A Glasgow Gang Observed

James Patrick

• Publisher: Neil Wilson Publishing
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781906000394
• Topic: Ciencias sociales
• Subtopic: Violencia en la sociedad

In the 1960's a 26-year-old schoolmaster at a Scottish reformatory (List D) School, under the alias of James Patrick, went undercover with the help of one of his pupils to study the often violent behaviour of the teenagers in a gang in Glasgow. He managed to conceal his identity and motives and during the course of a four-month assignation in 1966 he observed closely the gang members and concluded that the boys were 'afraid of fighting other gangs but more afraid of not fighting them.' Ultimately it was 'the struggle between identification with the boys and abhorrence of their violence that forced me to quit.'This book became the first published observation of a Glasgow gang and as such has stood the test of time as a number of factors that Patrick identified as contributing to the growth of gang culture still remain in existence today, most crucially poverty, grim housing conditions and unemployment. This is a portrait of gang culture before the drug barons moved in and created another level of violence and as such it deserves its cult status.Now fully indexed with a new Preface from the author whose whereabouts remain known only to the publishers.The republication of the book follows Peter Mullan's highly rated film 'Neds' which portrays a Glasgow gang in the 1970s.

1

Entrée

I WAS DRESSED in a midnight-blue suit, with a 12-inch middle vent, three-inch flaps over the side pockets and a light blue handkerchief with a white polka dot (to match my tie) in the top pocket. My hair, which I had allowed to grow long, was newly washed and combed into a parting just to the left of centre. My nails I had cut down as far as possible, leaving them ragged and dirty. I approached the gang of boys standing outside the pub and Tim, my contact, came forward to meet me, his cheeks red with embarrassment.

‘Hello, sur, Ah never thoat ye wid come.’

Fortunately, the others had not heard the slip which almost ruined all my preparations. I had not planned to join a juvenile gang; I had been invited. For two years I had been working in one of Scotland’s approved schools during my vacations from Glasgow University and Jordanhill College of Education. As a result I applied for a full-time post as a teacher, was accepted and started work in August 1966. During the Easter and Summer holidays of that year I had met Tim, who had been committed to the school some months previously. Thanks to some common interests, we quickly became friends; a friendship which was resumed when I returned to the school. In discussion with the boys the topic of gangs and gang-warfare constantly cropped up. One particular conversation in the middle of July I remember well. A group of boys were lying sun-bathing in the yard during their lunch-hour. I was sitting on a bench among them, criticising boys who got into trouble while on leave. Tim, who had been on the edge of the group and lying face downwards on the ground, suddenly jumped up and asked me what I knew about boys on leave and how they spent their time. The honest answer was very little, nothing at all in fact. At this point the signal for the end of lunch-break was given and, as the boys put on their vests and shirts and walked over to their ‘line’, Tim sidled up to me and asked me to come out with him and see for myself.

This combination of invitation and challenge worried me during the holiday I had before taking up my permanent appointment. While I knew from records that Tim was a gang member, with an older brother serving a sentence for murder, the realization of what an opportunity was being offered me, coupled with a general feeling of well-being after three weeks in Italy, made me resolve to accept Tim’s suggestion. The very fact that Tim wanted someone in authority to see ‘whit the score wis’ intrigued me. On my return I made use of every possible occasion to discuss privately with Tim the most suitable time for me to meet him while he was on leave, the type of clothes I should wear, the bond of silence and loyalty which would have to exist between us, etc. At first Tim thought that I should be introduced to his mates as an approved school teacher but I soon pointed out the dangers and difficulties of that arrangement. For a start, I would then have been unlikely to see typical behaviour. It was slowly dawning on me that the best solution to the problem would be for me to become a participant observer.

