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Green & Blue Project
Pat O’Leary
I’m now seventy two.
I am from Kilcummin, Killarney.
I was promoted sergeant here in Clonakilty in 1972... and my first posting, for a very
short period was to Terelton, which is over near Macroom, I was sent over there and
I fondly remember it, because... we had a fall of snow, and trying to get to the place
was nigh on impossible, and when I arrived there there was no other Guard there at
the time because somebody was sick, and the other person was on holidays, so I
was there on my own, I was there for about maybe two, three weeks I’d say, when
I was told to then that I was... being transferred to the border.
Well it wasn’t really because I think we kind of realised that we would be going,
there were twenty five of us promoted at the time, and while I suppose we were all
hoping against hope that we wouldn’t be going too far, but nonetheless I think in
the back of our mind we felt, I did anyway, that we were going to go to the border...
and I always remember the morning that I was told, I was going down town, leaving
my house which is quite near the Garda station in Clonakilty, and our district clerk at
the time... left down the window in the office because he saw me going out the
gate, and he called me, and he said ‘your transfer is out’ and he said ‘would you like
to know?’ so I said ‘don’t tell me ‘til I come back’ because I knew where I was going
I said ‘I don’t want to be bothered now’ so when I came back I went to him, and he
told me, he said ‘you’re going to a place called... Burnfoot in County Donegal’ now,
number one, I’d never heard of the place, and to make matters worse, when I went
to the map to try and find out I couldn’t find Burnfoot in the map at all. In the map
that I had anyway, a road map, and the only thing I could find was Bridgend, which
turned out to be... very very adjacent to Burnfoot, Bridgend would be the Customs
post at the time, next to Derry, going from Donegal to Derry so then I found out
where Burnfoot was, but... I had to pack my bags anyway, and leave.
I was leaving behind Noreen my wife, and two children at the time, yeah. And the
two were young at the time... one would be seven, and the other would have been
three, yeah. And I think, which was a bit disturbing at the time as well, our daughter
Elaine who was the three year old, wasn’t well at the time, had a medical condition,
and we were up and down to Cork a good bit to a specialist, and I was kind of
conscious because we had only one car, even though a small car at the time! A very
small car, but I was very conscious of the fact that... I was leaving, I had to leave
the, my family without a car, number one, I had to travel and... Noreen was going to
be saddled then with looking after our sick daughter as well, and do you know I was
afraid that the condition might deteriorate as well, but anyway I had to go, so I
went in the, I’d say if my memory serves me right now, about the first week in
March I’d say, I head off for County Donegal, Ulster. And I had a Mini Minor car,
now I’m fairly tall, and I was scarcely able to get into this car myself, but the
�amount of luggage I had, my little car was packed, heading for the border, and I
distinctly remember... the day that I went, I left early in the morning... somewhere
outside Sligo I thought at this stage, now... I was nearly there, there was this guy
doing something to cattle on the side of the road and I pulled up and I got out of
the car, probably wouldn’t be able to do it now at all because ‘tis probably a highway
now, ‘twas a very minor road at the time, and I went over to him and I said, ‘do you
know where Burnfoot is in County Donegal?’ and he said ‘never heard of it’... so then
I mentioned Buncrana, because I knew that was the next town, so he said ‘I do,
now I have an idea now’ he said ‘where you’re probably heading for’ and I said ‘by
the way’ ‘how far is it?’ he said ‘you’re all of seventy miles still from Burnfoot’ and I
thought I was there, I thought I was there at the time.
Seventy miles in a Mini on a bad road, yeah... but I got there and I remember when
I arrived in Burnfoot, trying to find the Garda station, it was an old rectory, well in
off the Buncrana-Derry road... line of trees leading up into it, it still looked like a
rectory, the only difference that there was, there were two Garda houses built at the
end of the driveway, and there was a sergeant and a Guard living there, but anyway
I found the Garda station.
