Broadmoor Hospital was originally named Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. The first patients to arrive there were 95 women in 1863; male patients arrived the following year. The asylum had been built following the Criminal Lunatics Act of 1860; it’s uncertain why Crowthorne was chosen as the site. The Mental Health Act of 1959, which came into operation in 1960, changed the name to Broadmoor Hospital making it into a Special Hospital for psychiatric patients of dangerous, violent or criminal propensities. Its role was to treat these patients.
The patients include persons sent by the courts either because they are too ill to defend themselves in court or are deemed by the magical Mental Health Act not to be held responsible for their actions. Others are sent there because it is thought that, for their own sake and that of others, they should be treated in a secure hospital where they are unable to leave the treatment situation. These people need not necessarily have broken the law or have appeared in court; the decision in these cases is made by the doctors.
Following the escape of a homicidal patient, Straffen, who allegedly killed a little girl in Arborfield, there were calls in the village for some sort of alarm system to give some warning of an escape. As a result of this, a siren was set up including six satellite sirens, which are tested each Monday morning.
Should there be an escape, then the people in the village suffer from this siren blaring away for approximately 20 minutes. Then the ‘all-clear’ siren sounds for at least another 20 minutes when the patient is eventually recaptured, regardless of the time of day or night! If there is an escape from Broadmoor, Crowthorne comes to a standstill for the duration because roadblocks encircle the village and cars are checked for the missing patient.
Since 1992, there have only been a handful of security breaches at Broadmoor, including an escape in 1993 and a rooftop protest in ’96.
When I arrived at Broadmoor in ’78, my old mate, Ron Kray, was there; he warned me to be careful. Ron had it all sewn up … good visits, nice food, nice cell, TV, the lot. But even Ron had to be on his toes.
Rooms? They’re really cells with high ceilings, cold stone floors and cold walls with dull colours. The cell … sorry, the room door is solid oak with just a spy hole in it
The daily routine in Norfolk Ward, the ‘intensive care’ section at Broadmoor, starts at 7.30am: wake, wash, shave, empty pot, shit and piss.
The recess, where all this piss-pot emptying and washing takes place, stinks like a farmyard, but most are so drugged they don’t smell it. Some fall over with their pots of shit; you may be lucky to get a five-minute shower! Some loons walk about naked with erections while in a daze; all laugh and point, ‘Look at that!’ ‘Size of that!’ ‘Let’s pull it!’ ‘Let’s suck it!’
‘Come on, boys, behave!’
This mixture of stink, laughs, cries and screams makes the morning a hell. Things happen … madness, insanity beyond reality, then breakfast and more madness.
Pills — first medication time — pills, syrup and injections. Alcoholics, quickly up for a fix, all into the day room — soft chairs, carpet, curtains, windows, grey walls and a bookshelf with old books, which are all out of date.
Games — Monopoly, chess but most just sleep, dream, talk to themselves. TV on or off, they stare at it with dead eyes. Nurses watch, a fight breaks out … restraint … injection … gone! Won’t see them for days or weeks.
Lunch — 12.00pm, five tables, three to a table, serving hatch, steel shutter, not allowed behind it. Nurses serve up more medicine, more sleep, more TV, more thoughts, maybe a fit in between, hysterics or a fight, always something. One loon may rush a nurse, attack and hurt, because he’d been done short on the chips. Lunatics never forget. Barry Quigley would go strange, stand up and run at a nurse, punch and run off laughing.
Michael Smithers bit a nurse’s ear off! Why did Mick do it? I’ll tell you why — they drove him mad. Mick’s solid stuff, a real blinder. Me, I became a zombie, the forced drugs turned me mad, soon I was insane, shaking and, like the rest of the loons, waiting to take my pot of juice.
Sleeping whilst shitting; I once squatted on my pot and fell asleep on it! I woke up with the pot stuck on my arse! I’ve had so much serious mental pain I’ve banged my head on the door to give myself a physical pain to take away the mental torture. I’ve jumped on nurses so they would jump on me. Beat me; give it to me! Why? Why not? Pain is a pleasure to escape the madness.
A beating can and does help, ’cos mental agony is the killer — it destroys. You have to escape it, so what’s it like to queue up for the drugs? Shuffles, stares, shakers, dribbles, stony silence, it’s a fucking hell on earth. Swallow! They then say, ‘Open your mouth, stick out your tongue,’ to see if you’ve swallowed. Shuffle back to your chair, vision blurry, dry mouth, out of breath, sit down, watch the rest! Fucking die, you poor fuckers, kill us!
Bed time — 7.30pm! Time for bed, walk to your room, strip off outside the door, put your clothes in a box, get checked. Lift up bare feet, lift up bollocks, pull your cheeks open, pull tongue up! If you don’t do it, you’ll be jumped on and they’ll do it for you. They pass you pyjamas, you end up tired, depressed. I used to bury my head under the blanket hoping I’d never wake up. There was fuck all to wake up for, only more hell, more drugs and more inhumanity!
I remember one night, I was asleep on the floor and my mouth was up against the crack of the door. I felt a bang and a shout. ‘What you doing down there? You OK?’
In a daze I said, ‘Yeah.’ I was sucking the draft, getting the air on my face; I was going through a claustrophobic state in my sleep. My window had a locked shutter on it so the draft under the door was my way of survival. How low can a man get? How low can they push a man? I was a rat in a sealed cage with no hope!
It was the 1980s, not the 1890s … how could it be? I’ll tell you how; it’s an asylum and in these places it can happen. We are the insane; who listens to us? Why should you listen? If you did then you’d be classed as mad!
It was not ’til I crashed into Broadmoor that I realised just how many paedophile scum existed! God … you just don’t know how many, all crammed into the asylums like pilchards. Prison’s bad, but the asylums are 100 times worse! And it’s in your face.
I walked into a cell in Broadmoor only to witness one of the sickest sights I’ve ever seen. It was in Gloucester Ward back in 1979 … I went into a lunatic’s cell to collect some tapes I had loaned him. I should have tapped on the door … I was shocked to see three loons prancing about naked. One was bent over a chair chewing on another’s dick; the other was up the second one’s arse; they were in their element. ‘You dirty fuckers, where’s my fucking Abba tapes? You sick, twisted, fucking …’ It put me on my toes. It turned out two of them were nonces! And the slag who had my tapes, he had raped and killed a 79-year-old woman.
