Gaol Hawk: Forged in Sheffield

By Rob Brenton

1920s Sheffield was so infested with gangs that it was nicknamed "Little Chicago".

In 1937, George Orwell wrote: "Sheffield could justly claim to be the ugliest town in the Old World."

Cut to Hillsborough 1960 and a new breed of criminal, Clyde Broughton, is born into the ‘’Steel City". An early start in petty crime led to time at Borstal, football trials at "Wednesday", and an apprenticeship in crime with the notorious Dave Lee. Robbery with violence, burglary, and run-ins with his arch nemeses in CID and the infamous Judge Pickles eventually resulted in a hefty sentence behind bars. Clyde’s story sees him travel through the UK prison system, where he meets some of the country’s most revered faces, including 54 days solitary in Wakefield Prison with the infamous Bobby Maudsley.

Gaol Hawk includes other tales, some humorous, from along the way, including his long time friendship with heavyweight boxer, Paul Sykes, trouble at the local Gypsy Camp, a life-changing machete attack, and an organized hustle filmed by documentary makers entitled Smoking with The Hawk.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WarCryPress UK
• Release date: Jan 2, 2023
• ISBN: 9781912543045

Book preview

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Gaol a place for the confinement of people accused or convicted of a crime.

Hawk a person who advocates an aggressive or war-like policy or one who is constantly alert to potential opportunities of personal gain.

‘For the people of Wybourn, and indeed Sheffield as a whole. My parents RIP, siblings, especially my brother Billy, god rest his soul. My lads Billy & Danny, my beloved wife Wendy and everyone who ever had to ‘graft’ to get by’

Clyde Broughton

‘P.S. Everyone else... go f*ck yourself!’

‘One of the Strongest Kids Yorkshire has produced’

– Paul Sykes on Clyde Broughton

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Gaol Hawk

‘Forged in Sheffield’

Clyde Broughton with Rob Brenton

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facebook.com/warcrypress

Rob Brenton (c)

Please accept my apologies for any inaccuracies in times, dates, places, people etc. None one of them are intentional, the events contained herein were some years ago now and re-visiting those memories was somewhat of a ‘graft’ in itself, but it all happened in one way or another, trust me.

God bless – Clyde

Gaol Hawk - Forged in Sheffield’ ISBN: 978-1-912543-04-5:

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying and recording, without the written permission of the copyright holder, application for which should be addressed to the publisher at [e-mail]. Such written permission must also be obtained before any part of this publication is stored in a retrieval system of any nature. This book is sold subject to the Standard Terms and Conditions of Sale of New Books and may not be re-sold in the UK below the net price fixed by the Publisher. Gaol Hawk ‘Forged in Sheffield’ Produced by Warcry Press (part of Roobix Ltd) on behalf of Rob Brenton, Knottingley (c) 2018.

Printed and bound in Great Britain by Clays, St. Ives

Cover photo by Bill Stephenson

Cover Art by James Ryan Foreman

Find out more at: facebook.com/gaolhawk/

Author’s Introduction

‘LITTLE CHICAGO’

‘The labyrinth of back alleys of Sheffield after the First World War meant home-grown criminals could strike and vanish with ease. Boys that had grown up in inner city poverty had evolved into gangs that turned their urban environment to their advantage. Returning soldiers, now trained to kill, found unemployment lines instead of victory parades. Some had returned with bayonets and enemy guns and decided that if ‘civvy’ street wouldn’t pay, criminal life might.’

Sheffield is a major city in the county of South Yorkshire in the North of England. Nicknamed the Steel City due to its long heritage in the forging and metal industries, its motto ‘Deo Adjuvante Labor Proficit’ meaning ‘With God's help our labour is successful’, is a mantra that still runs through the veins of its citizens to this day.

