interview with mary-anne fairhurstformer combat medical technicianby Terry Donaldson |
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am off to meet Mary-Anne Fairhurst and I am filled with anxiety. I have just been looking at some of her modelling pics on starnow.com and she is the very image of one of the babes that most men dream of. Hailing from Nottingham, from Robin Hood country, she was , so she says, ‘Initially a bit of a rebel. Naughty is the word’ she tells me.  Mary,
25, remembers reading war poetry, at the age of 14, especially the poems
of Wilfred Owen, and was strongly influenced by the emotional content there
that she came across. ‘I really felt for the men out in the trenches that were really up against the odds, but who really wanted to serve their country.' ‘My granddad was in the army, as was my dad, both in the artillery. My brother was also in it, so I had something of a background to help get me started.’ She joined when she was just 16, just prior to her 17th birthday.  ‘After
three months of basic training I managed to get seconded into a combat medical
mission. I liked the sound of combat, and always wanted to get into the
front line to see some action’. I ask about what her colleagues were like. ‘They were a really great bunch of people- from all walks of life. The camaraderie was marvellous. We all knew we were heading out to a really dangerous place and it was important for us to form bonds that would last.’  Her
medical training done she was indeed heading out to troubled waters- Afghanistan!!‘We were in Baghram, in central Afghanistan. I remember the intense heat, and the silence at night. Casualties where we were were fairly light, but it was a big cultural change- and has made me appreciate just how much we have got going for us in this country.’ Mary returned to the UK in July 2002, and passed first class the Leishman Memorial Medal for being the Most Academic Medical Combat technician for the Year. As part of her distinction, she was seated at the head of a banqueting table at Sandhurst Military Academy along with the Director General in charge of Army Medical Services. I ask if she charmed him like a dove, ‘I tried !’ she says, tantalisingly. It is her genuine modesty which I find almost as incredible as her accomplishments. |
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 Shortly
after that she found herself off on a military plane to Iraq. We lined up in Kuwait, and then one night the order came through for us to all move forward. So we did. The opposition was massive, but we made it through. ‘There the fighting really was intense. Many casualties’ she says, her speech slowing and her eyes downcasting, as she recalls momentarily some of the sounds and sights of the horrors of real war. I gently ask about what some of those horrors might have been. .jpg) ‘Well,
on one occasion I had to keep a guy cheerful that had had half his neck
shot through.‘His head was literally hanging off several shards of flesh, bone and nerves, but he was fully conscious. I even managed to make him laugh!’ ‘What else happened?’ I ask, quizzically. ‘It was whilst in Iraq that I met the fella that is now my boyfriend. In a campful of marines I fell in love with him!!’ She is still with him, to this day. Mary-Anne is currently a studying for a degree in Archeological and Forensic Services, and intends to join the police on completion. As if that wasn’t enough, she is also doing modelling and acting on a part-time basis. ‘Do you do any sport, in your spare time?’ I ask. ‘Yes,’ she says, ‘I do Thai boxing’, which, when I hear that makes me resolve not to make any spelling mistakes with her name!! |
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