I had to watch myself in that place, ’cos I was in the minority. I’d say 75 per cent of the inmates were ‘nonces’, if not 85 per cent, so it’s a battlefield … if you want it to be! Fortunately for me, most of my five years there were spent in solitary, otherwise I would have lost it and become a killer. I’d have had no choice. Would you accept living next door to the Ripper or the Stockton Strangler? I had some close scrapes in that place; well, it is a madhouse!
Ian Ball was a nice chap; I liked Ian. Who’s Ian Ball? Remember in the ’70s some loony grabbed Princess Anne, almost kidnapped her? Well, that was our Ian.
Ian was very unlucky; that day, he shot a cop’s finger off in the struggle. It’s common knowledge he’s a dead loon walking, and three decades later he still walks the asylum grounds.
I met Barry Williams there. He shot dead five innocent people. I asked him why. He shrugged. ’Don’t know!’ Strange answer. He was a weird case … devil eyes, mad eyes, black pits of insanity. I could smell evil on him. Five innocent people — bang, bang, bang, bang, bang — and he didn’t know why. Pity he never shot that Norman Parker, ’cos then there would be no Parkhurst Tales.
In the 1950s I met Donald Hume there; what a nice chap he was. I admired him, a lovely old boy. He chopped up a geezer and slung him out of a plane over the Channel, and then he robbed some banks in Switzerland. He spent 15 years over there in jail. Then they brought him home and put him in the asylum. He’s now done more than 40 years! Time flies by for us all!
I’m coming up to 30 years … 30 fucking years! I told you it’s mad. Like the time Bob Maudsley and John Cheesman kidnapped Alan Francis in the Boot Room on Somerset Ward in Broadmoor. Sadly, Alan died a most horrific death.
At their trial at Winchester Crown Court, both Maudsley and Cheesman said, ‘Send us back and we will kill again!’ They had killed to escape hell! (A great shame it wasn’t one of the doctors they had killed. I’d have respected them for that.) They both got life. Then Bob, as I’ve previously mentioned, killed twice again in jail. That’s madness for you. They kill in Broadmoor and all of a sudden they are both sane and sent to a jail. Is there any sense in that?
Bob kills two more and suddenly he’s sane! The whole system is nuts! You can’t be insane one day and then sane the next! You’re either one or the other. Or are you only insane when the system wants you to be? Or shall I rephrase it … you’re only insane when they drive you insane! Insanity drives me mad. Now do you get my drift?
Asylums like Broadmoor are Victorian. They are designed to break men, but they still live in the shadows of fear. The Broadmoor walls touch the sky. Few ever escape. Most don’t wish to, as institutionalisation creeps in. Sadly, most in Broadmoor are dead men dreaming. They masturbate their years away, forever dreaming, until one day they can’t get it up and then they die. Some fight it, but all lose!
The drugs will beat you. They inject you with hell. Psychotropic straight to the nervous system, you can’t even scream or move. You’re a bag of shit and it’s all over: you’re history. So you learn to ride it, until the opportunity arrives to kick some ass! Then you give them hell, but then you lose again, but you ride it, and that’s how it goes. Insanity!
I’ve mentioned events that happened in Broadmoor in previous books, but I’d need 100 books to cover the Broadmoor years! So I’ll give you a taste of some of the events that I left out. I can’t go into them all, as there are people I have to protect, good people. Some things have to go with a man to his grave! I’m not Norman Parker or John McVicar! Yeah, McVicar.
And since McVicar’s been out, he’s now like a fucking welfare officer, putting his nose in where it’s not wanted. I personally don’t like him, as he is another one who acts the large … gives it the big ’un. He actually believes he’s a top journalist using his big words, but it’s fuck all. He’s just who he is … an ex-con. OK, I might be laying it on a bit thick here, but when I hear certain things, I say it how it is. Hey, good luck to him, I’m pleased he’s out there, ‘free’. I don’t wish jail on nobody. I’d even let out Rose West … someone’s bound to shoot the fat slag!
Don’t it all make me laugh! Parker with his tales — where’s the facts? You want facts … I’ll give you facts.
Some lunatic used to pay lunatics a tenner a time if he could watch them have a shit. Ten fucking quid! He would go with them into the cubicle and just watch! The nurses all knew … male pervo nurses.
I had to put a stop to it, as it made me feel just a little bit sick. I pulled him into the recess one day and give it him big time, mostly body shots. No sooner had he fallen, I picked him back up and gave him more. I used his body as a human punchbag. I just ripped into him; I felt a desire to destroy this bag of filth. What sort of man pays a tenner to watch another man shit? It’s beyond me!
Outside, I’d just have put him in a hole! I couldn’t swallow that! Could you? Imagine outside, being approached by that sort of thing! Try to imagine it! This is insanity at its very best, and if you allow it to, it will eat you up, rub off on you and destroy you. You become sick, one of them! I advise you to fight it ’til you drop dead. Don’t become a part of it or you’re lost. Dehumanised. This is asylum life … a different kind of survival.
One loony sat in a secluded room. She was mad, but she could not accept it; so she was neither sane nor insane. She could not be either until she knew herself, so in limbo she had to die. She kept stuffing toilet roll into her mouth. They found her choked to death.
Someone got a lovely pair of trainers from his mum for Christmas, the best pair he had ever had, but it was the nylon laces that he couldn’t take his eyes off. They found him hanging in his cell.
Another one was a silent type, very nervous of people; shy, introverted, nobody would believe he could scream so loud … well, he did drink a bottle of bleach.
One lunatic never got any letters. He would talk to himself, get old envelopes and pretend they were sent to him. ‘Look, look, I got ten letters today, twelve yesterday and eight on Monday. I’ve had 50 letters this week.’
One wally, dressed in black, would march up and down the corridor, with his little Hitler moustache, mumbling about Jews and gypsies. Funny to see, but deadly dangerous and, at times, he would break into hysteria and scream abuse. He would have to be restrained and injected.