I knew I was going there as a sergeant, but what role I was going to play as that
sergeant I didn’t really know on the border, because we were ill prepared to be quite
honest about it now, I served all my time here in Clonakilty principally as a patrol car
driver for the, for five or six years, doing mundane... police work around West Cork
which was quiet at the time, you know? Here I was facing the border in the midst of
the troubles at the time, because it was 1972 now you know, and... I was trying to
figure out myself as I drove that day to Donegal, what am I going to be doing, when
I arrived there, the sergeant, one of the sergeants that was there, said to me, ‘I’m
delighted that you have come because I’m trying to get out of here’ he said, ‘I want
to, I’m hoping to get a transfer, my only hope for a transfer out of here is for a new
fella to come, and you happen to be the new fella’, so I said ‘fine’ so I... got to
realise very quickly that I was going to be a jack of all trades really, because he was
going, and hell-bent on going so he had lost interest in the place obviously, and I
didn’t blame him for it, either because he’d a young family as well, I was really in at
the deep end then because I was, I was there as a sergeant, a young sergeant,
totally on my own, like starting off... and we were straight into trouble there like,
because we’d problems, we’d problems, practically every day there like of one sort
or another, now it wasn’t any better, any worse than other Garda stations along the
border, but nonetheless... the fact that we were the next Garda station to Derry I
suppose didn’t help either, you know?
Well, we would have things like, there was one particular day I remember, I was
sitting down talking to a Guard in our public office, and... we saw these two guys
walking up the avenue, and I just happened to say to the Guard, this is a problem’
you know, when we saw the two of them, this was in the middle of the day, when
they arrived in anyway, we discovered they had been travelling around in a
travelling... shop... and the shop was actually... commandeered by guys who had
�taken the shop off them, this is a mobile shop, a van or a truck, or whatever it
was... and of course, they were after the money, and the contents, and the two
boys were left Shanks’ mares, back to the Garda station to tell us about their
ordeal... and we, the Guard that was with me realised immediately, I wasn’t long at
all there now when this happened, the Guard and myself realised immediately... this
i an international problem now, because these guys are gone across the border with
this, this is not in our area anymore, but anyway we had to go out and search and
we did, and... possibly got to know very quickly what had happened. That was the
biggest problem that I felt while I worked there was trying to... conclude anything
that you, you started, you started investigating something, but you never came to
the end of it, you were left, a lot of things were left in mid air, or in mid stream,
because ‘twas very hard to pursue them because you were dealing practically all the
time with cross-border traffic, and this would refer now to very minor things that we
would take for granted down here, maybe traffic accidents and... minor things like
driving licence and insurance on cars and things like that, you held up somebody,
you found that things weren’t right, but they were living across the border, so... they
were out of jurisdiction, you know as far as we were concerned, but... we had
robberies as well, serious robberies, I mean I distinctly remember one, they had a
big dance hall there on the Buncrana road, just outside Burnfoot, ‘twas in the area
where we were... and one night just after the dance, about 2.00a.m. just after it had
finished, there was a raid on the dance hall and I remember the time, that night I
was off, Noreen actually happened to be up and the children, ‘twas during the
summertime and there was a raid on the dance hall for the proceeds of course of
the night, they were looking for the money, and there were shots fired... and we
were called out, and of course we were all unarmed, we would have batons stuck in
our pockets, and into the unknown as well like you know, not knowing what you
were facing, and as well as that the routine stuff was difficult as well because like if
you were doing say, you often hear checkpoints on the border, we were doing
checkpoints on one side of the border, the RUC were doing their checkpoints on the
far side of the border, but [pause] some trouble happened in the north, it was likely
that the cars were going to come to our side of the border, vice versa could happen
then, there could be some problem that we had on our side, and the guys were
going back in across the border, so... you were dealing with... like I said,
inconclusive type of duties, which made it very very difficult, you see, I suppose
anybody in the workplace, no matter what you’re doing, you like to be able, if you
start something, you like to be able to finish it but it made it difficult, I also
remember one evening I was in in Derry with the sergeant who was there at the
time, he was the replacement of the man that left... and we went in to Shantallow,
into a big supermarket, we used to go in there, maybe pretty often enough, but
we’d always go in in pairs shopping, ‘twas a fine supermarket, and of course we
were going in there to bring things home as well because we were buying stuff in
Derry cheaper, a lot cheaper that time than you were buying them in the Republic...
and we were in the supermarket, came home and I remember I was in where I was
in digs, in Burnfoot... and at teatime we were all sitting down, there were a lot of
the other lads that would be working with me there as well... there was a bang...
and the windows of the house shook... now we hadn’t a clue at the time what was
after happening, so we discovered later that evening in the BBC news... that there
had been an explosion in the supermarket that we had been in ... ‘twas bombed
�actually that evening... and all the contents, everything was destroyed in the
supermarket, and there were people injured at the time as far as I remember, but...
the, the tale to that story is... there were people going in across the border for
weeks and months afterwards, because they were buying off shop soiled stuff from
the supermarket, even though ‘twas cheap enough before, but ‘twas now being sold
much cheaper.
