Easy Pickerings for The Brad and O'Connors

By way of rounding off this series of unusual happenings in golf, our final article has a distinctly Irish flavour. And it involves such legends of the game as John Burke, Joe Carr, Cecil Ewing and Harry Bradshaw, along with anonymous individuals whose contributions are no less memorable.

Our first stop is Royal Dublin GC in August 1960. That was when The Brad was confronted by an 18th cup which was actually filled with £1 notes.

The cash was placed there by millionaire Londoner Harold Pickering who was playing in a fourball with The Brad, Christy O'Connor Snr and his nephew, Sean, who later took up a professional post in the Bahamas. And the financial frolics had started on the long 14th where Pickering offered Sean £10 if he could make a birdie four.

With the pride of the O'Connor clan at stake Sean duly reached the green in two and got down in two putts to collect a handy little bonus. Then on the 18th, where The Brad was 10 feet from the flag, Pickering filled the hole with £1 notes and challenged the demon putter from Portmarnock: "It's yours if you sink the putt." Standing over the putt, The Brad uttered the familiar phrase "Open the door Mrs Murphy, I'm coming in" and, as it happened, the ball ran unerringly into the cup. When The Brad had picked up his reward, Pickering then offered O'Connor Snr £1 per yard for a 25-yard putt. In this instance, the ball slipped past the target.

Mind you, Pickering's cash was no more than pin money to O'Connor that particular summer, given that he won no fewer than six tournaments in Britain and Ireland.

But food was an entirely different matter. And Ewing discovered that being a Protestant could be a distinct bonus at a time when Catholics were obliged to eat fish on a Friday.

That was the dominant memory Carr retained of the Irish Amateur Open Championship of 1951, when Ewing gained revenge for the previous year by beating his great rival 2 and 1 in a classic final at Portmarnock. For that particular championship, Ewing was Carr's guest at his famous home overlooking the second at Sutton GC.

"I can remember the final took place on a Friday," said Carr, "and after losing to him, I had to suffer the further indignity of seeing my wife Dor give Cecil a big steak afterwards, while the rest of us ate fish. Still, it gave us the chance of talking to each other, which we hadn't done on the course. Cecil was like that: a great competitor who didn't believe in giving an opponent an inch, verbally or any other way."

In his book Curiosities of Golf, which we dipped into earlier in the series, Jonathan Rice observes that the Irish feature in many of the game's odder shots. Like at Bray in 1910, when a Dublin cyclist, Mr W Lee, happened to be riding his bike away from the clubhouse as a player sliced his drive off the eighth tee.

As Rice wrote: "The slice was so wild yet so powerful that the ball jammed between the spokes of the back wheel of Mr Lee's bicycle. Mr Lee, being a keen cyclist rather than a keen golfer, was unaware of the collision and pedalled off into the distance. He was called back before he finally disappeared out of earshot and the ball, rather the worse for wear, was retrieved from between the spokes."

In his delightful book Only Golf Spoken Here, Ivan Morris reminds us that only Carr won more Irish national and provincial titles than Burke. Indeed, the author makes no secret of his enormous admiration for the golfing skills of the Lahinch man, while highlighting the consequences of his decidedly republican leanings.

Morris writes: "How the British found out about John's politics was interesting. During a raid on a British army encampment in Co Cork, John's Brigade (of the Old IRA) 'purloined' a fine pair of brown military boots, belonging to an enemy officer, among other goodies. The boots had the initials 'JB' displayed prominently on them, so they were given to John as a matter of course.

"Some weeks later, John and a few colleagues were detained for questioning in Co Clare. Gradually, it dawned on him that the interrogating officer was the owner of the very boots he was wearing. It could have been disastrous if it had been discovered. Fortunately for him, a most uncomfortable few hours passed by without the boots being noticed.

"Exactly 10 years later, John was playing for Ireland against England at Sandwich, south of London. During one of his rounds, he became aware of a familiar face in the crowd, but could not place it. After the game, he approached the gentleman who had aroused his curiosity, only to find that it was the officer whose boots had been 'captured', and who had questioned him about his IRA membership.

"When the secret of the boots was revealed, the officer fell about laughing and 'forgave' John with alacrity. Soon afterwards, John was selected to play for Great Britain and Ireland in the Walker Cup matches in America (1932). The team was to sail on the Queen Mary from Southampton with the Irish contingent joining the boat at Cobh, Co Cork, en route.

"John's new friend, not realising this, drove to Southampton to wish him bon voyage. But, of course, John was not there. Instead, the former officer told one of the GB&I officials about this and John's unusual friendship, and gave him a handwritten 'best of luck' note for John."

When the note was being handed over, John was told in no uncertain terms that it would be his last Walker Cup because there was "no place on a British team for IRA terrorists". Burke died in 1974 and more than a quarter of a century on there is no way of proving the truth of those allegations.

Still, though he halved his match with Jack Westland in the 1932 matches at Brookline, he never made another Walker Cup appearance.

Several years ago, in a conversation I had with Sutton's Jimmy Carroll, it became clear that Burke never modified his republican beliefs. Carroll recalled how he and the Lahinch man were members of the Ireland team in the Home Internationals at Muirfield in 1948.

He recalled how, when they entered the clubhouse bar, they were confronted by a portrait of the Duke of Windsor (the former Prince of Wales).

According to Carroll, Burke couldn't bring himself to acknowledge the royal personage, despite HRH's strong ties with golf.

"So," the Sutton man concluded, "lifting his glass, John nodded to the portrait and said 'Me life on you, James Braid'."

(Series concluded)