Oh! Dennis Nash was at Broadmoor for 30 years. He used to have an aviary in Gloucester Ward. Loved his birds, did Dennis. He also used to have sex in there with his boyfriends. He even had a mattress in there for it. Fucking mad or what?
One old loony used to walk up to people sitting in the day room, fart in their face and back off. I know it’s not nice to hit old boys, but he should not have done that to me. I picked up an ashtray and slung it at him. I never meant to smash his skull open. I felt a bit bad about that, but he never farted again. I cured him. I cured him in days … Broadmoor hadn’t been able to, not in 40 years of trying!
I remember the day a big black guy stabbed a white guy in the eye. It was over, would you believe, a spoon of sugar. The poor lad lost his eye, simple as that. I saw it, it’s not nice … the scream never goes away, I still hear it, and I still smell the fear of that lad. He knew he’d lost that eye. I can still see the big black guy’s smiling face. A sick smirk, he enjoyed it; he was a psycho. The psycho had hit. Such is life, a day in the asylum. I saw things that never leave me; each incident is a scar!
A lunatic has a fit, he loses it, he smacks his head ten times against a wall, blood, lots of blood, tears and snot; he falls to the floor crying, a heap of disaster born to suffer! I saw a lunatic headbutt a door and knock himself out. Another trapped his finger in a door, more blood and more screams. Fights, biting, scratching, stabbing, a kidney ripped out, a testicle, more screams, shit … lots of shit! They love it, write on the walls, draw faces … the stench never leaves you!
Suicides — you read about them … but you don’t know the truth. If you were to see it, you would go insane! Cut throats, cut wrists, hangings, suffocating, eyes bulging and tongues protruding, more shit. Suicides always shit themselves … did you know that? Life’s final shit, the final act of madness; smell that, you rats! Clean me up, you pigs, zip me up in the bag, you scum, and get me out of here … Get me the fuck out of here!
The asylum years taught me a lot about myself. Bear in mind I’m the only lunatic in the United Kingdom who has spent time in all three max-secure asylums. Don’t ask me which is the best, as how do you compare insanity with insanity?
Mark Rowntree had to be one of the most puzzling madmen I ever met. He looked like any normal 20-year-old lad to me, good-looking, a sense of humour, smart and pleasant. Then I’m told he stabbed to death a whole family of five including two kids. What can you say? I asked him why. He said, ‘I felt a bit depressed.’ That was it! I can accept a guy snuffing out a load of Old Bill, judges, drug-pushers, ‘nonces’ or even traffic wardens, but what can you say? Fuck all!
But, believe me, not all were insane. Guys like Ron Greedy, Chris Reed, Lenny Doyle, Steve Sloane, Mickey May, big Phil Baxter, big Steve Roughton, little George Heath and Micky Smitken. Micky bit off a screw’s ear, but the screw was a pig anyway, so who cares? Ear today, gone tomorrow, such is life.
A lot of the asylum staff were mad … you can’t work in madness and not be affected by it. Some had mental breakdowns, some turned to booze and several got caught shagging arses! Insanity drove them mad … or did I drive the whole of Broadmoor mad?
As you now know, I hit their evil roof three times, great moments of victory. But you can’t win; you rot away in a hole. My asylum years taught me how corrupt it all is. It’s a wonder Norman Parker wasn’t a part of it, he would have loved it there.
I was honoured to have met Diana Dors, Terry Downes and Acker Bilk when they visited Broadmoor. Jimmy Saville as well, but Diana to me was amazing; I’ve never met anybody quite like her. That was all down to Ronnie Kray. Ron’s pal there was Charlie Smith, who’d got life for killing a tramp, and then he killed a cellmate in the Scrubs. He’s been in Broadmoor since 1980. I thought he was OK. Obviously, he was Ron’s bit of meat; Ron spoiled him with gifts. Charlie was his ‘plaything’, but when Charlie absconded I knew what he did outside, and he knew I knew.
Kate Kray’s sister was close to Charlie then, but she isn’t now and neither is Kate. Charlie, I’ll say now, that you’re no better than a maggot; I’ll not bother saying what! But live with it, cunt. Insanity did drive Smith mad.
I see that Denis Nilsen is always in the press; he might as well have his own press officer, suing the headquarters because he can’t have his hardcore gay mags. Well, I want a box of apple pies! If that cunt can have his filth, why can’t I have some pies? It makes me puke up to hear all this nonsense. He shagged and killed 15 fellas!
I met Ned the Neck in Broadmoor in 1979. He had been sent to Broadmoor in the 1940s during the war. He was caught on a bombsite up a stiff’s arse! He had been getting his rocks off with all the corpses! What a fucking sicko! If being bombed up isn’t bad enough then having Ned the Neck stab your ring piece is the pits. When anybody died in Broadmoor, we all used to shout, ‘Ned, Ned, it’s your birthday.’
There really are some sick bastards about; how many more are out there? They can’t all be locked up, can they? How many more Fred Wests are out there? Hundreds, if not thousands! I just can’t understand how anybody can shag a stiff; it’s beyond my comprehension. But then again, I am mad! So I’m told.
Glen Wright was, and probably still is, mad. He’s from Northampton, the birthplace of my old dad. Glen came in serving a three stretch and got lifed off for two alleged murders inside and he’s still fighting it. Well, this guy has got to be the number one shitter in the system. He’s forever protesting — dirty protests — but we all like Glen ’cos he does at least fight for his rights in his own way.
Glen, like me, hates monsters, so I respect him for that. He got that nail-bomber Copeland who blew up part of Soho in London, near a gay bar … Glen bashed him over the head with a teapot. Glen also gave it to Michael Stone! Stone, you might recall, was convicted of the murder of Lin Russell and her daughter, Megan, in 1998, and he lost his appeal in 2001. As well as being a murderer, Stone also likes cock. I’ve got it on good authority from contacts at Wakefield (Monster Mansion) that Stone was found hob-nobbing (literally) with another inmate when both were caught naked behind a barricaded cell door. A screw broke down the barricade and Stone turned lemon like the perverted killer that he is and threatened him. And, fuck me, that’s the prison they want to send me to from Durham, where I am at the moment. Can you imagine me with Stone? I’d be barricading him and me in a cell for a few rounds and it wouldn’t be for hob-nobbing … it would be for knob-chopping!