I realised, however, that this method of approach presented its own problems, chief of which was to what extent I should participate. My greatest worry was that incidents might be staged for my benefit, that Tim’s behaviour might be radically altered, for better or worse, by my presence. Tim’s willingness to introduce me to the gang solved the problem of obtaining entree. But from then on I would have to play it by ear. I spent the month of September thinking and planning, as the tan on my face slowly disappeared to leave me as pale as Tim and the others. I consulted no one during this period as to what my role should be, my main reasons being a need for total secrecy and a fear of being stopped. Privately I came to the conclusion that I must be a passive participant – a conclusion that became increasingly difficult to abide by, as I shall explain later. I had read, but not fully appreciated, Michael Young’s thoughts on the ‘Interpenetration of observer and observed’ in his book Innovation and Research in Education. A sentence of his was to remain in my mind: ‘The main problem, and excitement, of the social sciences is how to cope with the involvement of observer in observed … ’. Not only had I to recognise the fact that I was bound to change what I was observing just by observing it, but I had also to contend with the problems of role confusion. The situation of my being a middle-class teacher during the week and a member of a juvenile gang at the weekend produced a very real conflict for me. In fact it was the internal struggle between identification with the boys and abhorrence of their violence that finally forced me to quit.

To overcome the problem of background, I decided to present myself as Tim’s ‘haufer’ (i.e. his best friend in the approved school), who was out on leave at the same time, and, ‘havin’ nae people’ (i.e. relatives), had been befriended by Tim. This proved to be a simple but effective answer to questions about where I lived.

A third problem was that of language. Born and bred in Glasgow, I thought myself au fait with the local dialect and after two years of part-time work with these boys I considered myself reasonably familiar with their slang – another serious mistake as it turned out. So confused was I on the first night that I had to ‘play daft’ to avoid too many questions and also to enable me to concentrate on what was being said.

The plan was to meet Tim on the Saturday evening of his next weekend leave. Boys from Glasgow and the surrounding area were allowed home for a weekend once a month and for Sunday leave in the middle of the month.¹ I began to concentrate on making my physical appearance acceptable to the group. I was prepared to give my age as 17, although this point was never questioned. In fact I was able to pass myself off as a mate of a 15-year-old boy; my exact age remained indeterminate but apparently acceptable. Clothes were another major difficulty. I was already aware of the importance attached to them by gang members in the school and so, after discussion with Tim, I bought the suit I have described in the first paragraph. Even here I made two mistakes. Firstly, I bought the suit outright with cash instead of paying it up, thus attracting both attention to myself in the shop and disbelief in the gang when I innocently mentioned the fact. Secondly, during my first night out with the gang, I fastened the middle button of my jacket as I am accustomed to do. Tim was quick to spot the mistake. The boys in the gang fastened only the top button; with this arrangement they can stand with their hands in their trouser pockets and their jackets buttoned – ‘ra gallous² wae’.

One point of cardinal importance remains to be explained: namely, how an approved school teacher could develop such a close relationship with a pupil. I was the youngest member of the staff and looked it, and this as much as anything else made my relations with the boys easier and more informal. A common set of interests football, swimming and pop music – helped to further my connection with Tim. He for his part showed an intense curiosity about my home, family and middle-class background and I was equally curious about him. Our conversations during the evenings and weekends when I was on duty, plus the camaraderie engendered by a week’s camping with a group of boys including Tim, seemed to ensure a closer relationship than usual between teacher and pupil in a normal day school. But the bond of loyalty thus forged was soon to be tempered in far more testing circumstances.

Finally, Tim and I came to an understanding that, whatever happened, nothing would be disclosed by either of us to other members of the staff or to anybody else. This was seen by both of us as a necessary precaution for our own protection. Tim kept his part of the bargain throughout the four-month period I was involved with the gang (from October 1966 to January 1967) and continues to keep it. I have given a fictitious name to every single character in this book, and any material of an incidental nature which would make participants traceable will be slightly altered or omitted. This leads me to a discussion of the legal advice I have received. Some abridgements have necessarily been made. Unhappily for society, no character in this book is fictional. And, while using pseudonyms, I have retained nicknames of a type likely to be repeated in other gangs throughout the city. I propose to describe the general area in which I worked, to list the gangs in that area, but I shall not identify the name of the gang I joined. Wherever possible, I shall let events and characters speak for themselves. There were 12 outings in all and the first few will be recounted in detail. Then, instead of a blow-for-blow account in strict chronological order of every time I met the gang, key events and representative situations will be described.

