Billy Hutchinson - My Life in Loyalism

MY LIFE IN LOYALISM

MY LIFE IN LOYALISM

BILLY HUTCHINSON

With GARETH MULVENNA

First published in 2020 by

Merrion Press

10 Georges Street

Newbridge

Co. Kildare

Ireland

www.merrionpress.ie

Billy Hutchinson and Gareth Mulvenna, 2020

9781785373459 (Paper)

9781785373466 (Kindle)

9781785373473 (Epub)

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book.

Typeset in Sabon LT Std 11.5/16.5 pt

Front cover image: Peter Muhly/AFP via Getty Images.

Back cover image courtesy of Eddie Kinner.

Unless otherwise stated, all images are taken from the
authors private collection.

C ONTENTS

L IST OF A BBREVIATIONS

ACT Action for Community Transformation

CLMC Combined Loyalist Military Command

CLPA Combined Loyalist Political Alliance

DUP Democratic Unionist Party

IICD Independent International Commission on Decommissioning

INLA Irish National Liberation Army

IRA Irish Republican Army

MLA Member of the Legislative Assembly

NICRA Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association

NILP Northern Ireland Labour Party

NIO Northern Ireland Office

PSNI Police Service of Northern Ireland

PROPP Progressive Release of Political Prisoners

PUP Progressive Unionist Party

PIRA Provisional Irish Republican Army

RHC Red Hand Commando

RMP Royal Military Police

RUC Royal Ulster Constabulary

SYT Shankill Young Tartan

SDLP Social Democratic and Labour Party

SPG Special Patrol Group

UDA Ulster Defence Association

UUP Ulster Unionist Party

UVF Ulster Volunteer Force

UWC Ulster Workers Council

UUAC United Unionist Action Council

VPP Volunteer Political Party

YCV Young Citizen Volunteers

P REFACE

A fter an event in the Shankill Road Library in October 2016, which had been organised by the Action for Community Transformation initiative to promote my book Tartan Gangs and Paramilitaries: The Loyalist Backlash , Billy asked could he have a private word with me. He had been on a panel earlier in the evening with me, Eddie Kinner and Dr William Mitchell, during which he had talked candidly about his experiences as a member of the Young Citizen Volunteers in the early 1970s; experiences which he had shared with me for my book. I think its time I told my life story, Gareth, and Id like you to help me.

Id known of Billy since the late 1990s when, alongside David Ervine, he had come to the fore as an impressive advocate for progressive loyalism and an inclusive Northern Ireland for all people. He was also a Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) for the area I lived in, North Belfast, as I moved from Methodist College to Queens University to continue studying politics. With my ongoing research interests in political and paramilitary loyalism in Northern Ireland, it was inevitable that I would at some stage come to meet Billy, and I did so some time after completing my Ph.D. at Queens University. He agreed to speak on the record for my oral history of the emergence of Tartan Gangs and loyalist paramilitaries in the early 1970s, and ever since we have remained in close contact.

This book is the fruits of that relationship and friendship, whereby Billy placed his trust in me to assist in writing his story. I dont and cant agree with everything that Billy has done in his life, and he wouldnt want me to. Thus, without being so heavy-handed as to write a disclaimer, there are many events in this book which I do not endorse or support.

However, I do feel honoured to have been asked by Billy to assist in writing his life story. I took this project on because I feel that his story an incredible journey from young paramilitary through to politician is an honest and insightful account that will add to a better understanding of loyalism during the Troubles in Northern Ireland.

Dr Gareth Mulvenna,

June 2020

I NTRODUCTION

My so-called public image does not reflect my true self at all and so few people really know me outside of sensational newspaper headlines.

Gusty Spence, excerpt from resignation letter to
UVF Belfast Brigade HQ (1978)

T his book is my story. It is not an attempt to rewrite history. I want to take responsibility for my actions; actions I took because of the circumstances I and other young men found ourselves in during the violent early 1970s in Northern Ireland. I made choices in my life and I want to be honest about how I came to make those choices. I want to show that the story of working-class loyalism during the Northern Ireland conflict is not a one-dimensional story. The tabloids have filled plenty of column inches about me, and thus people perceive me in a certain way which is based on what they read or hear, but this book is my perspective and I aim to show that my story, and the stories of other young men of my generation, is more complex and nuanced than the way journalists and propagandists have tried to portray it.

By being able to tell my story, I understand that I am in a privileged position. Many of the people who I grew up with died during the conflict or are injured and unable to tell their stories. I hope that some people reading this book will recognise their experiences reflected in mine.

It is a story in three parts: growing up at the beginning of the Northern Ireland Troubles, becoming involved in loyalist paramilitarism and being incarcerated in Long Kesh for my actions; my years in prison, where I gained an education and decided that upon my release I would seek to help the community from which I hailed without resorting to the gun, and finally, how, through politics and the Progressive Unionist Party, I sought to make Northern Ireland a better place for everybody.

This is my life in loyalism.

Billy Hutchinson,

June 2020

CHAPTER 1

S HANKILL B ORN

I was born on Saturday, 17 December 1955 in a small two-up, two-down red-brick house at 98 Matchett Street off the Shankill Road. My parents William and Elizabeth greeted me into the world as everyone around them was eagerly anticipating Christmas, rushing around and making all their traditional festive preparations. In the midst of all this, it seems that I didnt make much of an impression; indeed, after the local doctor had helped to deliver me, he turned to my mother and said, Mrs Matchett, youre the best mother on Hutchinson Street. It would be fair to say that my life hasnt exactly run in a straight line since.

Parts of the Shankill are in North Belfast and other parts are in West. Matchett Street is on the North side, between the main Shankill and Crumlin roads. The whole area has been redeveloped, and many of the old streets have disappeared. In those days, however, those streets were tightly packed with red-brick terraced houses where extended families lived in strong networks of kinship. Our house was near the end of the street, and where numbers 94 and 96 should have been there stood wasteland which had apparently been created by a Luftwaffe bomb during the Blitz. It sounded like a good story when we were young, but it wasnt true. Our house had an outside toilet which rarely worked and a yard that flooded in the winter. The roof leaked continuously, and the house was always full of damp. Such were the living conditions for thousands of families in the Greater Shankill area. Like many other children born to working-class parents in Belfast at this time, I was a drawer-baby. Despite what it might sound like, the term doesnt mean that I was an art prodigy, it just meant that I slept in the only cot that was available the bottom drawer of the dressing table.