Never mind how tough you are, hardness doesn’t come into it when they rush you and stick you with a hypodermic needle! You’re out of the game. The tranquillisers can knock out rhinos. It’s fear, don’t kid yourself. I fucking despise drugs, but these slags pumped me up with it, as they do with most. Restraint pants down and slap, in it goes! I’ve had needles snap off in my butt ’cos my buttock muscle was so tense and rock hard with fear! Will they inject me with petrol or an air bubble? Are they going to kill me? I won’t be the first or the last. When will this nightmare end?
You wake up in a pool of piss, sweat and even blood. Drowsy, aching, restless, zombified, senseless, dry eyes, blurred vision, shaking. You’re a fucking wreck, a dead man dreaming, dehumanised. The door unlocks, ten white coats … ‘Take this tot, take it or another injection!’ You take it and … back to Disneyland, back to death, weeks, months and even years of it. End result — a wreck, a lazy, fat, tired-out bag of shit. That’s insanity, that’s torture, that’s the truth.
‘No more, no fucking more,’ on your knees screaming, ‘No more … come in and bash me! Beat me senseless, but no more of this shit. Stop killing me slowly, shoot me, hang me, stop destroying me, no more!’ It’s a nightmare, a hell and I’ve lived it and breathed it!
Broadmoor creeps into your blood; the walls touch the sky and the grounds suck you in; it’s even got its own burial ground. We called it the ‘Madman’s Hole’; it smelled of fear: a stillness and even the birds seemed to have stone faces like their eyes were made of marble. So many monsters, men of hell, I don’t know how a sane man can keep sane in there. No living thing is safe …
Did you know that the Ripper is so evil that even the plants in his room at Broadmoor refuse to live! Yeah, that’s true! Now we all know Prince Charles likes to talk to the plants, well, let’s just say they are able to sense the difference between good and evil; they’re sure as hell trying to say something about the Ripper’s soul — it’s lost!
Not too many have had it away from Broadmoor! Well, not since it became max secure. Bear in mind it’s over 100 years old; up ’til the 1960s, it was just a wall. Any lunatic could hop away. In the early 1900s the loons were allowed out in working parties, and plenty ran off. All that stopped in the 1950s when monster John Straffen had it away.
Straffen was born in 1930. In his younger days he would play truant and by the age of ten he was attending a school for the mentally retarded. By the time he was 17 he had assaulted a child and was committed. Released in February 1951, he went on to strangle two girls to annoy the police! Pronounced unfit to plead he was sent to Broadmoor.
In April 1952, Straffen escaped from Broadmoor only to be captured a few hours later. During Straffen’s few hours of freedom, a little girl, Linda Bowyer, went missing. She was found the following day in a nearby field, strangled to death. When Straffen was interviewed by the police, he said, ‘I did not kill the little girl on the bicycle.’ This was before they had asked him about the murder.
Straffen appeared in court in July 1952, and entered a ‘not guilty’ plea. His ability to plead was accepted on the basis that three doctors had asserted that he was now fit to plead, partly because he understood four of the Ten Commandments.
The trial was abandoned after a juror was heard to say that he thought Straffen was innocent and that the crime had been committed by one of the witnesses. Amid great publicity, the judge, Mr Justice Cassels, stopped the trial, empanelled a fresh jury and the proceedings began again and this time Straffen was found guilty and sentenced to death. A reprieve was, however, forthcoming and he was indoctrinated into the prison system and not to the asylums, as some would have expected, spending all 50 years in maximum-security prisons throughout Britain.
Straffen insisted he hadn’t killed Linda Bowyer. Amazingly, it has come to light that three independent witnesses all heard what might have been the child’s final scream at 7.00pm — 20 minutes after Straffen had been recaptured! In my heart, I feel that Straffen did kill the little girl. Even if he hadn’t done it, he was still a monster and deserved to die for the other child murders.
During the 1960s, there were some dramatic escapes from prisons and asylums. Our very own Frank ‘Mad Axe-Man’ Mitchell, his legacy lives on; a great guy. A couple of other celebrated escapees are Ronnie Biggs from Wandsworth Jail and Blake, the spy, from Wormwood Scrubs.
Lord Mountbatten eventually turned the whole fucking prison system upside down in his report, creating maximum-security jails such as Albany on the Isle of Wight. The very first all-electric prison followed and then Long Lartin. So jail escapes became less frequent, but nothing is impossible.
Alan Reeves proved that in 1981, and so did Len James Lang. Alan’s escape was a classic, a beauty. I’ll always remember it. Why? ’Cos I was there. Alan had been in Broadmoor since he was 15 years old; he had killed a fellow lunatic while he was there. It was doubtful he would ever have been released, so he went anyway. After 15 years of being locked up in hell, he flew out like the eagle he is. Alan flew out on a summer’s day using a TV antenna as a hook! Up and over! Whoooosh! The waiting car sped off, Southampton Docks, a nice ferry ride. Some madman, eh? Fucking genius!
J Lang, now he was a different sort, the killer of a 16-year-old girl. He fortunately only made it out for a few hours, ’cos when he jumped down off the wall, he broke his ankle. Shame it wasn’t his neck.
But escapes from Broadmoor are so rare. Now it seems the wall reaches the sky, with its cameras and fences — it’s all super max. The lunatics are pretty much secured. But one day some genius will fly. It’s like a rat in a cage … it keeps on gnawing, it’s wanting out. Nobody wants to live in a cage … not unless they’re mad!
I had a pop at escaping in ’82 but it fell in. Caved in on top of me; quite upsetting to think about it. I hate defeat, so I prefer not to go into that; it hurts. I recall one loon who was trying to escape with a spark of an idea; he climbed up on the wall, flapped his arms and dived off to fly. Poor sod was in the infirmary for six months, legs and arms in plaster, but he tried. I felt a bit sorry for him. Well, I did tell him he could fly!