At the time it was ranked the third largest city in the country by population, with around 500,000 residents, not including all the waifs, strays and drifters that flew beneath the radar. Sheffield had a rich and well documented criminal history to say the least in fact in the 1920s Sheffield was so infested with gangs that it was nicknamed ‘Little Chicago’, George Orwell even dubbed Sheffield ‘the ugliest town in the world.’ Around 500 police officers were expected to keep a lid on a population of half a million. By 1921 a good proportion of those were unemployed adult males, ones with families to feed. The munitions factories that had previously supplied the massive bombardments of the war had closed with the onset of peace. That fall in demand, combined with a global steel depression, was devastating for a city dependent on steel production. Sheffield’s crowded back to back housing saw families sharing outside toilets and meant poverty and crime infected it’s cobbled streets. What passed for a welfare system was not surprisingly, overwhelmed.

For many, one small glimmer of hope in such depressing times was illegal gambling. Huge sums of money were bet on the toss of a coin in a game called ‘Pitch and Toss’. It required just three coins to play and had no equipment to setup and dismantle, it was cheap, quick and could easily avoid detection from the police. The number one site for those games was on the crest of a hill by the name of Skye Edge. Its location meant the gangs that controlled the game could easily see any approaching police. Hundreds of people would gather to take part. The organisers of the ring took four shillings in the pound as commission. That would pay for the ‘pikers’ or ‘crows’, the lookouts that made sure the police or rival gangs were spotted in good time. In charge of the Skye Edge gambling patch was a man by the name of George Mooney, a man who enforced his patch through violence and where necessary even murder.

There was only one thing worse than a ruthless gangland boss attempting to control the city, two gangland bosses competing for control. Mooney had laid off some of his minders and henchmen and they formed a rival gang named the ‘Park Brigade’. They were led by Mooney’s onetime number two, Samuel Garvin. Whilst everyone else was suffering in the depths of the depression, these gangland bosses were driving Bentley saloons through the streets of Sheffield and dining out with the cities local politicians.

To bring things to a close the biggest and baddest of the local police were assembled to form a ‘Flying Squad’ headed up by a new inspector with a tough reputation, Percy Sillitoe. The 38-year-old Chief Constable had left England to become a trooper in the African Police. There he worked for a tough and brutal regime which kept control over the native tribes. He brought the same methods they’d employed over in Africa to bear on the gangs of Sheffield.

Sillitoe’s men wore plain clothes. They were fighting men but they fought with intelligence. They hit the gangs where it hurt most. They went into the pubs, the gangs profit centres and meeting places and told the landlords to refuse gang members service. If they didn’t, they’d lose their license. In due course the city had been cleaned up.

*       *       *       *

Cut to Hillsborough 1960 and history was about to repeat itself. International competition in iron and steel in the 1970’s and 80’s caused a decline in those industries for Sheffield. That coinciding with the collapse of coal mining in the area lead to a new wave of criminal activity, traditionally the one industry that is truly recession proof.

On the 12th August 1960 Clyde Broughton was born in Hillsborough in the heart of the ‘’Steel City’ and quickly set about reigniting the cities rich criminal history. An early start in petty crime, led to time at Borstal and an apprenticeship in criminality with one of the area’s most notorious crooks, Dave Lee. Before long robbery with violence, burglary and run-ins with his arch nemeses in CID and the infamous upholder of justice Judge James Pickles, resulted in a hefty sentence behind bars and a steep learning curve for the young Broughton.

From there Clyde’s story saw him travel through the UK’s prison system, where he met some of the country’s most revered faces, including 54 days solitary in Wakefield Prison alongside possibly the country’s most dangerous prisoner Robert Maudsley.

Maybe Clyde was born in to the wrong era. Sheffield’s has a rich history steeped in criminality stemming back to the days of Mooney and Galvin, and his quarrels with his arch nemesis (CID Officer) and Judge Pickles drawing parallels to Sheffield’s days of old.

Clyde’s story is interjected with many other short tales, some humorous, from that journey, including details of his long time friendship with Heavyweight Boxer Paul Sykes, troubles at the local Gypsy Camp, a life changing Machete attack and an organised pool hustle, which was filmed and premiered by documentary makers entitled ‘Smoking with The Hawk’.

Please excuse any inaccuracies, some elements of the story had to be stitched together to make them flow, remembering precisely what happened all those years ago is not an easy task, but it all happened in some manner or other. In any event here is Clyde’s story...