If the RUC were there, and they held us up, they... and naturally they’d ask who we
were, and they would be looking maybe for documents and things from the driver,
so they would, they would, sometimes they’d get to know that you were, other times
except you were asked, you just gave your driving licence with your name, maybe
the driving licence then had a Garda station... address or something, maybe
depending on who the driver was, but if ‘twas a kind of a general name that
somebody had been living in a townland somewhere, there would be no
identification... but you were always on tenterhooks, because... the one thing that I
was always afraid of, and particularly when I was travelling up and down, because I
usually, to make the journey a bit shorter when I got to know my way around, went
into the border at Aughnacloy in County Tyrone, and I came out at Strabane...
further up, but you were always conscious then at a lot of checkpoints along the
way that... you could have crossfire, somebody could attack the checkpoint, you
could be just unlucky to be there at the wrong time, so... we had to pick the time
that you travelled as well, you’d have to be very careful about the time that you
travelled... but having said that, I just remember having good relationship with the
RUC, because we’d meet them at the points, just at the points, we’d be talking,
you’d be kind of cross-border talking if you know what I mean now, but you’d be
kind of general type of, rather than... official type of... discussions, ‘twould be kind
of a general discussion about the problems that there were maybe at that particular
time, or whatever, you know? Because it affected both of us.
I mean we were there for a purpose, to try to prevent, because the problems were
across the border mainly, now... we had a spinoff in our place from... what was
happening across, because we’d a lot of people who were maybe committing that
type of crime across the border, were coming across to us, so there would be, there
would be... that, but the liaising, and I think you know was kind of at a higher level
than us, really, the main liaising with the RUC would be, would be a higher level of
the Guards than what we were, we wouldn’t have much recourse, talking about...
say political duty matters or anything like that now with the RUC at all.
That is it, that’s the kind of general conversation more than anything like that, yeah
‘twould be, yeah ‘twould be,
Oh yes, certainly, certainly because... there was an understanding like that we were
both trying to do a job of work, which was probably as difficult for them and more
difficult for them than ‘twas for us, really... I suppose we were in the happy position
�as well, some of us that were there, that knew we were only there for a short time,
we would be getting out of the place... but having said that, I was there on a
permanent transfer, so I didn’t really know when I was going to be getting out of
there.
It was difficult from that point of view, I suppose not so difficult from my side
because I got into my stride in the work very quickly because you got to know like
what was required and things like that, but was shocking difficult to be so far away,
I mean I was... single journey three hundred, and almost three hundred and fifty
miles from home, where I was. Thinking of your wife and a young family back
home... also thinking about yourself like, you know that they were worrying about
you, they didn’t know what was going on either, and probably was much worse for
them because they were seeing things on television, and hearing of events that
were happening, even they could be miles away from where I was,
You have to imagine now, the people up there are living on the border... they would
have been some of the people, relations or... people connected with people that we
would have been looking out for maybe inside the border, maybe involved in
activities, so therefore you were always, you had to be very much on your guard, we
had gone in there, and this is what I am saying about no preparation in the world
for this thing, you were going into strange territory really, the dialect also of course
was slightly different, and very hard to grasp because, like... I used to hear them
talking when I went up there first about weans, and I didn’t know what they were
talking about at all, these were the children, and they had, they had different words
for much different than we had down south, of expression, I found that extremely
difficult for a while, but then after a while you got to know it... talking about the
policing aspect of it, I must say now around Burnfoot... I discovered very quickly
that there were an awful lot of... parents in the Burnfoot area, and the Buncrana
area, and the Muff area, which was close to us as well, who had sons in the Guards,
in different parts of the country themselves... and like, from once you got to know
those... they were kind of a rung on the ladder... to get to know the locality a little
bit better, or talk to them or find out what was happening... the other great problem
we had there was you see when we were off, what were we going to do? When we
were off duty? I mean you’re out in Burnfoot out in the heart of the country,
‘twould remind you of down this part of the country, now say Ardfert or Ballinascarty
or somewhere like that... I used to go playing bingo. I wasn’t in a bingo hall in my
life, until I went to Burnfoot, I always remember there were small little halls out in
the country, there was bingo there practically every night of the week, but the one
thing I discovered very early on was ‘twas busloads of women, that used to come
from across the border, ‘twas all older women playing bingo... and the small little
hall, full of smoke, I can still remember it well, every bloody one of them were
smoking, and the place was full of smoke, but like you’d very little to do... we used
to go on walks, and... they’d a football pitch there... and some of the younger fellas
used to play football locally, I was into football at the time, I liked it, so I used to
just go watching them ... but that was difficult as well then trying to kill time.
