Soldiers quit Bessbrook

Soldiers will pull out of south Armagh today on a day of reflection for fallen comrades, the army said.

Colonel Wayne Harber said the troops value restored peace in the North but added that it was a moment of nostalgia for many leaving Bessbrook Mill for the last time.

Twenty members of the Second Battalion Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment vacated the sprawling military complex at 9am in one of the final withdrawals of the military.

Col Harber said: “We are pleased to be going and that the peace process is progressing, so soldiers know the importance of peace more than anybody else.

“People have come so far and, particularly at Bessbrook Mill which has seen a large number of troops coming through, it is quite an important moment for us.”

On July 31 the army ends its official support role for the police, and troop levels are to fall to 5,000 from 27,000 at the height of the conflict in the 1970s.

Operation Banner has been the longest single campaign in British military history, stretching back to 1969.

Once the busiest heliport in Europe, Bessbrook saw the last soldier killed during the troubles.

Lance Bombardier Stephen Restorick was shot dead by a long-distance sniper while operating a security checkpoint in 1997. He was the last of 763 military personnel to die in the North.

Col Harber said a predecessor Regiment of the Princess of Wales’s, the Queen’s, was first to deploy to the North, to the Falls Road in August 1969 to protect the Catholic community.

“The army doesn’t deal in sentiment but there’s a hint of nostalgia and that thread of continuity and the significance that this is the longest military campaign in the army’s history,” he said.

“It is the idea of continuity that we feel today but we are optimistic.”

The last helicopter flight took place at the weekend.

At one point, there were 104 military bases in the province but there are now fewer than 20 and that too is set to fall further in the coming weeks.

Conor Murphy, Sinn Féin MP for Newry and Armagh, welcomed the departure from Bessbrook.

The regional development minister in the new power-sharing Stormont government said: “This is obviously welcome news for the community of South Armagh, who have had to live under British military occupation for the past 30 years.

“Sinn Féin made the issue of demilitarising communities like South Armagh a central part of the political negotiations. We are happy we have now arrived at this point.”