Orders, Decorations and Medals

The General Service Medal 1962 awarded to Trooper T. M. Cook, Special Air Service

General Service 1962, 2 clasps, Northern Ireland, Dhofar (23874243 Tpr. T. M. Cook, S.A.S.), good very fine £1200-1500

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Ron Penhall Collection.

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Trevor Malcolm “Charlie” Cook joined the Special Air Service from the Parachute Regiment in 1969 and quickly witnessed active service in Dhofar, taking part in “Operation Jaguar” with ‘B’ Squadron, 22 S.A.S. in the following year, which unit was involved in ‘30 actions in 30 days’. He was also among the reinforcements landed at Mirbat in July 1972, by this time being employed as a sniper and machine-gunner, but also being noted as a very good mortar man.

Leaving the Army in 1978, after having served in Northern Ireland as a Corporal, Cook rejoined his old regiment in the following year and was a member of ‘B’ Squadron’s C.R.W. Team at the Iranian Embassy siege in May 1980, when he was employed as a sniper - presumably located in New Rise, parallel to South Carriage Road, facing the Iranian embassy in Princes Gate, or on the rooftop of Kingston House, to the rear of the embassy.

Cook also served in the South Atlantic in 1982 and is believed to have been one of those men selected for the aborted attack on Rio Grand Airfield in Argentina - certainly he was among the advance team airlifted to Ascension Island and is mentioned in that context by Tom Read in his memoirs, Free Fall, as being ‘one of the Old and the Bold ... a hard man, always scratching his balls and barking at people.’

It was shortly after the attack on H.M.S. Sheffield by Super Etendards, armed with Exocet missiles, on 4 May 1982, that elements of ‘B’ Squadron, 22 S.A.S., began training for an assault on the Argentinian mainland, to attack and destroy the Super Etendards at source. Accordingly an advance team was airlifted to Ascension Island to carry out low-level parachute training prior to being dropped into the Task Force, and thence, from the aircraft carrier Hermes, in a specially stripped-down Sea King, flown to their target area - the helicopter would then ditch on the Chilean coast, as if blown off course from the Task Force, to allay suspicion.

The main danger for the team was the take-off from the aircraft carrier itself as the helicopter, overloaded with fuel, might have been unable to gain height quickly enough. In the event, the helicopter took off like a plane, then dipped drastically seaward and, with barely a few feet to spare, began to gain height and headed towards the Argentinian coast, flying low to avoid the coastal radar - inside, despite wearing Arctic warfare dress, the team were freezing. The pilot landed within a few kilometres of his target, to allow the S.A.S. patrol to infiltrate on foot but as they were preparing to disembark, a flare curved into the air over the sea, signalling that the operation had been compromised. The pilot, therefore, reverted to his alternative plan and put them down over the border in Chile, and flying on with the last of his fuel, made the Chilean coast before ditching, as were his orders.

The team now made its way on foot and attempted to make contact with certain agents in Chile, but without success. They next tried to make their war rendezvous points where S.A.S. reception teams would replenish their food supplies, only to find them unmanned. At length, with their rations running low, and more by luck than intention, they bumped into one of these teams, eating in a restaurant. The team subsequently spent much of the war kicking their heels in Chile, before being flown back to Hereford without having engaged the enemy.

In 1987 Cook was posted on attachment to the Parachute Regiment as an Instructor Sergeant and he left the Army as a Staff Sergeant in 1989; sold with a laser-copy photograph of the recipient in full-kit.