SAS Rogue Heroes: What’s true and what’s false? From Paddy Mayne smashing up a Cairo restaurant to unit’s founder trying to flee prison, historian gives his verdict

The new series of BBC drama SAS Rogue Heroes has drawn both praise and criticism for its depiction of the wartime exploits of Britain’s most elite troops.

The second series of the adaptation of the book by historian Ben Macintyre is certainly an all-action extravaganza.

But aspects of the show have also been slated by historians, not least Jack O’Connell’s portrayal of the SAS’s commander, Lieutenant Colonel Blair ‘Paddy’ Mayne.

Historian Damien Lewis told MailOnline on Thursday that his depiction as a ‘drunken, ill-disciplined, irreverent, uncouth, misfit’ is a ‘travesty’. 

But the BBC drama does repeatedly get across the immense bravery of Mayne and his men and the respect they had for their commander.

A disclaimer at the start of each episode also warns viewers that what they are watching is ‘not a history lesson’.

So, with that in mind, MailOnline separates fact from fiction in each of the drama’s six episodes with the help of Mr Lewis – who has written more than a dozen books on the history of the SAS.  

Did Paddy Mayne really smash up a Cairo restaurant and then have a fight with military police?

The opening episode of the second series of SAS Rogue Heroes shows Paddy Mayne smashing up a Cairo restaurant after being denied leave to attend his father’s funeral.

The SAS commander really was refused permission to go to his father’s send-off.  

Mr Macintyre’s original book does say that Mayne went on the rampage shortly after receiving the news. 

He writes: ‘In the course of a few hours in Cairo, it was said, he smashed up several restaurants, got into a punch up with half a dozen military policemen and was flung into a cell.’

The TV version shows Mayne sitting in a posh restaurant in Egypt’s capital as viewers hear him reading out a letter to his mother, telling her that he was ‘somewhat aggrieved’ he could not come home for ‘dad’s funeral’. 

He then explodes with rage and causes significant damage to his surroundings before brawling with military police.  

Mr Lewis says there is ‘no evidence’ he smashed up the restaurant, but that he did have a fight with members of the military police.  

Verdict: Partly true

Did the brother of SAS founder David Stirling really butt heads with Paddy Mayne over the change of the unit’s name to the Special Raiding Squadron? 

It is true that the SAS was re-styled as the SRS in April 1943.

Rogue Heroes shows Mayne arguing with Lieutenant Colonel Bill Stirling – the brother of David – over the name and trying to stop any change. 

But Stirling was never involved with the name change. Instead, he was sent to Algeria to raise the 2nd SAS Regiment (2 SAS). 

The BBC show also depicts Bill Stirling briefing Mayne’s men, some of whom are insubordinate. This is not a historical account.  

Mr Lewis said: ‘The two forces – Mayne’s SRS and 2 SAS – were encamped hundreds of miles apart, and had no need or desire to meet. 

‘Stirling never briefed Mayne’s men for Italy ops, and he certainly didn’t turn up in Italy to command Mayne and his men in the field. 

‘Indeed, he was seen as being too valuable a commander raising and training 2 SAS to risk him at the coal face of operations.’

Verdict: False

Did Paddy Mayne really order his men to leave British sailors to drown and tell them to cut loose a flailing soldier who had clung onto their boat?

The first episode of Rogue Heroes shows a harrowing scene minutes before they land on the beach during the first steps of the invasion of Sicily.

Mayne is seen telling his men that they will soon encounter British comrades drowning in the sea, with their gliders having crashed into the water. 

He tells them that they are not allowed to rescue them because there is no time. 

One of Mayne’s men, Reg Seekings, who is portrayed by Theo Barklem-Biggs on TV, later said: ‘The poor devils were shouting for help but we didn’t stop.

‘We shouted to them to hang on, but we couldn’t stop to pick them up… we’d got a job to do.’

On screen, Mayne is even seen ordering his men to cut loose a drowning man who was clinging onto their boat.  

But Mr Lewis said Mayne and his men had ‘no idea’ there were drowning men until they came across them vessel, the Ulster Monarch.

‘They sailed into the carnage and had to deal with what they found. They actually rescued several of those drowning. 

‘The lead LCAs were then full, so yes they had to continue and Mayne made that clear. All his men understood why.’ 

Verdict: False

Did the SAS really clash with the Sicilian mafia? 

In Rogue Heroes, Mayne’s men are seen exchanging fire with the Cosa Nostra, members of the Sicilian Mafia.

The criminals later double-cross Mayne by betraying his men to the Germans.

However, the introduction of the mafia is pure fiction. Similarly, there were no interactions at the time with the Italian resistance. 

Verdict: False

Did David Stirling really have a French lover who visited him in prison disguised as a nun?

Rogue Heroes shows David Stirling being visited in captivity by French spy Eve Mansour, who is also his lover.

She gets into his cell disguised as a nun and the pair sleep together, narrowly avoiding being discovered by guards.

However, although there were many heroic female spies in the war, Mansour – who is portrayed by Sofia Boutella – is an invention. 

Verdict: False

Did David Stirling really not get on with his brother or Paddy Mayne?

In Rogue Heroes, Connor Swindells’ David Stirling is seen angrily telling Mansour that his brother is in command ‘because it was my idea’.

He also appears to disparage his older sibling by referring to him as his ‘older, calmer, more sophisticated brother’. 

But Mr Lewis says there is ‘no evidence’ for the hint of bad blood between the Stirling brothers, or for suggestions in the series that David and Mayne did not get on either.

He said: ‘No evidence of this at all. As there is zero evidence that David Stirling and Mayne didn’t get on. 

‘In fact, both write of missing each other when David Stirling was captured.’ 

Verdict: False

Did David Stirling really try to escape from captivity?