Another nutcase thought about cutting himself so he could get to an outside hospital; the plan was to run off while he was there. He cut his throat and almost bled to death.
So many loons come up with mad plans, but that’s all they are, mad plans that can’t possibly work. There was one nutcase who starved himself for weeks. His plan was simple. Starve! Get skinny, smear his naked body in butter and slip through the bars. ‘Look,’ I told him, ‘your fucking skull won’t alter, no matter how much you starve!’ But he wouldn’t have it. He went down to six stone, tried it and gave up. But you gotta hand it to them.
Another climbed into a cardboard box when a washing machine came in and got two lunatics to carry it out with the rubbish. All you could see was them struggling with it! So that soon ended, and all three were put into seclusion.
One got a job down the gardens, but he only lasted a day. He dug a 12ft hole to plant spuds. He told me later he was going to go down 20ft, then start to tunnel under the wall. ‘Why 20ft?’ I asked. He had no answer. The guy was crazy. You’ve gotta laugh.
While prison still has its spectacular and dramatic escapes — the helicopter at Gartree, or the ones at Whitemoor and Parkhurst — sadly, they’re now so rare and are mainly things of the past. But let’s be honest, nothing can beat a good asylum escape.
And while I’m at it, Frank Mitchell got his name ‘Mad Axe-Man’ for the Broadmoor escape. He broke into an old couple’s house with an axe, but he didn’t harm them. Quite the opposite, they loved him. Frank was a big, strong man, a gentle giant. He only ever got violent with the guards ’cos he could have a right fight.
Anyway, his feet were all busted and bleeding after running for 20 miles with Broadmoor boots on; evil fucking boots they were. I know ’cos I also wore them. The old lady bathed and washed his feet. He had a nice meal with them and they all got on well with each other. It was the Old Bill, as usual, who sensationalised it all. Frank had his problems like us all, but he had morals. He would never have hurt old people, but a label sticks like shit to a blanket, and it went with him to his grave. A great guy and a true warrior – RIP. Enough of escapes, as it always gets me excited.
Now a bit on dormitories! Yes, yours truly was once in a dorm in Broadmoor. Me in a room with other madmen; not a nice experience. Now let’s be sensible about it, lunatics and murderers sleeping in the same room? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying I was scared, but let’s just say I slept with one eye open.
I just could not believe I was ever in a dorm. I had almost strangled to death a paedophile in Rampton; I was described as the most violent man in penal history; I was not happy; and would you want to sleep in a room with me? Or, better still, with ten fucking madmen?
It still makes me smile, even 20 years on, me in a dorm! I only lasted a week. But it was a week I’ll never forget. Insanity at its best! Snoring, farting, wanking, stinking smelly feet, shouting in their sleep and sleepwalking. And, of course, the ‘gay flings’! I was like an eagle, watching every noise and every movement, I was alert. No fucker was gonna waste me in the night.
Some of those loons were mad killers. One had killed five people; six would mean a bag of chips to him. I did most of my thinking in that dorm; I had to, my sanity was at risk. What if they all got together to plot on me? What if one fancied me or maybe planned to kill me? Kill Bronson and be the one everyone will know. Killing me would put him in the history books.
To say I never liked the dorm is an understatement. I hated it; it was making me ill, sick in the crust. I began to imagine myself going berserk and wasting them all, but what choice did I have? This was madness with a capital ‘M’.
I studied them carefully — eyes, facial expressions, movement. One fucking strange move and I’ll kill the whole lot. I’m too young to die, I thought. Hey, they could be plotting on gang-banging me; it would be all over the papers: LOONS GANG-BANG BRONSON. No way … I’ll kill them all. On the first night, I smacked one in the chops.
That week will remain with me for ever. I was smack in the centre of a nightmare and it made me psychotic.
On the second night, I found two of them in the recess having it off! I felt sick, two old faggots in their heaven. I kicked them both up the arse. ‘Go on, fuck off, you pervo sickos.’ The fucking state of the sad bastards, baggy skin, dead eyes, smirks for smiles, panting and playing with each other’s skinny, smelly dicks. Get me out of this nightmare! They all knew who I was, but who were they? Who had they killed or raped? They never looked like blaggers to me.
‘Oy, cunt,’ I shouted to one, ‘what are you in for?’
‘Me?’
‘Yeah, you!’
‘Err, I killed my wife!’
‘Oh yeah, what for?’
‘I was ill,’ he said.
‘Ill! What had she done to get wasted?’
‘Nothing!’
‘How did you kill her?’
‘I strangled her with her tights.’
‘Yeah, I bet you stuffed her panties in her mouth as well and done her up the back door, you filthy maggot!’ Looking at another loon, I said, ‘What about you … you over there with the evil eyes?’
‘I’m a rapist,’ he said.
Oh yeah! Big tough guy, eh? So who did you rape?’
‘I’d rather not say,’ he replied.
‘Oh, he’d rather not say … oh, so sorry for being personal, forgive me. I walked over to the bed and bent down and whispered, ‘Cunt … who did you rape!’
‘Err, my daughter,’ he said.
‘How old?’
‘Ten years old,’ he replied.
‘You cunt, you sick cunt.’
I then said in a loud voice, ‘All of you, listen to me. Listen, I don’t like you, I don’t like this place, you’re all sick …’ It went quiet, too quiet, unnervingly silent. ‘Err, sorry, lads, I got a bit upset there! I’m just having a go at the filth. If you’re not filth, my apologies, if you are, you’re filth!’ That’s how that dorm affected me, big-time crazy!
A week of it drove me nuts. I’d never fit in; I was not one of them. I had nothing in common; I’m a robber, a villain, not a fucking nutcase. Was I as mad as them, but to a higher degree, maybe more dangerous — psychotic? Was the problem me or were they actually thinking like me? Could they have wiped us all out? I believe they could and would if they had a gun or knife or a tin of petrol. The difficulty is, with me I can do it with my hands. To snap six of their necks before the others woke up would be a massacre without the weapons. How close it was, a nightmare come to reality! Screams beyond humanity!