But allowing the characters to speak for themselves presents two final problems – those of obscenity and unintelligibility. I must warn the reader that some of the phrases used, apart from predictable swearing and blaspheming, are extremely crude and are only included to convey a total picture of conversations I heard. The second difficulty is more intractable. Whole pages may at first glance appear to be extracts from Oor Wullie or The Broons (characters in strip cartoons of Glasgow life), but such is the dialect. A glossary is included as an appendix to the book to enable the reader to translate the main text into English.

On the Friday night as I left school, I reminded Tim for the last time that I was coming purely as an observer. At first he had been amused and delighted at my acceptance of his offer; latterly, as I made detailed preparations with him, his attitude became one more of incredulity. I now understand why.

2

The background

BEFORE I TAKE up the thread of the narrative, several general points remain to be made. Readers should, I feel, be in the possession of the same information as I had at the outset both about Tim himself what I knew of him and his background from school records – and about gangs in Glasgow, and, more particularly, the area I was about to enter.

Tim was born in November 1950 and admitted to the approved school in December 1965 at the age of 15. Seven days after his first appearance in the school he absconded with three other boys, returning voluntarily the following day at the instigation of his brothers. Shortly afterwards he was examined on diagnostic tests in English and Arithmetic, his results showing him to be in no way educationally retarded. Tim was also invited to write a composition on his home and he was allowed 30 minutes for the exercise:

My name is Tim Malloy. I live at 71 High Street, Glasgow, NW. I am the youngest of a family of NINE – 4 Brothers, 4 Sisters. I live with my mother and father. I went to St Enoch’s school but I did not get on very well with any of the teachers. My last year especially I was never at school because I was expelled for arguing with a teacher. I had a very good life at home and got practically everything I wanted until my brother got Arrested for Murder. FROM JANUARY TO MAY and after that everything quieten down and everything at home went great again [sic].

I would now like to summarise and at times quote directly from such documents as Tim’s probation and school reports to convey the extent of the information with which an approved school was supplied. We read that Tim’s previous convictions began at the age of 13 when he was put on probation for theft. A year later, he reappeared in court, was again found guilty of theft and was fined one pound, but was admonished on a charge of attempted housebreaking with intent. Still aged 14, he served 28 days detention for two charges of assault and breach of the peace. Within days of his release he was charged with the offences which caused him to be sent to an approved school – assault and attempted theft, assault and robbery, and assault. No details were provided with regard to any of these charges.

Tim’s religious persuasion, like that of his parents, was set down as Roman Catholic, but their connection with the church was described as nominal. Tim’s father had been unemployed for many years through ill health, his mother was a housewife, and both of them were dependent on national assistance. Their character was cryptically given as ‘good so far as known’. The four girls in the Malloy family were all married and living in their own homes. The eldest boy, William, aged 24, was serving a life sentence for murder, the second boy, Peter, three years imprisonment for assault, and a third brother, Michael, 12 months for assault. John, the brother closest in age to Tim, being at that time 16, was reported to be unemployed, on probation, and living in his parents’ home. Mr and Mrs Malloy rented a three-apartment Corporation flat at five pounds a month, which was said to be in good condition, comfortably furnished, but situated in a highly delinquent neighbourhood. Although Tim had spent three years at St Enoch’s junior secondary,³ all the headmaster could find to write about his educational achievement was that his progress in general and practical subjects was fair, that his IQ was 105, and that he had been absent for almost one third of his second year at school. Of Tim’s character and behaviour at St Enoch’s, the headmaster wrote:

Resents discipline, sullen and socially rebellious. This boy has recently suffered extreme emotional stress. His nervous response has been one of fury. He threatens older boys with backing of force from gang. Subject to flashes of unreasoning temper. Does not respond to any offer of help or kindness.