Rob Brenton

CONTENTS

Introduction - The Wheels fall off                  1

Forged in Sheffield                              8

‘Dreams of Naughtiness’                        13

Our Billy                                    18

Trials at Wednesday                              22

Crime Apprenticeship                              27

A nice little win at the bookies                  36

Lyceum Jewellers                              41

The Cartoon Judge                              46

Gaol                                          52

‘Soccer in the Lock-up’                        58

Fraggle Rock                                    63

54 days Solitary                              70

Free Bird                                    77

The Usual Suspect                              83

Fattorini’s                                    91

Back in Armley                              98

Sykesy                                          104

Money with menaces                              112

Bred for ‘feytin’                              117

The Horse & Lion                              124

Lindholme                                    129

Hull & back!                                    134

Shanghaied                                    139

Sleeper                                    144

Life on the tick                                    151

Shoplifting                                    156

Drifting                                          161

The Hustle                                    166

The Finale                                    171

Machete                                    178

Underworld - Afterworld                        185

Afterword                                    191

INTRODUCTION

‘The Wheels Fall Off’

BANG! BANG! BANG! The front door sounded like it was about to come off its fuckin hinges. Still laid in my pit somewhere half way between sleep and reality, that morning’s wake-up call wasn’t the usual type.

Still half dressed after a particularly heavy night down the Springwood I leapt to my feet, the cobwebs instantly blown away. I glanced over at my battered old alarm clock midflight, it was only six in the morning, what the fuck was going on. It was early spring and still pretty dark for that time of a morning.

BANG! BANG! This wasn’t one of my pals nipping round for a cuppa on his way to the dole office or the postman with one of his now regular and apparently ‘important’ letters, it was more serious than that and the second round of thunder confirmed it.

BANG! BANG! CRUNCH! A bobby’s knock for sure, but not the typical one. The sleep had worn off and things were becoming much clearer, it was the sound of thunder being rained on the door of my own little castle on the Manor.

Luckily the solid front door, though flexing, was having none of it, too much of a match for the local constabularies battering ram, probably harvested from monkey metal in some far-off land as part of a recent cost cutting exercise, the type which Sheffield would have been proud to manufacture only a few years previous.

BANG! BANG! BANG! It was now being swung incessantly at my door, no doubt by the fattest pig who happened to be on the squad that morning, making certain it went through without delay.

CRACK! The door of number ten Noehill Road on the Manor, Sheffield, was swelling at its hinges and about to burst, a couple more huffs and puffs from that little piggy and the prefab casing might completely fall down.

I flew down the stairs, barely touching most of them along the way, kidding myself that what I was about to face would be something I could deal with, another local crook with some relatively incidental beef, a foe that I could take on, deal with swiftly and get back to my pit.

NO CHANCE! This was the Old Bill, a small army no doubt, and I was being nicked, properly nicked. I’d realised that before I’d hit the landing carpet. What I’d have given for it to be that sweaty old red-faced postman this time, I’d have signed for that ‘summons’ without hesitation, maybe even used my real name.

CRACK! I’d made it to the door and fumbled the key a half turn in the lock, managing to get it open before the incompetent swine’s brayed it completely from its hinges.

At the other side stood a herd of baying pigs, the front row comprising of several smartly dressed CID, six in total, headed up by Rotherham’s number one bastard and lead officer John Wilson. Behind him a wall of genetically cloned foot-soldiers were ready to restrain me if needed. These lot could have been made from tissue paper for all it mattered I wasn’t getting past them.

I offered no resistance, like they say it would have been futile given the barricade they’d created, I wasn’t going anywhere any time soon.

The dapper John Wilson gave me a look of smug content and piped up Mr Broughton, you’re being arrested for Burglary…

There was a brief pause, the type you get in day to day dialogue when you’re about to reel off a list, whether that pause actually existed or it was my conscience telling me what I already knew was coming I couldn’t be sure, but it seemed to linger for an eternity.

It was dawning on me now, they hadn’t pulled me on a whim, my card had been marked for some time, the bust had to have been planned to catch me on the back foot. There hadn’t been any build up, sneaking suspicion or encroaching paranoia I was caught completely off guard.

