CHAPTER 12 - A HARD WAY TO LEARN

Some memories are a little painful so are best left to history, but one incident did affect how I felt about the armed forces! I reflected on it a few years ago and I am inclined to write it here.

During my time as a physical training instructor I taught many soldiers, not only from the Royal Military Police but from the infantry and Royal Marines. The course I ran was to teach self-defence and unarmed combat, the kind of skill a soldier might need to excel in during active service, and at that time Afghanistan and Iraq were not on my page, but the Far and Middle East was. My battalion offered the courses for more than three years and I met and taught many fine men, but I also met a few ‘dicks!

Those three years of extensive teaching were one of the most challenging of my life, especially as I was taught the skills, I was teaching by some of the country’s most amazing martial art experts, tough, strong, intelligent and ‘multi-Dan’ experts, such as the legendary Tom Shaw.

Such was the nature of the mixed armed forces when I served, with criminals hidden among college boys, builders with plumbers, unemployed chaps who may not have had an opportunity in life through being poor, generally from the north, and a few army-mad sons of fathers who had served.

Life in the army at that time was very tough and one had to struggle to be seen for what one was, but I was protected from all physical confrontations because I was a PTI.

On one course that I was leading in 1968, I was teaching Royal Marines, and what a bunch of great lads they were, respectful, kind and not at all cocky, except for one.

Of the twenty who attended that course in the winter, there was one who had been a professional wrestler and whose sleeve was emblazoned with a crown! That meant he was senior to me as he was a sergeant major, and boy, did he like himself.

WOII Harry Dyball was stocky, had almost no neck and stood out from his men. Not many other marines wanted to be his partner for the learning processes which could be very painful due to the large number of nerve-holds and locks involved. I still suffer from martial arts training that has given me osteoarthritis, and had I known when I embarked on this side of army life that such a painful condition would strike me when I was older would I have opted out? No!

One of the psychological methods I used at the start of such courses, perhaps in order to prove who was the tough guy, was to select a hard marine and ask him to partner me while I demonstrated a move, warning them that what I would do might hurt a lot, but after a while it would heal.

Harry, the cocky sergeant major breathed in and puffed out his chest. He glared at me, and his stare penetrated my eyes, like a shining laser.

Harry was perhaps a stone heavier than me and over three inches taller. I was sixteen stones, so imagine, having been the biggest PTI in the depot, I was about to be confronted by a marine who wanted to smash my face in so he could be seen to be the tough guy, beating up a PTI, and who was bigger than me. I had been fore warned!

He had recently returned from active service in Cyprus and had also served in Malaya with 28 Commonwealth Brigade. I called him out and asked if he would like to join me on the mat to learn a new move! I made it clear to him that when I was teaching, that there was no rank to be pulled, and he laughed in my face and whispered gently, “I am going to kick your arse, you f****** Redcap”. Wow!

There he stood, chest puffed up, rocking from side-to-side on the mat, as professional wrestlers do.

I faced him, gave him a bayonet locked into a scabbard and asked him to come at me from any direction he wished. Within a few split seconds he stabbed the bayonet towards my neck and the scabbard shot off.

That had never happened before, and I was faced with a state of emergency. I had to think quickly because he was not aware that it was supposed to be stuck into the scabbard and I saw him look at the black blade. I was given no choice but to assume this was for real, so I slammed him on the ground and removed the bayonet.

I had no choice. I put him in a hold that it is not possible to get away from if applied expertly, and he screeched and shouted as I pinned him to the mat. I asked him if I could release him, and he agreed that he had been dealt with and quickly became aware of the scabbard lying a few feet away. Everyone on the course stood rigid but dare not laugh at their humiliated sergeant major. I could sense that they wished they could!

Harry stood up and brushed himself down, faced me, and, grimacing at me with lips quivering, spoke.

“Sergeant, you have made me look like a pussy in front of my marines. I will deal with you later”.

As I headed for home after the day’s work teaching the course, a blue Sunbeam Alpine sports car drove up to me from the warrant officer’s mess where he was staying for the course, driven by Harry. He had the window open and as he pulled up, he told me to meet him behind the regimental gymnasium with a ‘second’ for a set-to! I told him I could not meet to duel with a senior rank, and he blasted in my face and screamed that unless I did, he would find a way to set me up.

“I will be there at sun-down dressed to kill, no uniform”, he said, and said this was to be a proper fight that could only be witnessed by the ‘seconds. My second was another PTI, my sergeant major, but the marine didn’t know that. I knew I had to cover myself with a senior rank as witness.

We met at the scheduled place just before the sun went down.

We stood again facing up to one another and he asked if I was ready.

“Bare fists and army boots, and this is to be a real fight, with no holds barred” he blurted. He looked angry and his ‘second’ was confidently smiling. “No weapons, just hands and fists”.

He came at me and threw a straight-right towards my chin. It was such an easy attack to deal with. It was then that aikido came into its own, and I had him on his back in a second, groaning and shouting expletives. I held him down and told him that this was now the end, and that we needed to return to normality and behave. The point had been made. Rank meant nothing in such situations!

He slowly stood up and then flew across the grass to head-butt me, but I was quick to deal with his attack, and my protective action split his forehead. There was a sharp crack, blood spilled out onto his face, and it was quite a bloody mess. I sent my ‘second’ running to the guard room to ask for a first aider while I stopped the bleeding. Within a few minutes he was on a stretcher and being attended to by two MPs.

He was certainly in a state and never attended the last week of the course, but drove out of the barracks in his Sunbeam, head bandaged and stepping up the speed as he drove away, with two fingers raised.

Now comes the crunch. That man, that very young sergeant-major, that experienced marine with active service credentials and a line of medals, is still alive aged 93, and through the Internet I have been able to contact him.

Harry remembered me after a few hints, so I sent him a friend request.

Harry declined!