Tim was described by the probation officer as:

… an averaged-sized 14-year-old boy of stocky build with straight, mid-brown hair (worn in a fringe), good fairly even teeth, broad features and a fresh, healthy complexion. His finger nails are very badly bitten. He is of good appearance and deportment and mixes easily with other boys but is anxious to be accepted as a dominant figure in the group. He does his best to convince others that he is a ‘hard man’ and he is quite prepared to bully weaker boys. He is an active, agile lad who enjoys participation in recreational activities though he prefers informal or unorganised pursuits.

Malloy is a sullen lad, suspicious of authority, and he has inherited the reputation of his older brothers as being troublesome and rowdy in the neighbourhood. Whereas he can be a difficult boy, he is also capable of being respectful and has some common sense. It is probable that he is a very disturbed lad who has been unable to cope with the domestic trouble caused by his other brothers’ actions. The eldest was before the High Court on a charge of Murder.

Two weeks before his brother’s trial, Malloy’s behaviour became such that the headmaster decided that it would be better if Malloy stayed away from school for a few weeks. After the trial the parents were informed that Malloy should return to school but he remained away until the resumption of the school in August.

Malloy’s attendance since the beginning of the August term has been 29 out of a possible 146. Although part of this term was spent in the remand home it reflects a most unsatisfactory attitude to school and authority. On several occasions when he did attend, Malloy was sent home from school because of his aggressive behaviour and undisciplined manner.

In the Malloy family there exists an aggressive attitude towards the police whom they regard as victimising them. Mother shares this view and it is probable that Malloy has been caught up in this attitude. One of the difficulties in preparing a report on this lad is that his sullen, reticent attitude results in him giving away little of his true personality.

At that time my information about gangs was supplied by the daily press, a diet supplemented by conversations with the boys and members of the staff. Looking back, I now find it extremely difficult to give an accurate account of how much I knew then. Names like the Calton Tongs, the Gorbals Cumbie (from Cumberland Street), the Maryhill Fleet, the Possilpark Uncle (coined from the television show The Man from Uncle) and perhaps one or two others were familiar to me. Weapons, I knew, were used occasionally, clothes were a matter for detailed discussion, and girls were involved somehow. I had read (like most Glasgwegians) the stop-press in the Sunday newspapers which began: Boy stabbed. Last night a gang of teenage hoodlums … . This, I think I can say honestly, was the extent of my knowledge.

The press and the city generally had slowly become aware of the gang problem. News stories on juvenile violence began to appear in the late 50s and early 60s, but it wasn’t until 1965 that the trickle of news items on gangs began to swell into a flood. In March of that year, newspaper headlines proclaimed: The Gangs are Back! As the vandalism, the slashings, the ‘group disorders’ (to use the term favoured by the police) mounted, articles on causation, diagnosis and therapy kept pace with the growing interest in the problem. The organising secretary of youth clubs in the area explained the phenomenon as follows: ‘It’s the spring, you know. They don’t come out on the dark nights. They are too timid.’

In January 1966, some of the tenants of the Easterhouse housing estate formed citizen action groups and vigilante organisations. The Lord Provost of Glasgow seemed to be more than favourably disposed to the idea but it was soon scotched by the senior magistrate of the city, who realised that anyone who took the law into his own hands could only be treated like any other transgressor of the law. The idea of vigilantes died an early death.

In February of the same year a group of over 40 shopkeepers and businessmen petitioned their local Member of Parliament, asking him to take the necessary steps to protect their property and themselves from the gangs. In response to the increasing demand for action, an anti-teenage gang committee was formed, headed by the Lord Provost and the Chief Constable.

By May 1966, the national television and radio networks had taken up the story and phrases like ‘a stabbing is no longer news in Glasgow’ (on the Twenty-Four Hours television programme) caused a furore. In the same month, the crime figures for Glasgow in 1965 were released and revealed that over 850 people had been arrested for carrying an offensive weapon, that over 1,500 people had been arrested for breach of the peace and just slightly less for disorderly behaviour. In the local municipal elections...