Which one of my stunts was it for? I asked myself. Surely not the whole lot, that would be my saving grace, the police couldn’t possibly know about all of my activities and recent scores, statistically that couldn’t be the case.

Wilson continued And two separate counts of robbery with violence.

I was done, they had me for the lot, it defied reason, not my general day to day activities but the more significant crimes I’d been involved in during my 1979 crime apprenticeship under the wing of my trusted mentor Dave Lee.

You have the right to remain silent. You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say… Blah, Blah, Blah, the voices blurred as my brain went into a tailspin.

I’d heard it all before, but lord knows I didn’t want to hear it this time. The realisation of what was going on was now sinking in quicker than a nicked moped to the Don bed. It was unlikely I’d be back home for some time now, I was no fool, the likelihood of me getting away with a list as endless as that was slimmer than some of the entrants at the Owlerton Stadium.

CLICK! CLUNK! Wilson cuffed my hands behind my back with zero regard for my wellbeing, in fact purposely tight. I feared by the time we’d got back to the cop shop my hands would have turned blue and fallen off. Those tin shackles were cutting my wrists like a blunt knife, rough justice was being served. I knew not to complain though, it had become somewhat of an occupational hazard.

They frog marched me out of the front door, down our blocked paving and slung me in the back of the ‘Jam Sandwich’, standard procedure for a local toe-rag from the Manor. If I clocked my head on the sill on the way into the car then so be it, I wasn’t being handled with kid gloves anymore, I had elevated into real criminality and in their eyes, though only nineteen, I was now a mister.

SLAM! The passenger door shut, and we were off at pace. Sat in the back of the cop car on my way to West Bar Police Station in the centre of Sheffield. My brain began to rattle, thoughts buzzing around the inside of my skull like flies in a jar.

What did they know? How was I linked? Who else was on their way to the nick? Who’d bubbled me or indeed us? How could I let the other guys know we were being pulled? I could have filled a book with that endless list of questions. Many of them weren’t going to be that relevant if I was looking at a ten stretch, I’d simply have to get on with it.

The car pulled up abruptly outside West Bar nick and I was hoisted out by the same fat pig that had attempted to batter down my front door. He was still blowing the poor sod. The silence in that police yard like a roman amphitheatre, amplifying my inner concerns about what I would face next.

Bundled into the custody area and up to the front desk they asked me all the usual questions, confirmation of my particulars, did I have any medical issues, suicidal thoughts etc. Maybe I didn’t before but I sure as fuck thought I was about to have a thrombosis at that very moment.

They directed me down to the cells where I was left to contemplate my fate, every angle I could come up with quickly counteracted by my own doubts, there wasn’t going to be any easy way out of this one.

Less than half an hour passed before I was called in for interview. Two CID coppers straight out of an episode of ‘The Sweeney’, took me up to the interview room. I’d been arrested half a dozen times previous, half an hour was nothing; were they were hoping I’d still be half dazed from the early wake-up call, an attempt to reduce my thinking time to form an alibi. Smart tactics from good old John ‘The Bastard’ Wilson and his swarve side kick Price.

The lead officer named Wilson, was a real horrible bastard from Rotherham. I’d met him before, in fact in a previous tangle with the local police, he’d once thrown a typewriter at me during interrogation, they’d give you a clip back then, it was standard procedure.

He was accompanied by another copper by the name of Price, another bastard, one who really rated himself, a real wannabe ‘ladies man’, a good looking cunt I’ll give him that, but loved himself a bit too much, and also a first-class prick. I’d weighed them up before either had opened their mouths, bad cop and even badder cop.

CLICK, CLICK! The more senior of the two detectives Wilson engaged his Parker pen into work mode without delay, again minimising my thinking time, no opening gambit just straight in at the deep end. The nib touched paper ready to detail my every word. Shit was about to get very real.

They had me bang to rights, they knew way too much. I’d been hauled in for three major crimes all at the same time, a mugging outside the bookies on the Prince of Wales Road, a