The rest of my years in the asylums were spent in a solitary room. But even then in the early hours in my own mind I used to picture them, the whole asylum, asleep next door, in all the rooms and all the dorms. What were they dreaming and thinking and what horrors hid behind their faces. What depravity played in their brain? It’s no secret; there are a lot of sick bastards in them places!
I met them all in the asylums. Anyone who was anybody I’ve met! Hell, you just don’t realise who they are half the time, ’cos half of their cases never reached court; there was no trial, no media, it was all swept under the mat owing to insanity. Like the loon who cut up a prostitute and sent her tits to a national paper. Like the many mass killers who wiped out their own families. I bet loads will have butchered their kids and wives and in-laws. You’d be amazed at how many murders they’ve committed — four, five or even six killings and, to look at them, butter wouldn’t melt in their mouths — insanity at its best … or worst.
The religious freaks are the worst killers, as they do it for God, and they’re saved, blessed. They kill evil, you see! Then the sex killers, they’re the lustful killers; they dribble as they mutilate the bodies of their victims; some will chew the body and leave their DNA behind.
Then there’s the jealous killer; now they’re a sad lot, all they do is cry and feel sorry for themselves. Then there are the psychopathic killers; they’re cold as ice, pure wicked and you can see the hate in their eyes. It’s hate that motivates them; they often laugh as they destroy. Some even ejaculate as they plunge in the knife. Some will tell you it’s better than sex.
Most killers become pitiful. There is no higher crime than taking a life, but believe me, most live in a very sad world – I would say 90 per cent of them would turn the clock back, ’cos as the years fly by and they become old and more alone and isolated, they all regret it. Even the insane have regrets — believe it.
Asylums are crazy places, with crazy rules. If you’re not mad when you arrive, you are when (or if) you leave. I was lucky, I got slung out; they couldn’t afford to keep me any longer. I was Britain’s most expensive lunatic to keep caged. I cost Broadmoor £1½m in damage — three roofs prove it.
So there I was at the table, just about to pick up the teapot and pour a cuppa! And I caught the evil look on one of the lunatics’ faces on my table. This big black guy had stabbed a fellow lunatic in the eye before. I shouted, ‘Oy, what’s up with you?’ He was sweating, shaking, staring at me. If looks could kill I’d be ten times dead. His breathing was heavy, a sure sign of an attack; do I hit him now? Do I walk off or do I wait for the attack?
I reached over and grabbed his neck tightly, ready to punch in his insane face if need be! Squeeze — ‘Slow down, chap, pack it in … I don’t need it,’ I said, through gritted teeth. ‘But you’re gonna fucking get it if you don’t stop.’ He eased up. The madness disappeared. My eye was safe, ’til the next time. That’s how it comes on. He’d have shot me if he had had a gun. A knife, and I’d have had a hole in me. Any other place or time I’d have just hit the slag. But you have to make allowances for the insane. Why keep bruising your knuckles on their skulls? Asylum life is lethal! You can die as easy as a cup of tea; at any time you can be killed, and for nothing.
I went through a period during which I couldn’t keep off the establishment’s roofs, it was a serious urge I had. To look at a drainpipe and start shaking with excitement … nobody knows the feeling of hitting a prison roof, not unless you’ve done it. Let me tell you, it’s like a lottery win — it’s power. You’re the governor; it’s a kick in the teeth to the system.
When you’re on a roof, you’re free, under the stars, fresh air, alone. I used to get a hard-on when hitting a roof. They’d shout up, ‘You wait ’til we get you down; we’ll smash your legs, beat your arms and twist and snap your toes.’ What nasty fuckers they are; they’re insane, beyond help.
But Broadmoor’s roof was so special to me. It was heavenly. It was my way of fucking them up, and causing maximum damage and confusion; make them pay for it, cause them problems. Make them think, Best not fuck with Bronson.
I was Britain’s most expensive lunatic to keep locked up. That roofing contractor loved me, but the others hated me, despised me. I was their embarrassment. They would have killed me if they could have got away with it. You could see it in their eyes. They would shout up, ‘We’ve got a wild big syringe waiting for you, full of psychopathic drugs. You’ll fucking get it when you come down.’
I’d shout back, ‘You gutless fuckers, don’t threaten me with your drugs. I’ll fucking rip your faces off, evil screws. Nurses — don’t make me laugh. You’re rats in white coats. You’re evil beyond belief, beyond humanity. All you know is causing pain and misery.’
The female loons would all watch me rip the roof off Norfolk and Essex Wards. They would shout to me, ‘Yoo-hoo, yoo-hoo.’ I’d watch them hang their tits out the bars — beautiful tits. How long does a man have to go without sucking a tit? They would moon me, lovely juicy arses up against the bars. With a breeze I could almost smell their sex, so near, but so far, it fucking hurt. I’m only human — all that pussy looking at me. ‘Show us yours, Charlie.’
I flipped it out. ‘Yarhooo, look at this. YARHOOO.’ They screamed with laughter. I’d flop it about a bit. ‘Have that girls.’
‘Boootiful … looovelly,’ they all screamed.
But it’s depressing. I soon got fed up, so I’d go back to ripping the roof off. I’d have another shit through a hole in the ceiling and it plops into an office.
‘Dirty bastard,’ someone shouts.
‘Fuck you, screw, that’s all you’re worth, shithead.’ It’s a hate factory, a war zone and a mental fight.
Every morning, the weeds would be blowing about, the cold sets into the bones, your teeth rattle, your knees hurt and your fingers go numb. How much more pain can you endure? Your eyes are full of grit; your body is full of splinters. You ache, you curl up in the foetal position, you fall asleep and you dream of your loved ones. You shake with cold and pain.
A new day. Sun, warmth, but the hunger has you — pain in your guts — so you eat slime, moss out of the gutter. You eat some pigeon eggs; you drink water out of the tank on the roof. You survive! Again, they abuse you.
Sunday — emotions. You consider death. Then you believe you’re dead — you died the day the court sent you to Broadmoor. You’re insane. Insanity is death.
