“A TRUE GENTLEMAN”
Lieutenant Colonel Robert Blair ‘Paddy’ Mayne was a tough but misunderstood Ulsterman whose exploits while commanding 1st SAS Regiment became the stuff of legend
An athletic sportsman from Newtownards, County Down in Northern Ireland, Mayne had represented Ireland and the British Lions at rugby during the late 1930s and was also a trained solicitor. Initially an artillery and infantry officer from 1939, Mayne became a commando and was Mentioned in Despatches for fighting in the Syria-lebanon Campaign before he joined the newly created SAS in 1941.
During 1941-42, Mayne earned a formidable reputation in North Africa by commanding audacious raids against German airfields. He recorded a personal tally of over 100 enemy aircraft destroyed before he took over command of 1st SAS Regiment in January 1943 after SAS founder, David Stirling, was captured. Mayne led the unit through Sicily, Italy, France and Germany and won a plethora of medals. This included the Distinguished Service Order & Three Bars as well as the Légion d’honneur and Croix de Guerre from France.
One of the most highly decorated soldiers of WWII, Mayne had a mercurial personality. He was extremely courageous and intelligent but his behaviour away from the battlefield could often lead to violence. Nevertheless, Alec Borrie, who served and fought alongside him, believes his character has been unfairly maligned, “I knew he was an important figure but he was not what people say about him. He’s been really maltreated since he died with people saying he was a bully and a drunkard but he wasn’t. He was quietly spoken and never bullied or spoke harsh to anyone. He would call you by your Christian name and he was a true gentleman. But – he was a very, very hard man.”
Despite the many dangerous missions he led, Mayne survived the war and returned to civilian life when the SAS was disbanded in October 1945. He continued his legal career in Northern Ireland but was plagued with a wartime back injury for the rest of his life. Mayne was killed in a car accident in December 1955 and a statue of him now stands in Newtownards.
Because of the nature of their mission, operating so far from Allied forces, the SAS took extremely heavy casualties in France. This was largely due to the infamous Commando Order, “Our casualties were 50 percent, although not in our section. In France, there are over
300 graves of 1st and 2nd SAS Regiment men. Most of those who died in Germany were killed in action but in France they were mainly caught and executed. For example, during Operation Bulbasket (near Poitiers) about 30 SAS personnel were killed after being captured. The SAS of course went after those responsible after the war. Those who were captured were put on trial but they weren’t sentenced to what they should have been sentenced to in my opinion.”
River salutes
After two months in France, Borrie and his section recuperated in liberated Belgium before 1st SAS was posted north, “We had six weeks’ rest (if you can call it rest) in Brussels and then we went on to the Netherlands where we patrolled along the bank of the River Maas. The river was then the only separation between the Allies and the Germans but there was nothing going on.”
Compared to what he had experienced in France, Borrie found himself foraging for food and even fraternising with the enemy during patrols, “In between us and the river were farms with pigs running about. We were with the British Field Security Police and they said if we got a pig then we could have a nice dinner. We did that on a regular basis but there were other times in the mornings where we would wave to the Germans across the river and they would wave back!”
After this spell in the Low Counties, Borrie was granted a period of leave back in Britain. His time at home proved to be short-lived, “It was supposed to be for a month but we got a telegram within two weeks telling us to go back across the Rhine.”
“A spot of bother”
When the Western Allied invasion of Germany began during February-march 1945, Borrie found himself performing a difficult task for Canadian forces, “We did reconnaissance for the Canadian Army, which wasn’t a good job. We were supposed to be reconnoitring in front but we were not trained to do that. We’d go off and sometimes end up 20 miles in front during the day. We were getting trapped and it was Paddy Mayne who pulled us out in the end because it wasn’t our job and the war was virtually over.”
Borrie recalls that Mayne often came to the rescue of SAS units who came under heavy enemy attack, “He would mainly come if you were in a spot of bother. He’d turn up and you’d think, ‘It’s alright now because he’s here and we’ll be OK.’”
