On a bitterly cold night in the North African desert, a new, crack British Army unit called the Special Air Service burst on to the scene and straight into the annals of history.
Around 30 off-duty German and Italian fighter pilots were relaxing in the mess of the Wadi Tamet airbase when the door was suddenly kicked open, revealing a tall, bearded man in British uniform holding a Colt .45 revolver, flanked by two others with Tommy guns at the ready.
“Good evening,” said Paddy Mayne breezily, in a strong Northern Irish accent, before they gunned down every single airman in a matter of seconds.
Dodging bullets as a fierce gunfight ensued, the men darted around the airfield, setting explosive charges on planes and the fuel and ammunition dumps, before fleeing into the night as the base blew up behind them.
Paddy Mayne was known for his bravery, but also his drunken misbehaviour and violent outbursts.
The daring raid on December 14, 1941, destroyed 24 aircraft and stunned the Nazi war machine.
And as word began to emerge about the elite group of commandos operating hundreds of miles behind enemy lines, the SAS, and especially its maverick hero, became legendary. Lt Col Mayne, who took over as SAS commander after its founder David Stirling was captured by the Germans in 1943 has been immortalised in the new series of BBC drama SAS Rogue Heroes, in which he is played by Skins star Jack O’Connell.
The on-screen portrayal of his Second World War exploits has already led to calls for him to be posthumously honoured with the Victoria Cross, the highest award for gallantry, that even King George IV once remarked had “so strangely eluded him”.
Undoubtedly one of the Second World War’s greatest heroes, who probably helped accelerate the Allied victory, Mayne, who would have turned 110 today, was personally responsible for destroying 100 German planes.
He also pioneered the use of military Jeeps to perform surprise hit-and-run raids, usually on the Axis airfields.
And even while missing out on the Victoria Cross, he finished the war as its most highly decorated soldier, winning the Distinguished Service Order four times, and France’s Légion d’Honneur.
But he was a complicated man, known for his drunken misbehaviour, short fuse and violent outbursts.
They are among the reasons, some believe, his bravery was never rewarded with the VC. In fact, Robert Blair Mayne, nicknamed Paddy, had already made a name for himself before the war as a formidable sportsman.
Born in 1915 in Newtownards, County Down, he was capped six times by Ireland at rugby union and was selected to play for the British & Irish Lions on their 1938 South African tour. While there, he smashed up his teammates’ hotel rooms and freed a convict who was working on a chain gang.
Back home, he was notorious for going into pubs and challenging anyone to a fight, invariably winning.
Mayne, who studied law at Queen’s University Belfast, where he also became a champion boxer, joined the Army just before the outbreak of the conflict, and first attracted wartime attention as a troop commander in No.11 (Scottish) Commando.
He was mentioned in despatches, but then dismissed for drunkenly assaulting a fellow officer whom he had accused of shooting his dog.
Soon afterwards, his friend Stirling invited him to join the SAS.
Mayne is played by Jack O’Connell in the hit BBC series SAS Rogue Heroes
(
Image:
BBC/Banijay UK/Ludovic Robert)
“My mum was alone in a care home – it inspired me to make an AI robot copy of myself”
Again, he quickly became known as a daring and brave soldier, but also for often excessive ruthlessness. After the triumphant raid on the Wadi Tamet base, Stirling told his superiors: “I was obliged to rebuke him for over-callous execution in cold blood of the enemy.”
But his comrades idolised him, with one writing that he felt “immune to danger” when led by Mayne.
During just one week, the group destroyed more than 60 aircraft, numerous vehicles, a fuel depot and a bomb storage facility and killed over 50 enemy soldiers, with not one casualty.
In July 1942, Mayne came up with a daring plot to send two columns of 18 jeeps plunging into the Sid Haneish airfield at high speed, guns blazing.
The attack took the Germans completely by surprise. The SAS lost one man and one jeep, but destroyed at least 40 Luftwaffe aircraft.
The SAS attacks were so damaging that Hitler issued a formal order that “these British saboteurs and their accomplices are to be hunted down and exterminated without mercy”.
The following year, with Stirling imprisoned in Colditz Castle, Mayne led the regiment – temporarily renamed the Special Raiding Squadron – in campaigns in Italy that assisted the Allied invasion, Operation Husky.
During two daring missions in Sicily in July 1943, he led the unit in an assault on an enemy cliff-top gun emplacement, before a bold daylight attack on Augusta port, which led to the capture of 450 prisoners and the killing of up to 300 Italian soldiers.
They were then dropped behind enemy lines in France and went on to fight in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany, working with French resistance fighters and sabotaging infrastructure, ambushing enemy columns and co-ordinating air strikes.
But there were setbacks too, as dozens of captured SAS men were executed in accordance with Hitler’s notorious “Commando Order”, which stated any soldiers captured behind the lines would be killed, irrespective of whether they were in uniform.
Paddy Mayne with his men in 1941
(
Image:
Mayne Family / SWNS)
In 1945, Mayne led his troops into the heart of Germany ahead of the Allied advance. Near Oldenburg, he performed a famous act of bravery when he rescued some of his men who had been pinned down in a ditch following an ambush.
First, he ran alone into farm buildings from where enemy snipers were firing, gunning down every soldier inside, before coolly driving a jeep in full view of the enemy to rescue two wounded comrades while his gunner poured fire into the German positions.
One of his officers said there could only be one explanation why Mayne was not killed: “The sheer audacity and daring which he showed in driving his jeep across their field of fire momentarily bewildered the enemy.”
Sgt Albert Youngman, one of those he saved, later reported: “It was such a brazen thing to do… they were throwing everything back at him. God knows how they didn’t hit him.” It was, he added, the “finest act of bravery I have ever seen in my life”.
After the SAS disbanded in October 1945, Mayne travelled to the Antarctic with the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey. Perhaps more appealing than the idea of returning to normal life, he and his colleagues caught seals, drove teams of dogs and camped out in brutal conditions.
Hamish Ross”s had told Paddy Mayne’s story in his biography
Mayne’s statue stands in his hometown Newtownards
But a back injury he sustained from parachute drops into France forced Mayne to come home within months.
He returned to legal practice and became secretary of the Law Society of Northern Ireland. But in chronic pain and without the exhilaration and camaraderie of the war to sustain him, he found civvy street difficult.
He was killed when he drunkenly drove his red Riley sports car into a stationary lorry, aged just 40.
For many years, only his bronze statue in the centre of his hometown kept Mayne’s memory alive. His many fans hope he will finally be honoured with the Victoria Cross his immense bravery undoubtedly deserved.
This article contains affiliate links, we will receive a commission on any sales we generate from it.
Learn more
Earbuds we’d recommend for budget shoppers
Majority Tru Bio Wireless Earbuds
£34.95
For less than £40 these wireless buds offer decent connectivity and sound for the price. Here’s what they offer on paper:
- 30-minute quick charge and 30 hours playtime on full charge
- Bluetooth 5.3 (pretty standard if you ask us)
- Built-in mic
- Stereo sound and touch control
Amazon
Buy Here