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Auction: 11010 - Orders, Decorations, Campaign Medals & Militaria
Lot: 247

The G.S.M. to Sergeant T.W. Penrose, Royal Corps of Transport, Who Was Lured into a Flat on the Antrim Road, Belfast, and Murdered By I.R.A. Gunmen, March 1973 General Service 1962-2007, one clasp, Northern Ireland (23964965 Sgt. T.W. Penrose RCT.), extremely fine, with named card box of issue, (5) pieces of metal insignia and a comprehensive file of research (lot) Estimate £ 600-800 23964965 Sergeant Thomas William Penrose, born 1, County Houses, Pitlessie, Cupar, Fife, Scotland, 1944; educated at Pitlessie Primary School and Bell-Baxter High School; worked as an apprentice welder with British Rail prior to joining the Royal Engineers, 14.5.1963; transferred Royal Corps of Transport, 15.7.1965; promoted Sergeant, April 1972, in September of the same year he was posted to Northern Ireland as a member of the Movement Control Team operating in the Belfast Docks; on the evening of Friday the 23rd March 1973 Sergeant Penrose was understood to have been persuaded to join three other NCO´s to make up a foursome for a night out; the rest of party comprised of Staff Sergeant B.J. Foster, Duke of Edinburgh´s Regiment, Sergeant M. Muldoon, Royal Army Dental Corps and a Staff Sergeant ´X´, whose name and Unit have never been disclosed due to the events which followed later that night; it was believed that Staff Sergeant ´X´ and one of the other NCO´s had met two or three women in the Woodland Hotel, Lisburn on the previous Monday and had been invited to a party at their flat the following Friday; the four British soldiers arrived at the flat on the Antrim Road in civilian clothes at about 11pm; shortly after their arrival one of the two women left the flat saying that she would return with two friends to make up the foursome; the NCO´s were left with food and a fire; when the woman returned, however, she was accompanied by two men, one armed with a Thompson sub machine gun and the other with a pistol; Penrose and the other soldiers were ordered to lie face down on the bed and one by one they were sprayed with fire from both weapons; Foster and Muldoon were killed; Penrose was gravely wounded, and Staff Sergeant ´X´ who was the last to be shot moved slightly when the shots were fired, which was believed to have saved his life; the latter received wounds in his back, neck and part of his tongue and mouth were shot off; after the women and the gunmen left, ´X´ managed to crawl to the door outside the flat; the alarm was raised by the girl who lived in the next door flat; the RUC and Army arrived shortly after and Penrose and ´X´ were taken to the Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast; it was too late for Penrose though and he succumbed to his wounds in the early hours of the 24th March 1973; Staff Sergeant ´X´ was transferred to hospital in England; he was kept under constant armed guard, since he alone could identify the women who lured the soldiers to their deaths; he survived the shooting but was paralysed from the waist down and forced to live a secret life; initially it was believed that the murder of the NCO´s had been carried out by a splinter group of the Provisional IRA, however no group claimed responsibility; Sergeant Penrose was taken back to his young family in Liverpool, where he was buried with full military honours at Kirkdale Cemetery; despite exhaustive enquiries neither the women or the gunmen were ever bought to justice.

Sold for
£2,200