Yes, well I think especially when you’ve, you’re having children,
�Oh dramatically, it had of course, yeah it had of course, and as well as that you
know, you were there with a total strange group of Guards as well, that you didn’t
know at all like you went straight into a situation, where I didn’t know anybody
when I went there, because some of them had been there, most of them were
brought in there, transferred in there... and a lot of them were there against their
will as well, through no fault of their own, because they didn’t, ‘twasn’t that it was
County Donegal now or anything, or ‘twasn’t because ‘twas the border, but the mere
fact they were taken away probably from their children, a lot of them married, were
leaving families behind, and it made it very difficult for them... it makes Garda work
difficult, and it made Garda work very difficult, I always firmly believe looking back
on it that... the powers that be at the time didn’t realise at all what they were
putting us into... I felt we were half useless actually, up there... I did really, because
even though police work is the same no matter where you go... the fact that you
were dealing with cross-border stuff meant that there should be a little more
thought put into it and a little bit more training, like I felt that there were plenty of
places to put sergeants down the country who were promoted into stations further
down the country, there must have been a lot of Donegal fellas who would be
delighted to get back home, into stations in their own county, maybe there was a
reason for not doing that, I don’t know... but I felt that was the road that they
should have gone down rather than sending strangers like us up to the border, but I
would find fault with the fact that we weren’t prepared for it, I think that should
have been something that, because it meant you were going into a serious enough
situation, you know.
The political, as well as the police side of it as well, the policing side of it, the Garda
side of it as well, prepare you for the type of work that you would be doing, prepare
you for the fact like that you were going in... in charge of Guards, some who were
new in the area, others who, who knew the area pretty well, you had to find out, the
fellas that were there like, what were their intentions, what did they think about the
situation on the border, because like... true enough, some of them were lukewarm
about it, because they were living there as well, they were finding it difficult to deal
with people from their own area as well.
So you didn’t know, and we didn’t know, and it was very difficult for us to find out,
extremely difficult, but having said that, after a couple of months there I discovered
that the vast majority of the people who were living in the place... were very very
friendly towards us, because we were out all day and all night, and we had
checkpoints here and checkpoints there, and people were being held up continually,
and it must have been very difficult for them as well, going about their ordinary daily
work, you know you were sticking your head in the window of a car and you were
looking for identification, you were searching cars and... you know, which made it
difficult for the local people as well, but...
�I, I would say the raid on the hall, the night in the hall was... to me it could have
been dangerous, because... when we got there, we didn’t know what we were
facing, number one, number two we didn’t know if the people had gone out of that
territory or whether they were still around there.
We didn’t, hadn’t a clue and we didn’t know what they, well we knew what the
motives were, a robbery to get money... there would have been another one
another day that there was a shooting actually across the border at Bridgend, which
was, which was near the Customs post, and I remember going there with two young
Guards, now again we were facing the unknown, and again unarmed, we were just
there checking cars, quite close to where the activity had been before we arrived,
and again we didn’t know whether the people who were doing this, because it came
from our side of the border, they could’ve been still quite close to us, and we didn’t
know, we didn’t know when they were going to maybe open up fire again, even
though we were there, because ‘twould have been common knowledge we were
unarmed, so it could have been possible that they would do it again, those type of
incidents would be the worst really that I think that I was involved in anyway there
on the border, but there was always a danger, we were always particularly on the
alert, particularly at night, dark nights, you know out doing checkpoints and things
like that, and I remember there was a famous showband person at the time, now
I’m not going to mention any names but... he travelled mainly in his own car in and
out across the border, the van with the other members of the band... would be
either gone before him or after, but every night that he came back to the border and
he used to go in up at Bridgend... he was always enquiring, about how things were
in in the north that night, because he was afraid, he didn’t know what he was facing
into, he wanted to get back to his home safely, but every night that we were out,
he’d stop at the checkpoint enquiring about things in the north for the night... to me
‘twas a dangerous place, really I would classify it as dangerous now, I mean there
was a another time when a showroom in Derry was broken into... I remember at the
time there were four cars and they were all yellow, yellow coloured cars, now
whether they were in the showroom or in the garage at the time for a particular
group of people like taxi drivers or whatever, they were all the one colour, but the
showroom was broken into one night, all the cars were taken... and we were told
that they were actually driving them on a beach out in our area... and... we went to
check anyway, and ... when the Guards arrived... the boys had left the beach with
the cars, and of course within minutes they were back in across the border with the
cars, but there was a fleet of yellow cars actually removed that night from the
showroom, and taken...