Have a wank, swallow the sperm, it’s protein, it keeps you alive. It really will keep you going. Bet that’s blown you away! I bet the SAS do it and worse besides! You learn to survive when you’re alone. A pigeon, eat it raw. I’d eat a lunatic or a screw or a doctor — ‘Come up, I’ll eat you, raw.’ Fuck the SAS, SBS or even the SS … I’d eat them! Man has got to go on. Eat worms, spiders, cockroaches … anything, but survive.
The slags below start to fry mushrooms and omelettes so I can smell it. They’re cooking so it smells. They know I’m hungry and it’s torture. They’re using psychological warfare. It drives me mad, but how do you drive a madman mad?
There was this room in Norfolk House Intensive Care at Broadmoor. We called it the ‘plastic room’; it had a plastic window, plastic jug, plastic mug and even the bed was plastic. You ate from plastic plates; you used a plastic spoon. You became plasticated, and through your hazy, drugged vision even the nurses’ faces looked plastic. But this room was also used to apply mental and psychological pressure to you. It had bloodstains on the rails, walls and ceiling. Speckles of blood were splattered so as to intimidate the lunatic — behave or get it big time. Drugging us senseless was not enough; they wanted to destroy us in every way.
It was evil beyond anything you can imagine, and you stayed in that room ’til they said you could come out. They didn’t need to lift a finger in order to apply certain types of punishment. You had to shit in the potty. They wouldn’t empty it. You slept in there, ate in there. You got your fresh air for one hour a day, but only if they said so. People just don’t realise that a madman has no rights. They say, ‘You’re too dangerous to come out,’ so you stay in and you get no exercise. You get fuck all.
They will antagonise you, kick your door, whisper outside so you can hear it. One used to smoke outside my door and blow it through the crack. They would mess with your food — spit in it, put drugs in it and even steal half of it. They would give you a change of clothes, which would be dirty, or wouldn’t fit you. You would say, ‘Hey, it don’t fit,’ but it would have to do until the following week. Often I’d rip them up, then they would say, ‘Well, now you can’t come out.’ It would be seen as if it was me who was mad. But they drove me mad.
They would have a TV set in their tea room and turn it up loud. I knew all the soaps and the films, but I never got to see any of them. It was a living hell in which they drove us over the edge. The plastic room began to smother me, like I was wrapped in cling film. I went through bouts of claustrophobia in which I’d scream and bang the door for hours, ’til my feet and hands bled and I was exhausted. I’d lie on the floor, breathing the draught under my door, as I felt I had no air. The window was sealed with a plastic sheet and a shutter. I’d lie there in a state of severe depression. I’d hear footsteps. It would stop outside my door, and — bang! — the door would reverberate in my face. I wished the door were open so it could be my head. ‘Kick me to death, just put me out of this misery.’ I used to hear the screams in the night of the madmen’s nightmares — in time, it was me doing the screaming.
More drugs, more loneliness. You become a zombie and part of you dies. Your dreams are no more. A black hole sucks you in deep; you’re in the plastic room. This room had an oblong hatch, which locked on the outside. They would open it up to pass things in, such as tots of medicine. It had an inch-thick, see-through plastic covering. Some days, I’d just stand there looking through at the insanity of life in Broadmoor and, believe me, it was mad. What I saw through that hatch was my worst fucking nightmare come true. Soon, the plastic room was to be my home — my saviour.
I never fitted in; I could not accept this insanity. I’d watch the lunatics walk by in their pyjamas and dressing gowns to slop out. To watch them carrying pots of shit, full to the brim, spilling as they walked; shit and piss, smells coming through my door, polluting my space. A screw in a white coat would be pressing the nozzle on a can of air freshener; I’d get a whiff of scented air to kill the stench, but that stench never really goes away. The plastic room was a living sewer; my pot only got emptied when they chose for me to do it.
There were no bell buttons in the cells at that time. To get attention you had to kick the door, and then they would say, ‘You’re too aggressive,’ or ‘You’re too bad tempered.’
I’d say, ‘How the fuck else can I get your attention?’
‘Don’t get cheeky,’ they would say, ‘or you get fuck all.’
The cunts were turning me into a beast. A zoo would be better than this. I’d watch the nurses stuffing their faces with fruit and sandwiches (ours), and I’d watch them smoking. ‘Die of cancer,’ I’d shout through the door. ‘Cough your guts up, you German SS scum.’
I’d watch the loonies; some would come up to my hatch and look through. Their eyes were spaced out, mouths open. Some would have a sick look, a look of doom, dribbling. I’d tap the hatch and shout, ‘You OK, you OK?’ Some would nod and some would just look, ’til the nurses shouted, ‘GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM THERE!’
I’ve seen other loons being wheeled into the men’s room for electro-convulsive treatment, and when they were wheeled back there would be blood on the pillow, shit on the sheet; the trolley looked as though a wild animal had been on it. He had just had some shots of electricity into his brain.
After spells in the plastic room, I would live amongst the mad; I became one of them, so much so that I now enjoy being with the insane. They’re better than the sane. These guys are full of mystery and you never know when they’ll flip, or what they’ll do next. That’s why I love them.
Madness becomes a comfort. Let me explain. We all get times of stress, anxiety and boredom, so what do you do? Outside, you have options — hit the booze, drugs, go for a run, a gym or a good fuck. We all have to find our release, or we die of a stressed heart. Broadmoor in the 1970s had no gym, so what could we do to release our stress? At times you couldn’t even pull your cock, as the drugs took away any feelings. You’re impotent so you only have one way out and that’s madness. My way was to rip roofs off or attack. I’d get smashed down, beaten and taken back to the plastic room. But I’d be free of stress, until it built up again.
Others had their own ways. They, too, would fall and be trodden over, but madmen have a strong survival instinct. We only fear ourselves and that’s our true fear. Just what will we do next? Will we go on a mission we can’t control or will we go to bits, never to be put back together again — the Humpty Dumpty syndrome? The fear of jumping off a skyscraper — it’s not the diving, it’s the thought of the landing, but we’re all capable of such madness.
Michael Ryan — why did he shoot up Hungerford? Dennis Nilsen — why did he kill all those innocent young men? Why did the Ripper rip his name into the history books? I’ll tell you why — madness beyond their control. Call them monsters, but their mums love them. Just thank your lucky stars it’s not you or your son or your father, because it could be.
