Karen’s Boyfriend

One of the girls in our little crew was going out with a lad from the other side of Birmingham. They’d have a night out together in the centre of town, he’d see her safely onto the number 58 or 60 bus back to Small Heath, then cross town to get his own bus home. One night, he waved her off as the bus left, turned around and accidentally bumped into a black kid, who stabbed him. Karen saw him fall as the bus pulled off. He bled to death.

Chris and his gang decided this had to be avenged, so embarked on a campaign to hunt down the killer. They cruised around Handsworth in a Transit van, dragged people into the back of the van and ‘interrogated’ them, trying to find out who they were looking for. Eventually, or so the story goes, they found out who the murderer was and kidnapped him. I know for a fact that the hunt took place, but I’m sceptical as to whether they actually caught the guy. The story I heard was that they beat him up in the van, then weighted his body and threw him into the Acker docks to drown. The reason I don’t believe the story is that a few years later the Ackers, which were some derelict old docks on the Grand Union Canal, were reclaimed and turned into an adventure centre for kids, with climbing walls, canoeing, dry ski slope etc. I’m pretty sure that if there was really a body in the docks they’d have found it during the reclamation works.

I Get Beaten Up

I once got beaten up by a gang of lad six or seven lads outside a nightclub at the Swan, Yardley. They’d sexually assaulted my girlfriend, so I’d piled into them, knowing I was sure to take a hammering, but nevertheless hoping (in vain, as it transpired) that I’d be able to take a couple of them down with me. I ended up in hospital having my face stitched up and with a couple of bruised ribs.

Chris turned up at our house a couple of days later, wearing an overcoat although it was quite a warm evening:

“How you getting’ on, Col?”

“Oh, you know, OK, all things considered”

“Would you know ‘em if you saw ‘em again?”

“A couple of ‘em, yeah”

“Well, I’ve been asking around a bit and I reckon they come from Lea Hall. If you fancy a trip to Lea Hall, I’ve got the shotgun here..”

He opened the overcoat to reveal a sawn-off shotgun concealed in a long pocket that had been sewn into the lining. It was total madness for someone with his local reputation to be wandering the streets like this. If he got stopped for a routine search, he’d be facing another prison sentence.

I declined his offer of assistance and let things die down quietly.

Circumcision

One horrible rainy evening, I’d missed the night bus home from Janice’s house in Yardley, so elected to walk back to Small Heath. The streets were deserted, all sensible people tucked up warm in bed. In Hay Mills, I became aware of a lone figure stumbling towards me. As the figure got closer, I realised it was Chris:

“Chris, where are you going, mate?”

“Home”

“You’re miles past your road”

“Oh, Christ, am I, Col?”

“Yeah, come on, I’ll take you back”

We started walking through the downpour. Chris was extremely drunk and very much down on his luck. He’d recently come out of prison (again) and was bemoaning the fact that the world had got it in for him.

“Nothin’ ever goes right for me, Col. No matter how hard I try to get up, I just get kicked down again, and my fuckin’ doctor’s useless”

“Your doctor’s useless? What do you mean?”

“Well, the fucker won’t circumcise me, will he?”

I drew a breath in anticipation and dread of where this conversation might be going.

“Erm,… why do you want to be circumcised, Chris?”

Chris grabbed me by the shoulders, spun me around and backed me up against the wall.

“Think about it, Col, just think about it. Who’s circumcised?”

“I dunno, Jews?”

“EXACTLY – Jews. They’re all circumcised, ain’t they?”

“Yeah”

“And what have Jews always got?”

“Erm, loads of money?”

“THAT’S RIGHT. They’re all rich and they’re ALL circumcised. Think about it Col – there HAS to be something in it, doesn’t there?”

By now, we’re nose-to-nose. We’re the only two people in sight, it’s bucketing down with rain and I’m eyeball-to-eyeball with the local psychopath, fresh out of prison. Every fibre of my body wants to burst out laughing, but if I so much as smirked, I’d be dead in an instant. Somehow, I suppressed the tremors, kept a straight face and replied:

“Blimey, Chris, that’s brilliant. I’d never seen it that way”

“No, people don’t. They don’t want you to know the secret. Get onto your doctor tomorrow and tell him to circumcise you before it’s too late”.

With this potentially fatal crisis averted, we resumed our soggy walk along the Coventry Road, chatting almost like normal people would. I was suddenly aware that he was no longer alongside me. I turned around to see him poised and braced against a shop window with his foot drawn back, ready to smash the glass. I ran back and dragged him away:

“What you doin’ Chris?”

“Look – beer. There’s beer the other side of the window”

I turned him around and pointed out a large building about three doors away:

“Look – Hay Mills Police Station, full of coppers”

“Oh Christ, yeah. Thanks, Col”

We managed to get home without further incident and without either (a) me ending up dead, or (b) both of us ending up in the cells of Hay Mills Police Station. It was exhausting.

