Soldier thought after shootings, `We have done it now, haven't we?'

A paratrooper who was involved in Bloody Sunday has said that when things quietened down after the shootings, the situation seemed…

A paratrooper who was involved in Bloody Sunday has said that when things quietened down after the shootings, the situation seemed unreal.

Soldier 013, who helped load three dead bodies into an armoured personnel carrier, said in his statement: "I thought to myself: `F . . . ing hell, we have done it now, haven't we?' "

On his evidence, read by Mr Christopher Clarke QC, to the tribunal, this soldier drove with several others in an APC to the barricade in Rossville Street where there were three bodies.

His statement said: "They were all lying in the same direction. They were not sprawled all over the place and covered in blood. I even thought that they may be playing possum. One was, I think, smiling.

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"I remember one body in particular. I thought to myself that this was the best-dressed Irish rioter I had seen. He was a youngish lad with ginger hair, wearing suede shoes, a brown check jacket, smart trousers and a shirt and tie.

"It seemed as though he had come from church with his mother. He had a hole in his cheek and I noticed a capillary line running from the hole towards his mouth."

Mr Clarke said a number of witnesses said the bodies were treated callously. Ms Olive Mottram, saw a soldier drag a body over the barricade, and he then "fired the body into the Saracen. I heard the thud as it hit one of the walls of the Saracen".

Ms Patricia Canning says the bodies "were picked up like sacks and thrown into the back of the Pig". Ms Elizabeth Fleming said they were thrown in "as if they were bags of potatoes".

Mr Daniel McDaid described going to see his brother Michael's body in the hospital morgue. The skin on the back of his head was "all lifted up". He says he "was later told by a number of people that this was because he had been dragged along the ground by his heels before the soldiers had thrown him into the Saracen".

Soldier 013 said he and his colleagues picked the bodies up by their hands or wrists and put them in the APC. He was sure they were dead. They drove back to their previous position north of the Rossville flats.

"We did not really know what to do then," he continued. "Lieut N was in charge. I remember a priest coming to the Pig [APC] and I thought that he was being troublesome. As far as I knew, he was going to pull out a pistol and shoot at us. My instinct was to keep him away from the Pig. I soon realised that he was not being troublesome and wanted to give Last Rites to the bodies.

"I remember `O' calming everyone down. I seemed to be on another planet at this stage. I thought to myself: `F . . . ing hell, we have done it now, haven't we?' The whole situation seemed unreal. It was bizarre."

Counsel then reviewed the Widgery inquiry evidence of Father John Irwin, a local curate, who went to the Saracen APC after being told by a woman that she had seen three bodies being thrown into it.

Father Irwin said a British army officer denied there were any dead or injured in it. The woman again pointed out the same Saracen, and when Father Irwin, with Father Anthony Mulvey and a Knights of Malta member, returned to the vehicle, "the officer flung open the door and there were three bodies piled one on top of the other".

The priests anointed the bodies, and as he climbed out, Father Irwin said, he accused the officer of having deliberately lied to him. "He just shrugged his shoulders and smirked".