American he doesn’t appreciate the inbuilt hatred of Unionists that has been fostered over 100s of years. They will never, ever respect nationalists or work under them in anyway… Something SF has done in reverse since the GF agreement.
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What’s this latest LCC statement threatening free state politicians… Rishi needs to come out with it, come out with it !
It’ll backfire on them this time round. The alliance party have made serious inroads. If they can be persuaded to declare themselves as "unionist " itll solve the issue after the December election.
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It has to backfire… they’ve managed to separate themselves from SF in this regard. At least SF worked under them when it was reversed.
Hardcore loyalist/ unionists will never, ever accept nationalists at the top.
Correct ref Alliance- hopefully numbers will make a difference
Alliance will struggle if this election happens I reckon. Nationalists who previously gave them their vote will likely vote SF this time as a 2 finger salute to the DUP for refusing to accept a SF FM. Whatever DUP voters might be disgusted with them forcing this new election are far more likely to move to UUP than Alliance, so Alliance will be squeezed from every side.
DUP will be looking to campaign in as divisive and bitter a manner as possible to rally support around them, it is likely to be a grim few months ahead.