I usen’t come down that often really, about every second month, I’d say.
[Noreen:] Every two months.
Every two months, yeah. I’d travel up and down every two months, yeah.
�And how like, would you try and keep your days off together?
I would, I would and I can tell you I remember one... I left Burnfoot in my Mini...
after night duty... which was a highly dangerous thing to do, and I said, ‘I’ll drive
part of the journey now and I’ll rest’, and I got as far as Athlone, and I always
remember going into a hotel in Athlone, and I went into the foyer of the hotel and I
remember saying to the receptionist... I was going to have... breakfast or food...
and I said, ‘do you know, I’d have a sleep first, call me at a certain time, maybe an
hour, an hour and a half, I’ll have a rest, because I was dead tired, and I went to
sleep and she called me at about an hour and a half... and I sat into my car after
having something to eat and drove all the way down to Clonakilty... but... ‘twas a
long lonely drive, was grand coming home, but to sit in your car then in Clonakilty
and face back again, and like... I was conscious there were twenty five other
sergeants with me that were doing the same thing, all in the same boat, now some
of them were lucky, they went to towns where they got accommodation, that was
the other thing, I could not get accommodation where I was, I’d have to get
accommodation in Buncrana or Letterkenny.
Well, Buncrana would have been, I’m not sure now the distance, but I suppose,
twelve, twelve miles maybe from Burnfoot, I don’t know how far it is, Letterkenny
would have been farther away, but even at that time to get accommodation there
wasn’t easy either because you had a lot of personnel on the border looking for
accommodation at that time as well, and from time to time there were a lot of
temporary people going to the border that time as well, if there was something
serious happening ... there was a time there, when there was riots in a place called
St Johnston, up on the border, ‘twas before I went there, and there were an awful
lot of Guards taken in there in temporary transfer at the time, they would have
been... maybe thirty, forty, fifty Guards taken in there, there was a lot of trouble
there, serious trouble... so ‘twasn’t easy to get accommodation, and we... I, my
family went up for the summer, we lived with a lady in a place called... Fahan, ‘twas
Fahan, yeah, Fahan, she was still living in the house when we were there, we just
had the use of the kitchen, and our bedrooms, we had the two children at the time,
but that was grand then because my family were there so you know, you’d be
somewhat happier. I had peace of mind.
Well, you’d be a bit happier anyway, that’s for sure, you weren’t kind of isolated or
left on your own or anything like that, but of course ‘twas great for people as well
because a lot of stuff was brought across the border at that time, I mean people
were bringing car parts and everything home, tyres and batteries and all this type of
thing, cigarettes or butter, all these things were much cheaper in across the border,
and they were markets and people used to go into the markets, but again you had
to be a little bit careful going in as well, because ‘twasn’t a kind of free for all that
time at all, like you would go in and walk around you know I was much happier
when I had somebody with me who knew something about Derry, because you
didn’t want to drive into the wrong areas or you didn’t want to do something that
�would draw notice to yourself, so from that point of view, lot of pressure, lot of
pressure, we were working under extreme pressure, that’s what I felt as well... yeah
I didn’t know anybody on the border, from working on the border who said that they
were relaxed, because they weren’t, even the local Guards would find it difficult
enough because... they were conscious as well... had they to take action... against
somebody they were living close to in the locality possibly, they had a family, you
know, maybe some of their children going to school, so therefore you were looking
over your shoulder all the time, it put... a lot of extra pressures on... the police
forces, I’m sure... much worse on the RUC in across the border than it was on us,
but it did on the Guards as well along the border, yeah and you know ‘twas a kind of
a strange feeling to have all these strange Guards moving into an area all together
at once, I mean I was staying in digs in, Burnfoot... beautiful landlady and landlord
in the house, would do anything for us... but like, they were totally overcrowded,
because they were the only place that would cater for us, they were able to look
after the Guards there at the time, you know? And they gave us accommodation,
and good accommodation, we were lucky to get it... and... but you felt all the time
that you were away from home and you were isolated and you were in strange
surroundings, you were dealing with strange people, but again having said that, the
people found it difficult I’m sure as well, you know?