Ted Bundy — look at him, a nice chap, good-looking, women loved him, but inside his heart was madness. The electric chair burned it out. He fried like a sausage for his madness. Ted could easily be your uncle or your cousin or your twin brother. Ted Bundy lies in every man if you allow the evil to eat into your heart.
Sane today, madness tomorrow, you can’t stop it, it’s like a growth of cancer and it spreads; it sucks away your senses. My advice is simple — don’t fuck with the insane, as, like an elephant, they never forget, never! That little thing you did 20 years ago may end up your worst ever nightmare, as you may forget it, but a madman never does. You may owe him 50p, but he owes you a knife in the back. Don’t fuck with madness.
There are killers out there amongst you, watching, waiting; it’s time you woke up to smell the coffee. You could be next. A noise, a shadow and it’s your turn to die; some are born to kill, others born to be killed. Which are you?
Predators hunt; prey is for picking off. Madness is for ever! We even smell different; our hearts don’t beat, they tick. Our eyes are different; we don’t just see, we also pick up vibes. We are probably dehumanised and way past our ‘sell-by’ date, totally unusable, bitter as lemons.
We have the beauty that the sane don’t have; it’s like a warm glow that protects us. I challenge any sane man to spend a single day in the plastic room, and not come out insane! For me, I could easily go back in, and accept it like a tortoise wears a shell; maybe I never left it or it never left me.
Away from the madness, there’s also a lot of sadness. Please believe it when I say great sadness. Asylums are full of sad, lost people, and it fucking hurts to witness it. I’m not a soft touch or a weak man, but I’ve felt compassion for my fellow madmen and women! Sure, they can seriously piss you off. But when you get to Hawthorn and understand them and see their sadness … I’ve walked into a room and seen a guy bashing his own head on the wall. Lumps, bumps, blood. Why? Crying, hurt, pain! I’ve hugged them, told them not to, talked to them, tried to help them, bathed their heads and faces.
Do you know why they do it? ’Cos they hate themselves. They’re ugly and they’re unloved — they’re just fucked up, lonely people. Bang! Crash! It’s their way of expressing their inner pain. I’ve seen it so often. Some I’ve helped and others have been beyond help.
One old boy I used to love to chat with in Broadmoor when I got the chance was Alan Depreze, a caged man for more than 40 years. He went to Broadmoor in the 1930s. I fucking loved this white-haired, white-moustached old boy. I’d get a bag of soft sweets and him and me would sit together and eat them and I’d listen to all the old mad stories. Then there was Walter Prince, 50 years in Broadmoor, and Eric Davies, a 45-year man. All three died while I was there. They were all buried in Block Eight — Broadmoor Cemetery. They were in hell before they died and the only love they got was from their fellow madmen. Hell! I respect the insane. They’re the cat’s bollocks to me.
Rumours flew around the asylum. ‘Don’t you dare get a blow-job off anyone you don’t know, ’cos you might get it bit off.’ I’m told years ago a Broadmoor female did just that. As sexes mix, it’s possible it did happen.
Night-time in the asylum is a time to reflect. You need that time to come to terms with each day. The madness you’ve seen, you need to analyse it all, study it and try to find the answer. But for some there is no answer.
When the door opens in the morning, it’s back to madness. A naked body walks past. Shouts of, ‘Get some clothes on,’ or ‘Empty that shit,’ or ‘Clean your teeth.’ There’s always a smell of shit in the asylum, body odour and sweat, a smell of despair. Some are so badly drugged up they forget if they’ve wiped their arse. Some fall asleep on the bog. They’ve got drugs to make you sleep, wake you up, make you shit and to make you eat — all sorts. Drugs, drugs and more drugs.
Insanity, I believe, truly can get you through it all; if you can laugh, you’ll survive it. If you cry, they make you cry more. If you scream, they love it. To see a man cry and scream is their way of saying, ‘Shut it, or no sweeties.’ Say that to me and I’ll smash your fucking skull in the first opportunity I get. It takes ten of them screws to bash one lunatic up; it takes just one of me to do it to them.
That’s the reality with me. Don’t take liberties. When the Ripper arrived in Broadmoor he was on Ron Kray’s ward. Ron went up to him and told him the score. ‘Don’t fucking look at me and, when I walk in a room, that’s when you walk out, got it?’ For ten years that’s how it was. Ask yourself, what if the Ripper had looked? Monsters have to be put in their place otherwise they take over. You have to lay down the law from the word go.
I met Dickie Langrell in Broadmoor in ’79. He was over 50, small, 5ft 4in and 9st, harmless looking, but he was a complete psychotic. He’d hear voices and then attack. One day the voice told him to attack me. He flew at me and jumped on my back trying to bite out my neck. Fuck me, what a dangerous fucker! I smashed him up into a wall. I managed to prise him off, and then the nurses took over, injected him and segregated him. Days later, he carried on as if fuck all had happened.
One geezer got a glass jar and rammed it into a nurse’s face. Why? ’Cos he didn’t like the colour of the nurse’s socks! Another lunatic went into the recess and kept nutting the toilet door … ’til his head went through it. A loon was having a shit at the time. Imagine that!
Let me leave you with this thought! Some will say, ‘Don’t listen to Bronson! He’s mad! It’s all lies.’ I say this:
- Yes I was certified insane, but to leave the asylum one must be certified sane!
- Have you got a certificate to say you’re sane?
- I have!
I also say, in some countries it’s an offence to deny the existence of the Holocaust. It’s called ‘Holocaust Denial’. I believe I have gone through as much if not more than any Holocaust survivor and for anyone to deny this is, in my opinion, ‘Brutality Denial’, and they should be brought before the courts and slung in an asylum!
How anyone can go to the extreme of visiting the scene of such atrocities as carried out in Hitler’s death camps is beyond me … just visit your local asylum. Have a look at the padded room or the plastic room! Remember one sure thing — I tore Broadmoor roof off; I cost you plenty. You never beat me! You never could beat me! I was just too sane for you insane fuckers.