Category: General

I am Steve Jones, the Old Gaffer’s grandson. I’m pleased to report that he’s still around, although is now in a care home. His health is such that he is unable to contribute to this blog anymore, but he wanted to convey his gratitude and best wishes to readers everywhere – the comments have been… Continue reading The Old Gaffer

Apology Friends and relatives have been telling me that my English, and spelling, in the part 4 and part 5 of ‘Do you realize’ has been a little suspect. Most of my general readers are aware that I will be 90 next year, and am severely handicapped, which tends to make me tired. In consequence,… Continue reading Apology

The Royal Ulster Constabluary, Part 2 At that time I was a member of Fortwilliam Golf Club, and not entirely innocent of drink driving. We, a mixture of Regulars and Reservists, would shoot off in the Land Rover and at the whim of the Sergeant in charge, we would stop, set up a control point,… Continue reading The Northern Ireland Troubles,5

The Royal Ulster Constabluary, Part 1 She was married, she was young, she was pretty and she was a clerk, she was also a police woman. What she was not was a threat to anyone, any more than the poor old cleaner of a police station who was also killed just because he was unsuspecting… Continue reading The Northern Ireland Troubles, 6

THE LUDICROUS GIFT I have referred to the ‘liberation’ of articles by the terrorists. One which happened on a contract I was engaged on, took place a day or two before we stopped for Christmas. We had a gang laying pipes down a main road in the City . On the morning men arrived in… Continue reading Northern Ireland Troubles, 3

THE THEFT OF THE DRAWINGSAt the time I was tendering for a large contract, worth enough to bring contractors over from the Mainland to consider pricing. The drawings for the job ran into two rolls of between thirty and forty drawings a roll, and these I permanently kept in the boot of the car so… Continue reading The Northern Ireland Troubles, 4

ANOTHER IRISH QUESTION In the 40’s, you would have thought Ireland was nearer Australia than Britain for all the majority of the residents of Britain knew about the place and, I’m afraid, I fell squarely into that category too, when I was dispatched there by the Navy in ’42. In fact I knew more about… Continue reading The Northern Ireland Troubles, 1

THE CASE OF THE FARCE AT THE BARRIER One day in the 70’s I was faced with yet another typically Irish question, equally stupid, but highly charged, It was at the height of the bombing campaign by the IRA. I was telephoned from Head Office to be told that bombs were ‘on all the bridges’.… Continue reading The Northern Ireland Troubles, 2

A real event – dramatised I ‘m a bricklayer who has been instructed to examine the main drainage culvert beneath the quiet dark streets of our sleeping city. All afternoon a joiner and two men have been erecting a temporary sluice gate they call a stank to hold back the waters of the whole city… Continue reading 1950 – , Local Government,Part3