I was there from... very first week in March until the middle, almost the end of
November.
Oh ‘twas a good spell, yeah and lucky, we were extremely lucky because... I would
believe myself that the only reason we got out of there at that particular time was
because new people were promoted, so they replaced us and we were able to get
away, and I think gradually as well, they learned that they were inclined to put
people who were promoted more close to the border, to the border duties than
bringing people from very far away, because after that for us down here there were
few people that went, for long stints, now having said that, there were then
monthly... terms on the border as well, and I think, a lot of the members of the
Guards from around Cork, would have given the short stint of a month rather than
the long stints that we were in, because... except that you went on promotion or
something you weren’t there for a long stint.
Oh you would, ‘twas much easier, I never minded a month, because I... like I said to
you, off air at all... I thought I was finished with the border when I came down to
Athea, in County Limerick that that was me finished with the border, but I
discovered very quickly that I was on a list again to go back to the border, I said ‘oh
no, this is what happens’ the only good thing about it was that I mainly went to
either one of two places, Scotstown in County Monaghan, and I was staying in
Monaghan Town... or I went to Dundalk, staying in the town, I’d be able to get
accommodation and stay in the town... I loved to be quite honest about it, the duty
didn’t worry me at all in those two places, because I knew I was only there for a
month, much different... kind of attitude to monthly work than it would be for the
long term work.
�It was difficult from the point of view, but the one thing that I will say about it... I
did find in Dundalk and I’ve often thought back on it, there were a lot of young
Guards in Dundalk station because it’s a big district headquarters station... they were
very very active young fellas, very interested in what they were doing, now then the
Guards, most of the Guards would be permanently there... and we usually when we
went there for a month would have a group of fellas working with us, young fellas,
and I always remember our main work in Dundalk was... if we were on the early
morning shifts in particular, six, seven o’clock in the morning, starting... we were
searching vacant properties, searching vacant houses, which was dangerous really
because you know, you were obviously looking for something... that could have
been booby trapped, or we could find somebody or we could find explosives, but the
young fellas were used to doing it, and we were very well versed in how to handle
the situation... and I must say that I learned an awful lot about policing in Dundalk,
I learned an awful lot from the young guys who were there, because they were so
used to being in an area that was, that had a lot of trouble, that they were prepared
or I presume their authorities had them prepared for it, they had certain techniques,
certain methods by which they worked, and it made, it made work very easy. I was
also in Scotstown, which was on the border as well, with Fermanagh... and again,
mostly a lot of checkpoints out in the wilderness, out in, because ‘twas mostly rural,
very rural, mountainous, well I won’t say mountainous now, but hilly, lot of forestry,
again lot of searching, lot of that type of work, mainly. Again, ‘twas grand because
we were only there for the month, I enjoyed it, I used to get to a lot of football
matches because Monaghan was a great county for football, we’d get a lot of
matches, we’d great comradeship there as well, because there was a lot of people
up there on temporary for the month, so we’d all meet, we’d go to the pub together
and go wherever we went together and things like that, so ‘twas, that was fine from
that point of view, but... the long stint in Donegal was much much different, a much
different proposition altogether, yeah.
[Noreen:] We went up to Donegal, myself and the children for the summer, but we
went for a walk one evening, I’d say ‘twas the first evening we went for a walk
towards Buncrana, and we heard this big bang... and we said ‘there’s thunder, we
better go back home’ and Pat came back and told us afterwards there was a bomb
in Derry, I’ll tell you we didn’t go for a walk or anything there... no I, I enjoyed my
term up there really, I did, the lady in the house was lovely... Margaret... we can’t
think of her second name, but we enjoyed it, ‘twas beautiful weather and the
children enjoyed it, and everything, ‘twas lovely and ‘twas great for us because we
had been alone for so long, you know and the children loved it.