The former Hay Mills Police Station. Now the Old Bill and Bull Pub © Flickr

The Polite Bouncer

One of the girls in our crew had her 21st birthday party in the upstairs room of the Hay Mills Tavern. The pub downstairs was heaving, and we were having a very noisy disco. There was no proper security, so the lads were taking it in turns to act as doormen and stop people from coming up the very narrow staircase from the pub to the function room. As bad luck would have it, Chris and I were given doorman duties at chucking-out time downstairs, a potential flashpoint. The staircase was too narrow to stand side-by-side, so I stood (i.e hid) behind him (I’m not daft).

A group of drunken blokes came up to the stairs and told us they were coming up. Very quietly and very politely, Chris, who’s only a little bloke, about 5’8” and quite slightly built said:

“I’m really sorry, fellas, but we can’t let you in. It’s a private function and we’ve been asked to keep people out”

The drunk with the biggest mouth (there’s always one) started coming up the stairs saying:

“Fuck off, we want a drink and we’re coming in”

Chris: “No, don’t. As I said, it’s a private ‘do’ and they’ve asked us not to let anyone in”

Mr Big Mouth: “Fuck o,,,,”

He froze, mid expletive. I could only see the back of Chris’s head, but the guy was looking into the face of this little skinny bloke blocking his way.

“I ain’t going near him. He’s a fuckin’ nutcase, he is. Let’s go”

And with this they all turned around and exited sheepishly down the stairs.

I’d love to have seen what Mr Big Mouth could see, when he was looking into Chris’s eyes. The person in front of him was quite small, slightly built, impeccably polite, quietly spoken but patently absolutely lethal. I wondered what it must feel like to be able to terrify someone without actually saying or doing anything even remotely threatening.

Electroconvulsive Therapy

I moved away from Small Heath when I was 20 and went to live with my girlfriend in Stechford. Mom was still in Monica Road, though, so I’d visit her a couple of times a week. I’d occasionally bump into Chris on one of these visits so we remained distant friends.

On one occasion, he’d just come out of prison having served time for glassing the two bouncers in a club. He told me he’d previously been barred from the club but had somehow sneaked in and was having a drink at the bar when he saw the bouncers pushing their way through the throng towards him:

“I saw them coming, Col, and I was frightened. The last thing I remember about any of it was seeing them about ten feet away and then the next thing was them both lying on the floor, me with a glass in my hand and half a dozen people holding me down. I didn’t know what I’d done – couldn’t remember a thing”

He’d been sentenced to about 18 months, reduced to 9 months for good behaviour. He was walking really awkwardly, with a stooped, shuffling, gait. He continued:

“They gave me electric shock therapy in prison. It’s bloody agony. They put electrodes on your head, strap you down and then electrocute you. You have a thumping headache for days and days, you can’t sleep because it hurts to lie your head down. They give you a couple of aspirins, as if that’s gonna make any fuckin’ difference. It’s torture, Col”

ECT Therapy (being done properly) ©ar,inspiredpencil.com

The Coats

Another time when I was back in Small Heath, visiting Mom, she laughed as she told me a story. Chris and his younger brother had opportunistically stolen a van full of coats that was in the process of being unloaded outside a shop on Stratford Road. They’d taken the van back to Small Heath, unloaded all the coats into their house and then dumped the vehicle a few miles away. It must have taken the police all of fifteen minutes to work out who’d committed the crime, and inevitably the house was stormed by the Plod and the whole family taken into custody, charged with stealing and receiving stolen goods. Mom had bumped into them as they were on their way to Court…

“I had to laugh, Col. All of them were dressed up for Court, wearing the most lovely new coats! They looked really smart. Almost respectable”.

The Honorary Woofter

The last time I saw Chris was at the funeral of one of our neighbours in Small Heath, a lady who’d been a very good friend of Mom’s. He’d caught religion in prison and had calmed down significantly. We were having a typically boozy Catholic Wake at the Emerald Club on Green Lane. It must have been 15 or 20 years since I’d left Small Heath, so going back to the Emerald was an experience in itself. I got into a bit of a drinking session with Chris and a few of the old crowd.

As the afternoon turned into evening, it was established that I was the only person around the table who’d never been glassed. Everyone had scars on their cheeks, but mine were pristine. Jokingly, they nominated me ‘honorary woofter’ and made me get a few extra rounds in as punishment.

It had probably been ten years since Chris had last been in prison, but I noticed that he still smoked his cigarettes ’prison style’ with the ciggie cupped into his hand as if to protect it from the wind in the Exercise Yard. Some old habits die hard. I hope he’s still alive and enjoying a quiet life somewhere.

I hope you enjoyed reading this. As ever - a cup of coffee would be very welcome!