40 anniversary of the murder of Private William Pollock, a brave part-time UDR soldier
Recently we marked the 56th anniversary of the formation of the Ulster Defence Regiment CGC and paid tribute to all who served with great valour and honour. The men and women of the UDR CGC were all so brave. They courageously put their own body and mind in danger as a shield to the service of the community at a time of great need for Northern Ireland. They often paid the supreme sacrifice for standing against the evil scourge of terrorism that plagued Northern Ireland and are so worthy of our continuing support and honour.
We in Castlederg know only too well how vicious the IRA’s campaign of murder and ethnic cleansing was. A campaign that sadly the first minister of Northern Ireland, Michelle O’Neil has grotesquely and without shame said there was no alternative to.
Castlederg would suffer a very high price in terrorist attacks due to its proximity to the border with the Republic of Ireland and has the unenviable title of the most bombed town during the troubles. State collusion by successive governments in the Republic of Ireland to fund, arm and give shelter to republican extremists and their weapons of terror the bomb and gun attack was particularly heavily felt by the community of Castlederg. State collusion extended to every rank of the Garda in particular and its time the United Kingdom took judicial action against the Republic of Ireland to get justice for those murdered and maimed and to recoup the billions of Pounds of criminal damage caused by the Republic as a state sponsor of terrorism.
As this week marks the 40th anniversary of the murder of one UDR soldier from Castlederg I thought it would be a good time to illustrate how cruel, unjust and ultimately futile his murder was for the continuing ideology of no alternative.
William Charles Pollock was born in 1958. He was a farmer from outside the village of Killen in County Tyrone, a few miles from Castlederg. He had recently got married and together with his wife had moved into a new house beside Glesagh Bridge that spans the river Derg around four miles from the town of Castlederg in early 1986. William had served in the UDR since 1979 as a part-time soldier in 'B' Company, 6th Battalion. As well as farming, he was an expert and renowned marksman having won numerous shooting competitions across the United Kingdom.
William like other fellow UDR soldiers was very careful about his and the family’s security as he knew he was at high risk of a republican terrorist attack. UDR members had to be on watch 24 hours a day and were most at risk when off duty as they went about their daily lives in the community they served.
However neighbours with evil intent in their hearts and in cold blood were also watching William and after observing he checked under his vehicle before driving it but usually not the farm trailer they had then decided to make him or anyone else that would lift the car trailer left sitting on the side of the road close to his home their next victim in a terrorist ideology of murder, ethnic cleansing and destruction for a “new Ireland.”
The Pollock family had already suffered a member of the family murdered, Ronnie Finlay also a part-time member of the UDR and an uncle of William’s was murdered by republican terrorists in a gun attack at Strabane in August, 1983. It was just 12 weeks since republican terrorists had last committed murder in the Castlederg area when they murdered Victor Foster from Spamount, Castlederg who was aged 18 and also a part-time UDR soldier. His fiancée who was sitting next to him in the car when the terrorist indiscriminate weapon of choice an underbody bomb exploded and was very seriously injured.
It is believed that the bomb that took William’s life had been fitted under the cover of darkness by cowards several days previously. As the trailer was sitting on the side of the road it could have been lifted to be moved or borrowed by anyone during this time as is often the case in rural farming communities. Farmers are of the habit to always help each other out in times of need and a trailer is often shared and borrowed. William was such a man to loan equipment or help out in any way he could. His joining of the UDR was an outward illustration of that community service.
On Tuesday 8th April, 1986 while his mother and father was sitting in a car close by, William went to hitch up the trailer and as he lifted the drawbar the explosive device detonated under it fatally injuring him. His father Andy Pollock could so easily have been the victim that day as he often hitched up the trailer, the terrorist blood thirsty lust for murder and disregard for human life was such. William was aged 27 and would pass away before emergency aid could get to him. His brother who had been working close by cradled him in his arms as he died. Both parents suffered minor cuts and shock from the blast. Such a heart-breaking and barbaric thing for parents to actually witness their son’s vile murder. Like the far too many other murders in the Castlederg area by republican terrorist’s no-one to date has ever been brought to justice for the murder. In later years a stated member of the IRA who was a confirmed police informer and was paid large sums of tax payer’s money claimed he was involved in 14 murders in the Castlederg area and had informed his RUC handlers of planned attacks including that on William Pollock and this raises so many unanswered questions including collusion with terrorists on this side of the border as well.
It may now be 40 years since William Pollock’s murder but I still remember events that day so well. I often went fishing to the section of the Derg beside Glesagh Bridge as it was close to my home at Creeduff. I had got to know William quite well as had stopped to ask me how the fishing was going on several occasions. On the day of his murder I was fishing below the bridge and heard the bomb going off. I remember looking up startled at the noise of the explosion close by and seeing the dust and debris falling down from the trailer being blown to pieces only a short distance away, some of the small pieces of wood from the trailer landing on the river bank.
The numerous murders in Castlederg of innocents like William Pollock still deserve justice despite the passing of the years and the failure to deliver justice continues to dishonour those who held the line in Northern Ireland’s time of need. The warped narrative of republicans of no alternative to justify the unjustifiable and recently of Justice Minister Naomi Long who shamefully and callously said victim makers were victims as well adds to the deep felt insult of the forgotten and this must never be allowed to go unchallenged. Murder is murder, there was always an alternative. Those murdered or injured by terrorism still rightly deserve justice and it’s now time for a public enquiry as to why so many murders and attacks in the Castlederg area have went unpunished.
Stevan Patterson, Castlederg County Tyrone.