[Noreen:] Oh it was awful, it was awful really, and I had no car, and it was lonely...
it was lonely with two small children really, they’d go to bed at night and you’d sit
down and be there on your own, and... you know it was very lonely, it was really
yeah.
�[Noreen:] Oh it was brilliant, absolutely brilliant. Now we lived near the O’Callaghans
next door, down below in the houses as well, like as we’re here now as well, and
you’d have that company but it was lonely, really. You know, very.
I used to try to, when I was coming home, you’d always bring something. I wasn’t
the best out shopping at all, for anything to be quite honest I suppose, it’d be said
that I’m still not the best for it anyway... I always made a point when I was coming
home, I’d bring clothes for the children... and again there were a lot of markets, as I
say, and now sometimes in Monaghan, particularly when I was going on temporary
transfer, you’d buy things reasonable in Monaghan itself as well, but then there
were, markets across the border, Jonesborough was a great place for markets... but
I always made a point of bringing home clothes and I can still, in my mind’s eye see
the clothes that I bought and when I wasbuying them, because there’d be a few of
us together and we’d be comparing notes, we’d say ‘would this suit somebody now,
this age?’ you know, and you had men buying children’s clothes, lots of men...
Totally unusual.
[Noreen:] Very unusual, that men just didn’t get anything...
I went in so far as to buy...
[Noreen:] But he bought me a dress!
I remember buying a dress for Noreen...
[Noreen:] I still have it, I said ‘I don’t know it’s ideally... put it in a museum! Pat
bought me a dress!’
I remember two sergeants with me and I buying it, and we were inside, and they
had the girl modelling the dress inside for us, we were trying to decide... and they
were trying to get me to describe what kind Noreen was, her height, her
dimensions! Colour hair, eyes all this type of thing, we were trying to buy the
clothes.
[Noreen:] And sure I was pregnant when he was away as well, which was difficult
really.
‘Twas difficult, yeah.
[Noreen:] There was great excitement when he came home, we didn’t care where
we went.
And of course, ‘twas nice coming back to the children as well, because the children,
like ‘twas totally new for them, I was away, when you come back like, but they’d be
absolutely delighted when you come home.
�[Noreen:] Ah sure there was great excitement.
Oh there was big excitement and you know, I usually brought stuff to them, if it
wasn’t clothes it was something else, but again, ‘twas grand coming home, but then
facing back like you know, and then what used to kill me then was the drive, I
changed my car then one time when I was at home, and I thought I’d get a bigger
car, a more comfortable car, and I remember I bought an Austin 1100 car in Cork, a
nice car, lovely and comfortable... but a day or two before I was due to come home
from Burnfoot for my time off... the engine of the car started to give trouble... and I
remember driving down, I came home all the way with a water container in the car,
the water pump in the car was giving trouble, oh no ‘twas a gasket and the car was
giving trouble, and ‘twas leaking... and I was putting in water, I would have to stop
every so often and put water into the car, so I drove the whole way from Donegal
with a faulty car and I was petrified that it was going to break down, but like I
suppose... the only people that would travel to Donegal are people going there on
their holidays and ‘tis the most beautiful county, I would compare it really with West
Cork and Kerry, the scenery is exquisite in Donegal.
[Noreen:] Oh it was a lovely county, yeah it was, and we always said we’d go back,
we never did it’s so far away...
It’s divided really into two, Donegal is divided into two, you have the Swilly, Lough
Swilly, and Lough Foyle, you’ve the Foyle on the eastern side, but you have the
Buncrana that peninsula there, the Inishowen peninsula, and then you have the
western side of Donegal which is absolutely beautiful country, beautiful... I must
say, the longer I stayed there the better I got to know it, I liked the people there,
the local people, and... they had put up with an awful lot like, you know during the
troubles and everything.
‘Twas terrible for them, they had put up with an awful lot, you know and a lot of
inconvenience as well, with road blocks and everything, there were a lot of detours
and there were roads closed off, and it made life difficult for the local people, and
like when you go there first, you were probably not conscious of that, but as my stay
extended there, I got to realise that there was an awful lot of inconvenience for local
people.
