“They were so disciplined, they just lay there totally still and I decided to myself they were soldiers. There was a helicopter circling overhead and I don’t know why they didn’t do something, radio to the police or soldiers to come up, because there were these two of their own soldiers.
I can still remember the atmosphere. When I came back in, you could feel it; I knew they were going to be shot. I remember saying to myself I am going to try and stop them doing that if I can.”
The two soldiers were driven less than 200 yards to a waste ground near Penny Lane. There they were taken out of the taxi and shot dead.
Corporal Wood was shot six times: twice in the head and four times in the chest. He had also been stabbed four times in the back of the neck. Howes was shot five times: once in the head and four times in the body.
“There was nobody else, there just the two bodies. I went up to the one on the right. He was still breathing so I tried to give him the kiss of life. Then, after a while, a man came in and stood behind me and said, ‘Look, Father, that man is dead’.
I anointed him and went over to anoint the man who was lying three yards away. Then two women came along with a coat and put it over his head and said, ‘he was somebody’s son’."
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Two men were sentenced to life imprisonment for murder, but were released in 1998 under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement. Several other men received lesser sentences for their part in the corporals killings.