It was during one of these rescue missions that Borrie directly witnessed Mayne displaying such courage that he was recommended for the Victoria Cross. On 9 April 1945 near Oldenburg, Lower Saxony, members of the
SAS (including Borrie) were pinned down in a ditch following an ambush. “The leading vehicle of about ten Jeeps went around a corner and came under fire. We stopped while Mayne came up and he got someone to drive him around the corner. He wiped out a pillbox and those who were doing the shooting so he managed to save the SAS people who were there. Two were dead, one was injured, another fellah had been shot through the leg and I was about 20 yards from Mayne when this happened.”
As well as eliminating the German pillbox, Mayne had also killed enemy snipers who had been hiding in nearby farm buildings. One of his superior officers later speculated on why the colonel had not been killed himself, “The sheer audacity and daring which he showed in driving his Jeep across their field of fire momentarily bewildered the enemy.”
Although he was recommended for the Victoria Cross, Mayne’s award was downgraded to a third Bar on his Distinguished Service Order. Borrie believes that Mayne should have been awarded Britain’s highest honour for his actions at Oldenburg, “He should have got the
“THE SHEER AUDACITY AND DARING WHICH HE SHOWED IN DRIVING HIS JEEP ACROSS THEIR FIELD OF FIRE MOMENTARILY BEWILDERED THE ENEMY”
VC because he was one of the best people, particularly for that job.”
1st SAS were frequently in danger as they advanced through Germany but Borrie also encountered many capitulating soldiers, including his enemy counterparts. “The war had almost finished by then and the Germans were surrendering to us rather than the Russians. We once had a load of surrendering German Special Forces men. We were short of food, however we found some and shared it out between us and them.”
Despite the Commando Order, Borrie feels largely magnanimous towards his former enemies. “The Germans were similar people to us really and once the fighting was over there were no problems. The ordinary German Army in particular were much the same as us. They were fighting for their country and we were fighting for ours. There were the SS and the Gestapo but the worst of all were the [Vichy French] Milice. They were evil people who committed atrocities against their own people. I can’t stomach that – they were worse than anybody else in my opinion.”
Borrie’s own war in Germany ended when his Jeep drove over a mine approximately three weeks before VE Day. “There were three of us on the Jeep and an ambulance came up and took us to a casualty station, although one of us had died by then. We were patched up and sent home to Manchester. We spent a couple of weeks there before we were transferred to Dartford, Kent. In theory it was right near home for me but I couldn’t go because I was only allowed out for very short periods of time.”
Far from being able to celebrate Victory in Europe, Borrie had to recover from his injuries before preparing to fight the Japanese. “We then went to the SAS in Chelmsford getting ready to go to the Far East. However, somebody came round one day and said, ‘Forget it. It’s all over.’ I can’t even remember going out and having a pint to celebrate [VJ Day]. I can’t remember doing much at all.”
Changing Perceptions
Borrie left the SAS in 1946 as a lance corporal and worked as a carpenter until he retired. In the decades since WWII, he has noticed that perceptions of the SAS have changed dramatically. “It’s strange because people either think that you’re some sort of superman or that you just kill people. The real problem was the 1980 Iranian Embassy siege because they televised it. Everyone then heard about the SAS but previous to that hardly anyone knew about them. You never talked about it except when you went to a reunion and saw your old mates. Even then, you’d perhaps talk about where you served but you never talked about what you actually did.”
When it comes to the SAS’S contribution to the Allies during WWII, Borrie believes that they were a formidable diversionary force. “Some people say that the SAS’S contribution was quite a lot. Others think it was next to nothing, but what it did do was keep German troops away from the front. This was a big help from D-day onwards and in the desert they destroyed more aircraft than the RAF. We were not liked by the top people in the army because they couldn’t tell us what to do. Only Churchill could tell us what he wanted us to do because we were ultimately an independent unit in the army.”
The SAS suffered horrendous casualties during WWII to divert German forces in Europe, with Borrie being lucky to survive. When he looks back on his wartime service, one incident in particular has remained with him. “The strange thing is when I was in Belgium a little girl gave me a coin. It was a two-anda-half guilder piece – quite a big silver coin. I remember that she said, ‘You keep it and so long as you have it you will be OK’. I was blown up two months later but I survived. I’ve also survived Asian flu and COVID-19. I’m not a superstitious person but I do give the coin a little tap every morning!”