Page 178 - The History of the Royal Army Veterinary Corps 1962–2021

THE HISTORY OF THE ROYAL ARMY VETERINARY CORPS 1962 – 2021
not been entirely thought through. The dogs were kennelled in two Nissen huts, each one converted into four large kennel areas. The men were split up and integrated into the soldiers’ accommo- dation which amounted to a collection of 10-man wooden huts dotted around the camp.
Day one, for the first day for the new arrivals, began with a rude awakening from the over enthusiastic PT staff: everyone was to be outside their hut in five-minutes in full PE kit. Not having the kit, the dog handlers refused to join in. The day didn’t get any better.
After breakfast, the RAVC lads were expected to clean everything – that meant, everything – ready for “Room Inspection”. The detail was pretty strict with instructions to scrub the wooden floors to a shine, blacken the stove chimney and laboriously scrape surplus paint off windowpanes, and that was just a few of the many chores related to what was called “battalion life”. By lunchtime, the Dog Handlers had had more than enough and a meeting was called to decide on their next move. It was unanimously decided that “battalion life” was not for them, and the afternoon was spent moving beds and lockers into the dog kennels! The battalion didn’t approve, but after a few well-chosen words in the right ears the Dog Handlers retained the right to remain where they wanted to be – with their dogs. However, the mix of dogs and battalion routine was not a happy one and after three weeks of deployments and general misuse, the handlers decided to write to OC Army Dog Training School (ADTS) at Melton Mowbray, explaining the dire situation.
The letter was posted on the Sunday afternoon, just ahead of their next deployment and, as luck would have it, the timing could not have been better.
Private Hobson, who had been deployed to the water reservoir at Carryduff, County Down, was just settling into his sleeping bag on the Wednesday morning when he was summoned to the Ops Room. When he arrived, he was shocked to meet the OC ADTS, Major Donald Hall-Smith RAVC, who had received the Dog Handlers’ letter and flown out immediately to investigate the situation. He took one look around the patrol area and ordered an immediate withdrawal of the service and Pte Hobson to load himself and his dog into his Land Rover. Of the eight locations where dogs were deployed at the time, the Major pulled six of the dogs back to Ballykinler. However, HQ NI refused to allow the handlers to leave the
Province. It became clear, in that moment, that the men and the dogs were there for the long haul – but under what designation?
As the Troubles intensified Staff Officers at Lisburn recognised that protection and specialist dog teams had a critical role to play on military bases and in Operations against escalating terrorist action.2 It was clear to those monitoring the situation that the best way forward would be to create a unit specifically to deal with all the extra work. This was becoming of paramount importance and so the idea, ‘written on the back of a fag packet’, evolved out of discussions between Major Brian Thompson RAVC (Deputy Director Army Veterinary and Remount Services at HQ NI), and Staff Sergeant George Yeandle.3
On the 4th May 1973, the MoD endorsed the formation of the Army Dog Unit Northern Ireland (Royal Army Veterinary Corps) (ADU NI (RAVC)).
Bring on the Dogs
Army dogs were to play a defining and vital role in the anti-terrorist security operations in Northern Ireland and it was the training, skills and drills gained in the proving ground of Ulster that have had a direct and long-lasting bearing on the RAVC ever since. The Army Dog Unit NI (RAVC) was responsible for providing the wider Army in NI with working dog support; that is, the dogs trained for specific roles with one dog undertaking one particular task. The classifications were: Guard (Gd) dog – the most aggressive dogs the RAVC Training Centre produced were employed in the defence of bases for the detection and appre- hension of intruders, as well as the dog trained to protect the handler. Arms and Explosive Search (AES) dog – trained to locate and indicate the presence of firearms, explosives, hides, and bomb making ancillaries in various indoor and outdoor environments. Tracker (Tkr) dog – trained to follow the trail of suspected terrorists after an incident or by back-tracking from an incident in order to detect information that defines a suspected terrorist’s movements. Vehicle Search (VS) dog – like the AES dog, trained to locate and indicate the presence of firearms, explosive and bomb making ancillaries in all types of vehicles, including ships and aircraft and to complete the task successfully, efficiently and in a time way quicker than any human capability.
The Armed Forces and RAVC had a presence in Ulster, long before the mass deployment in the
2 Notes of Conference re the Use of Army dogs held in Northern Ireland – 22nd January 1971.
3 Major P C Hobson BEM RAVC Eames Op’ citation.
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