PMCI MARCH 2019

pmcimagazine.com
“MAD MIKE” HOARE: THE LEGEND
We pick up the action in the Congo in late 1964…
After Stanleyville, Mike was asked to lead raids behind rebel
lines in the area to rescue nuns and priests, both black and
white, who had been taken hostage and were literally being
raped or slaughtered, or both. Such rescues were beyond his
original brief, but he felt his units could not just stand by. The
eventual number of priests and nuns rescued by 5 Commando
is generally held to be about 2000. This was surely Mike’s finest hour.
‘I was personally involved in every one of the rescue raids (in
the Stanleyville area). They were very dicey little operations,
how we got them out. I led the men through enemy territory.
At one mission we freed about 100 nuns. They had been
treated badly, wooooo woo woo woo, bastards huh? You can
imagine how they (the rebels) treated the women.’
On one of the rescue raids, Mike copped a bullet across the
forehead, and I remember how this incident brought home to
our family the risk that Mike was taking, including the immense
repercussions if Mike were to be killed. But Mike himself made
light of it while also milking the situation. One of the officers,
Tom Courtney, later said, ‘The wound was protected by the
famous plaster which will go down in history as the longestserving
plaster of all time. Still, the press loved it.’
One of the mercenaries who took part in several rescues
was Gary Michell, resident in Cumbria, UK, in 2008. He saw
himself at the time as ‘not a particularly adventurous person,
just a normal person who enjoyed the military way of life’. He
had served in the Rhodesian Light Infantry, and also got his
wings as a Para. ‘Once, in 55 Commando, we rescued about 30
nuns and priests, but there was one priest who stood on the
steps and refused to leave. He said, “God put me here and God
will take me away”. I said “Okay, He sent me to get you”, and I
knocked him down and two other men picked him up and put
him in the truck. Mike was NOT impressed; he said hitting him
was not right – after all, he was a priest!’
One of the long-serving mercenaries, Lt Tom Courtney of
53 Commando, summed it all up, saying that in his opinion,
‘Mike was a professional soldier; he knew very well how to
lead and command respect; everyone I’ve met who served with
him felt they were part of a fighting commando, unlike Peters
and Schroeder whose men and myself felt we were part of a
barroom brawl.’
Meanwhile, although 5 Commando had saved the lives of
probably 2000 innocent hostages, and had liberated vast areas
of the country from Simba control, they continued to attract a
bad press.
The preconceived notions of Anthony Mockler, who was sent
to the Congo at the end of 1964 as an ‘apprehensive’ special
correspondent for The Guardian newspaper, would be typical.
As he says in his book: ‘At The Guardian the general view was
that mercenaries ... were the dregs of Europe – hired killers. The
reason for my apprehension was that my assignment was to
track down the leader of the mercenaries, the hired killer par
excellence, “Mad Mike” Hoare.
‘It came therefore as something of an anti-climax when
I discovered that “Mad Mike” Hoare was staying in Room
534 of the Hotel Leopold II where I was myself installed. His
physical appearance came as an even greater shock. He bore
no resemblance at all to a hired killer or a dreg from a gutter.
He was short, dapper and very neatly turned out in light khaki
with a major’s crown on his epaulettes. He wore a beret but he
carried an attaché case, not a weapon. He resembled a British
officer from a good regiment, though possibly politer and more
courteous than most of that class. He appeared to be in no way
insane.
‘That evening he took me out for a drink in a bar on
Boulevard 30 Juin. He drank orange juice himself. ... He talked
of his crusade against communism and told me how in order
to instil the regimental spirit he insisted on church parade and
football matches every Sunday for the “volunteers” ... of 5
Commando.’
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