A set of medals awarded to Warrant Officer Tony Haw, a British intelligence operative, made £21,000 ($27,588) at Spink on July 26.
Haw worked in some of the most dangerous parts of the world.
Tony Haw was a member of 14 Intelligence Company
He started his career as a member of 14 Intelligence Company in Northern Ireland during the Troubles.
The unit was formed in 1972 out of the ruins of the so-called Mobile Reconnaissance Force (MRF) – a group described by one of its own operatives as a death squad.
The MRF came to a sticky end in 1972, after a driver was killed in an IRA assault on a laundry used by the unit.
14 Intelligence carried out a range of covert activities, including gathering intelligence and monitoring suspected paramilitary leaders.
This was exceptionally dangerous work and several of Haw’s colleagues were killed in the line of duty.
In the late 1980s, attention shifted to Soviet-controlled East Germany.
Haw was deployed on the other side of the Berlin Wall.
He was awarded the British Empire Medal after he managed to sneak into a Soviet compound and photograph the inside of the new T-64 tank.
The chance of this mission going wrong was high. A few months later an American spy was shot dead after being caught on a similar mission.
The set includes a Queen’s Gallantry Medal, a British Empire Medal and a Campaign Service Medal.
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