For them ‘twas inconvenience as well, it was really. Now, you had people that
exploited the situation, you had people then who of course were... were supportive
of the cause that was going on across the border, and they were going to do what
they could to disrupt things across the border, and this is, was our purpose there to
try and prevent that from developing, and again that placed a lot of pressure on us,
the other thing for me I suppose was that the fact that... as I said I went up new,
newly promoted, I was young at the time like, I had only about ten year’s service in
the Guards... was to get to know even how to act as a sergeant, if you know what I
mean? In simple terms, how to play the role of a sergeant, because as far as I was
�concerned all I did was tuck my Garda role into a sergeant’s role... which sometimes
maybe wasn’t sufficient for what you were supposed to be doing, because there was
a lot of work, I found there was a lot of work in, Burnfoot for a sergeant, a lot of
work, there was a lot of paperwork as well connected with the border, because it
placed extra duties on the lads who were working outside... all the time... and I
would have been one of those that preferred to be working outside, so I used to go
out as much as I could with them, I’d be out a lot with them, we’d a lot of traffic
accidents now as well, which...
And it’s still, do you know? It hasn’t change, sure it hasn’t...
Because the percentage of deaths on the roads in Donegal is a way above the
national average, has been, thankfully lately I haven’t heard all that, but... there was
a period there and it was very bad, and in my time there as well, we’d a lot of
accidents, and again with a lot of... Northern Ireland drivers involved in traffic
accidents, whether it was the condition of the roads, or whether it was lack of
knowledge of the locality or what it was, and we had a lot of accidents at night
there, I can remember... because we used to be out like with our jackets, and ‘twas
a highly, highly dangerous place because we were on the Derry-Buncrana road, and
we had the Derry-Letterkenny road, we had two main roads coming from Derry, kind
of intersecting there and ‘twas a dangerous, dangerous place for traffic, but a lot of
time spent investigating traffic accidents as well, as well as border duties, so that
was...
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The Green and Blue Across the Thin Line (<em>collection</em>) [NC]
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of 39 stories that were compiled as part of a project with the aim: "To develop a storytelling project reflecting the cooperation and interaction between former members of Royal Ulster Constabulary and former members of An Garda Síochána along the border from the establishment of the two Police Forces to 2001." (From the Green and Blue website.)
Extracts from the 39 recorded interviews were published in book format in 2014. The associated Green and Blue website contains full transcripts for 24 of the interviews. The website also contains 18 interview audio files (as of 22 January 2016).
URL
Non DC - URL of Organisation / Project
http://www.green-and-blue.org/
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Diversity Challenges Board
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2014
Stories Collected
Non DC - Number of stories recorded as part of the project.
39
Stories Deposited
Non DC - Number of stories deposited with Accounts of the Conflict.
18
Collection Permission Form
Non DC - Collection permission form signed and returned.
Yes (signed: 21 March 2015)
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
Published book; and Web site
Language
A language of the resource
English
Delayed Access
Non DC - Yes/No on request for delayed access.
No
Availability Online
Non DC - Availabilty Status (deposited, delayed, external, cain)
deposited
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Police Services; Northern Ireland, Republic of Ireland; 1920s to 2001
Publication
A book, article, monograph etc.
Author
Author of the publication
Pat O'Leary
Date Type
Publication, Submission, Completion date etc.
Completion date 2014
Publication Title
Full title of publication, as it appears on item.
Transcript of audio interview
Publisher Location
Place of publication: city / town
Website
Publisher
Diversity Challenges Board
Publication Type
Report, Book, Manual etc.
Transcript
Publication Status
Published, in Press, Unpublished, etc.
Published on-line
Number of Pages
13
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
<em>Untitled Story</em>, by Pat O'Leary <em>(story transcript)</em>
Description
An account of the resource
Transcript (PDF) of the audio recording of interview with Pat O'Leary which was recorded as part of the Green and Blue – Across the Thin Line project.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Green and Blue – Across the Thin Line project
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2014
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
PDF version of transcript
Language
A language of the resource
English
Availability Online
Non DC - Availabilty Status (deposited, delayed, external, cain)
deposited
Catalogue ID
Non DC - ID for the Catalogue entry that relates to this entry
2877
Diversity Challenges
Green and Blue