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The Lions’ players christened their new friend “Rooster” and decided to help him and a friend fly the coop. That night Mayne and Travers returned with bolt cutters and clothing and set free the convicts. According to the Irish Post, Eoin McGonigal was Mayne’s best friend and possibly his only confidante. Accompanied by Mayne's shyness around women and drunken outbursts, historians have questioned the relationship between the pair. Some believed Mayne managed his feeling with alcohol, because he was a repressed homosexual. Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery signed a citation advocating a Victoria Cross but it was subsequently downgraded to a fourth DSO to go alongside numerous other honours that included being the first foreigner to be awarded the legion d’honneur and croix de guerre medals.
Eoin Christopher Mcgonigal c. 1921 - 1941 - AncientFaces Eoin Christopher Mcgonigal c. 1921 - 1941 - AncientFaces
Forming several groupings, one each led by Mayne, McGonigal, Stirling, and two others, the men had planned to regroup at a rendezvous point after sabotaging five German and Italian airfields. By adding an immediate and terrifying clarity to what must have been a baffling confrontation, these three syllables sent the room of thirty into “pandemonium”. He was mentioned in dispatches for the impressive manner in which he commanded his troop in the Litani River Raid in Lebanon and recruited by David Stirling for his newly formed SAS unit.Seconds later down the corridor another door was forcibly unhinged as Mayne surprised Lions captain Sammy Walker, an Ulster and Ireland team-mate, throwing the lifeless carcass on to the bed. Returning from an official function in Pietermaritzburg, Mayne spotted some locals and took off for an impromptu lamping session, returning in the wee hours with his bounty. Despite the gale force winds and flood that accompanied the storm, Mayne insisted on carrying out the mission, only to be stumped by pencil charges on the detonators, which, soaked through by the rain, rendered their explosives useless. Paddy Mayne didn't ever confirm his sexuality, and rumours he was gay appear to be speculation arising from authors and historians that has never been substantiated.
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They fight to keep Paddy’s legacy alive, and are keen to point out that the ‘muscle for hire’ image many people remember him for doesn’t tell the full story. For instance, they reveal he carried a poetry book called Other Men’s Flowers into battle – and SAS: Rogue Heroes does show this side of him, as we see Mayne reciting poetry in prison during the first episode. They also tell the story of how – when his best friend Eoin McGonigal (played by Donal Finn in SAS: Rogue Heroes) was killed in action, Paddy gave up his leave to go and search for Eoin’s grave, putting himself in considerable danger, and wrote a heartfelt letter to Eoin’s mother sending his condolences.The soft-spoken desert warrior was not without his demons, though, and could act out in unsettling ways. Paddy Mayne was socially awkward with no idea how to talk to women even though they were attracted to this very big, athletic man. He revered his mother and put women on a pedestal, refusing to tolerate swearing in their presence. He also plays Sayed in The State and Usman Abboud in the BBC Two series Industry. Paul Boche will play Walter Essner in SAS Rogue Heroes
Eoin McGonigal The Second World War in Northern Ireland - Eoin McGonigal
The famous actor is known for playing the lead role in The Lost Honour of Christopher Jefferies, for which he won the BAFTA TV Award for Best Actor. In May 1944, Ambrose became involved with what were known as the Dover “Tarbrush” raids. This led to him receiving a Bar to his MC after this recommendation: “This officer [Lt. Ambrose McGonigal] was the commander of a military force which landed to the East of Calais on the North coast of France on the night of 16/17 May 1944, to carry out a reconnaissance of enemy beach obstacles. The operation was of the highest importance and was of an extremely hazardous nature, involving as it did a three mile approach to a heavily defended enemy coastline, by night in an 18 foot Dory, and the carrying out of a minute examination of beach mines and obstacles of unknown potentialities. During the run in, and the return passage to the parent M.T.B., Lt. McGonigal was forced to alter course on two occasions to avoid a single enemy vessel and a convoy of seven vessels proceeding towards Calais a mile offshore. Despite such interference he so navigated his craft as to reach the selected landing point without error thus greatly facilitating the task of the landing party. Throughout the entire operation his skill, courage, and level headedness inspired his force to the maximum of effort and resulted in the obtaining of vital information.” He was later rebuked by Stirling, who said that while “it was necessary to be ruthless…Paddy overstepped the mark”.Sir Ambrose Joseph McGonigal, MC (22 November 1917 – 22 September 1979) [1] was a High Court Judge in Northern Ireland.
SAS Rogue Heroes cast revealed for new BBC One series
This episode, as intimate as it was gruesome, “veered away from sabotage and close to assassination”, the author maintains, and it has dogged Mayne’s reputation ever since. The new series comes from Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight based on Ben MacIntyre’s book of the same name. In May 2019, it emerged that the creator of Peaky Blinders is adapting the story of the birth of the Special Air Service as a television drama. Here, John O'Sullivan examined the life and times of Col Robert Blair "Paddy" Mayne - an original member of the service and an Irish rugby international with a reputation as a hard-drinking, free-swinging firebrand. And yet six months later his Victoria Cross was downgraded to his fourth DSO instead. It’s not known who took this decision, or why, but it remains a wartime controversy that is still ongoing.
Man who subjected victim to 'appalling childhood sexual abuse' is jailed for 22 years
The decision has courted much controversy, and even caused a baffled King George VI to enquire as to why the Cross had “so strangely eluded him” at the time.
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