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February 4th marks the 40th anniversary of the horrific murders of twelve soldiers and civilians who were travelling from Manchester to Catterick Garrison by coach. 38 people were also seriously injured. RIP. 
‘Daddy, Can We Sit Back There?’
Dedicated to those who died on the 4th February 1974, their families and the survivors.
“How could a woman kill innocent kids?” A nation of women cried down.
Reading a tale of the bold IRA, the killers of children with never a frown.
“Hangings too good for people like her” The nation cried out, it’s anguish complete.
For here was the woman that murdered them all, those people with semtex just under their feet.
For she had strolled up, that dark winters night, as cool as you please, and done her sick deed.
Condemning so many to horrible death, just doing her ‘duty’, fulfilling her creed.
By throwing that case in the boot of the bus, then watching the soldiers and children climb on,
She witnessed the victims of her semtex bomb.
She smiled at the young ones, walked swiftly away, night breeze in her hair,
The words drifted to her, “Can we sit back there?”
So now the bus travelled through Manchester’s Streets, the hour had gone midnight, the die had been cast.
The journey it travelled, with headlights ablazing, would now be it’s last.
And as the gears ground up the long Pennine slopes,
The passengers slumbered, their dreams and their hopes,
Would soon become nothing, for ticking below,
The clock in the suitcase was ready to show,
How the bold IRA murdered women and kids, to achieve its sick ends, to let the world see
How a united Ireland would be good for them all, and would teach you and me.
And the tales of this ‘bravery’ would echo for years,
Along with the shedding of millions of tears.
Twelve people lay dead on that cross Pennine road.
The coach had exploded, disgorging it’s load,
Across all six lanes of the M62, and firemen wept as they counted the toll,
Of women and children, whole families killed, by the ones with no soul.
And what of this women who planted the bomb, in bed with her lover as victims lay dead?
The wrong that she’d done never entered her head.
Her thirty year sentence cut short in its prime.
Her appeal upheld, by judges so stupid for cutting her time.
Now there’s nothing to show on cold Hartshead moor, as the winter wind moans past the odd farmhouse door.
A small noise just whispers across fields so bare,
A young child asking, “Can we sit back there??
Dave 2004.
Dedicated to those who died on the 4th February 1974, their families and the survivors.
“How could a woman kill innocent kids?” A nation of women cried down.
Reading a tale of the bold IRA, the killers of children with never a frown.
“Hangings too good for people like her” The nation cried out, it’s anguish complete.
For here was the woman that murdered them all, those people with semtex just under their feet.
For she had strolled up, that dark winters night, as cool as you please, and done her sick deed.
Condemning so many to horrible death, just doing her ‘duty’, fulfilling her creed.
By throwing that case in the boot of the bus, then watching the soldiers and children climb on,
She witnessed the victims of her semtex bomb.
She smiled at the young ones, walked swiftly away, night breeze in her hair,
The words drifted to her, “Can we sit back there?”
So now the bus travelled through Manchester’s Streets, the hour had gone midnight, the die had been cast.
The journey it travelled, with headlights ablazing, would now be it’s last.
And as the gears ground up the long Pennine slopes,
The passengers slumbered, their dreams and their hopes,
Would soon become nothing, for ticking below,
The clock in the suitcase was ready to show,
How the bold IRA murdered women and kids, to achieve its sick ends, to let the world see
How a united Ireland would be good for them all, and would teach you and me.
And the tales of this ‘bravery’ would echo for years,
Along with the shedding of millions of tears.
Twelve people lay dead on that cross Pennine road.
The coach had exploded, disgorging it’s load,
Across all six lanes of the M62, and firemen wept as they counted the toll,
Of women and children, whole families killed, by the ones with no soul.
And what of this women who planted the bomb, in bed with her lover as victims lay dead?
The wrong that she’d done never entered her head.
Her thirty year sentence cut short in its prime.
Her appeal upheld, by judges so stupid for cutting her time.
Now there’s nothing to show on cold Hartshead moor, as the winter wind moans past the odd farmhouse door.
A small noise just whispers across fields so bare,
A young child asking, “Can we sit back there??
Dave 2004.
In memory of Private David James McCahill
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