In Rogue Heroes’ third episode, Stirling is seen attempting to escape from his Italian captors.   

Fellow inmates help him to get out of the prison walls, before he begins abseiling down to the ground. But his ploy fails when a guard finds him and cuts the rope.

Injured, he is thrown into solitary confinement. 

In the sixth episode of Rogue Heroes, which is available on BBC iPlayer but has not yet aired on TV, Stirling is seen attempting another escape while dressed as a German soldier. 

Again, his plot is foiled and he is banged up once more.  

Although both escape ploys depicted on screen are inventions, the reality is that Stirling did try to escape from prison more than once. 

For his efforts, he was sent to the supposedly ‘escape proof’ Colditz Castle in Germany.

There, he spent the rest of the war.

Verdict: True

Was Paddy Mayne really a fan of poetry?

O’Connell’s Mayne is seen more than once in Rogue Heroes reciting poetry.

In the third episode, he gets part way through Anthem for Doomed Youth – the great work by First World War poet Wilfred Owen – before forgetting the next verse.

The scene is an accurate representation of Mayne’s love for poetry.

Mr Lewis said: ‘He would carry a book of poetry with him into battle named Other Men’s Flowers, an anthology by General Wavell. 

‘An eclectic collection, it includes much war poetry, but also philosophy, spiritual works, those on magic, landscape, beauty, love and much more.’

Verdict: True 

Did the SAS really kill a gravely wounded soldier in an act of mercy?

The third episode of Rogue Heroes also shows Mayne shooting dead a gravely wounded German soldier after being asked to do so by the young man’s terrified brother.

Mr Lewis said that this tragic act of mercy really was carried out after the SAS came across two soldiers who were siblings, one of them gravely wounded. 

Verdict: True

Did Did Hitler really order for captured SAS soldiers to be executed? 

The fifth episode of Rogue Heroes shows Mayne being told that ‘Foster, Shorthall, Dudgeon and Brunt’ were captured and then executed.

He is also told: ‘The new command from Hitler regarding SAS prisoners was carried out to the letter’.

Viewers are then shown the names of ‘the first SAS to die as a result of Hitler’s Commando Order’.

They were Captain James Patrick Shortall, Sergeant William Johnston Foster, Captain Patrick Laurence Dudgeon and Parachutist Bernard Oliver Brunt.

Mr Lewis said: ‘The “Commando Order”, as it became known, was notorious, illegal, and against all rules of war.’

Adolf Hitler imposed the order after being left furious by the damage wrought by the SAS and other commando units.

In October 1942, Adolf Hitler was left so enraged by the SAS’s raids that he imposed his order to execute all captured commandos, even when in uniform. 

Verdict: True 

Did Reg Seekings really shoot a gravely wounded boy in an act of mercy during the battle in Termoli?

In Rogue Heroes’ fourth episode, SAS soldier Reg Seekings is seen shooting a gravely wounded boy in an act of mercy during the German assault on Termoli in Sicily.

Earlier scenes had showed him befriending the child, who is depicted as being from the family that owns a laundry firm in the town. 

The family are seen washing the SAS soldiers’ uniforms before German forces attacked.

But the child and his family are then killed when a German bomb smashes into their home.

Mr Macintyre said in his book that an Italian family – a man and his wife who had a teenage daughter and son – had taken in some washing for the troops and had become friendly with the SAS soldiers.  

And Mr Lewis confirmed that Seekings did shoot the family’s son after he was gravely wounded in the German attack.

Although the boy’s sister survived, his mother and father were killed outright in the blast. On screen, all members of the family are killed. 

Seekings later said of the boy: ‘Suddenly he got up and ran around screaming. Terrible sight. 

‘There was absolutely no hope for him, and you couldn’t let anybody suffer like that. So I caught him, and I shot him.’  

Verdict: Partly true

Was SAS soldier John Tonkin really saved from execution when a German commander summoned him for dinner? 

In the fourth episode of Rogue Heroes, SAS man John Tonkin (played by Jack Barton) is seen being captured and then unexpectedly getting a reprieve from execution when the German commander summons him to have dinner with him.

After the pair eat together, Tonkin is again set to be put to death but then escapes.

Mr Lewis said: ‘He gave him dinner and a veiled warning that he would be forced to hand Tonkin to the Gestapo and that would spell the end. 

‘That drove Tonkin to escape and he brought back to the SAS the very first intimations that Hitler’s Commando Order did exist.’ 

Verdict: Partly true

Did Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery really come to Termoli to inspect the SAS?

In the show’s fifth episode, Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery is seen coming to Termoli to inspect the SAS after their victory.

He encounters Mayne, who is insubordinate and defiantly refuses to wear the regiment’s new maroon beret. 

O’Connell’s Mayne then wins the senior Army man’s favour and Montgomery says he has his permission to continue wearing his sand-coloured beret. 

Mr Lewis confirmed that Montgomery really did come to Termoli but says that Mayne only refused to wear the new beret after the SAS were withdrawn to the UK.

The historian also insists: ‘He never spoke back to Monty. Between them there developed a huge respect.

‘Mayne congratulated Monty on his promotion by wireless message from the field. Monty acknowledged and thanked him for that.’ 

Verdict: True

Did Paddy Mayne really start a fight in the Ritz with American GIs, before it was broken up by spy Dudley Clarke firing a gun at the ceiling?

The sixth episode of Rogue Heroes shows O’Connell’s Mayne brawling with American GIs at the Ritz Hotel in London.

The fight breaks out after the US soldier tries to aid hotel staff in getting the members of the SAS to leave.

The brawl is finally broken up by intelligence officer Dudley Clarke (portrayed by Dominic West) when he fires his pistol.

Viewers may not be surprised to learn that the scene is fictional. 

Verdict: False