Jack O’Connell’s portrayal of SAS soldier Paddy Mayne reminds us that history’s most compelling characters are rarely neat or comfortable. Mayne was a war‑winning raider, a frustrated lawyer, a loyal friend, a hard drinker, a man who loved poetry, literature and philosophy and might have died in a bar fight. The 191cm, 98kg Irishman was a rare breed of man.

Had Paddy met Ernest Hemingway, they would have beaten each other pulp or been the best of friends, or probably both. Paddy lived hard, fought hard and left behind lines and lessons that still resonate for anyone who sees honour in courage and art in rebellion.

The Paddy Mayne Story

Robert Blair “Paddy” Mayne remains one of the most colourful figures to emerge from the birth of the Special Air Service (SAS). Born in Northern Ireland in 1915, he was a solicitor and rugby international who read law at Queen’s University Belfast and boxed for Ireland. Quick‑witted and equally happy brawling or reciting poetry, he embodied the contradiction of a man who was happiest in war yet loved literature . Modern viewers met him through Steven Knight’s television adaptation SAS: Rogue Heroes, where Jack O’Connell plays Mayne as a violent contradiction: a charismatic wild man capable of extreme and unyielding violence, but also has the tenderness of artist and quotes poetry and philosophy between, during and after raids. That combination of brute force and sensitivity is far closer to reality than many might expect.

The real Mayne – soldier, scholar and hell‑raiser

Historians describe Mayne as a “natural warrior” with the rare ability to process information and make the right decision instantly . Mike Sadler, a colleague in the Long Range Desert Group, recalled that Mayne “felt his true vocation in war,” but he was also a qualified solicitor and a “very able sort of chap”. He had been a British & Irish Lions rugby player and university heavyweight boxing champion before the war . Perhaps more surprisingly, he loved poetry and literature. Fellow SAS men knew he carried volumes of Yeats and Owen and could quote from them between bouts of heavy drinking.

Mayne’s first SAS raid came on Christmas Eve 1941 at the Italian airfield of Tamet. He led five men across the desert and placed bombs on the fuel tanks of Italian aircraft. Despite heightened security after an earlier raid that had destroyed 24 aircraft, Mayne’s party infiltrated the airfield and slipped away as the first bombs exploded . He later joked that when Italian guards challenged them with “Chi va la?,” he replied “freund” (friend) before calmly walking past . By war’s end, he was credited with personally destroying as many as 100 enemy aircraft.

His battlefield exploits were matched by his appetite for risk. He drank with the sergeants until two in the morning yet was the first to appear for 6 a.m. training . He insisted on toughening his men with 45‑mile marches over rough country in sweltering Palestine . When appointed commanding officer of 1 SAS, he reorganised the unit into small three‑man cells built around a Bren gunner, rifleman and rifle‑bomber, creating what his men called “a highly efficient little fighting unit” . General Miles Dempsey later listed the reasons for their success: they were well‑trained, fit, disciplined, carefully planned and motivated by a long experience of fighting and a fierce spirit .

Mayne’s courage earned him a bar to the Distinguished Service Order (DSO) for leading the assault on the Sicilian gun batteries at Cape Murro di Porco, where he eliminated enemy pillboxes and captured a second battery with a loss of just one man . His men admired his fearless leadership; signaller Alf Dignum remembered landing at Bagnara on the Italian mainland and following Mayne up the beach: “Paddy Mayne was first up the beach… there was still only one set of footprints” . General Dempsey told the SAS he had “never met a unit in which I had such confidence” . Mayne was recommended for a Victoria Cross for rescuing pinned‑down comrades under heavy fire in 1945, but bureaucrats downgraded it to a further bar to his DSO .

The legend is also peppered with darker anecdotes. Stories spread of Mayne pistol‑whipping a bar owner, threatening a BBC correspondent, or even shooting a drinking companion. Many are exaggerations or myths. Military historian Hamish Ross notes that the SAS’s founding philosophy demanded discipline, intelligence and training as well as toughness . Ross argues that Mayne’s reputation as an undisciplined berserker was inflated by veterans who barely knew him and by journalists desperate for heroic copy . In reality, he maintained a strict professionalism; he just detested pompous officers and preferred to drink in the sergeants’ mess .

His life after the war was brief. He struggled with the transition to peace and was killed in a car accident in 1955, aged 40 . Obituaries called him a man who “lived hard in peace, as well as in war” . The controversy over his missing Victoria Cross persists – many still feel the medal should be granted posthumously.

The TV version – Jack O’Connell’s warrior‑poet

BBC’s SAS: Rogue Heroes casts Jack O’Connell as Mayne. O’Connell admitted that the role required him to research Mayne’s psychology because “who they are personality‑wise and what their psychology is required you to… bring in those elements to steer you along” . He noted that few people knew how Mayne spoke or behaved, which gave him “room to manoeuvre and… add something” . Having spent his teenage years in the cadets, O’Connell felt comfortable in a uniform and considered playing a founding SAS member an “enormous honour”. O’Connell also had a reputation of a wild lad in his youth, and claims he partied for 7 years straight, allowing him no doubt to round out Mayne’s hard-drinking persona.

On screen he presents a towering, brooding Irishman who downplays authority and relishes battle. Yet he also shows glimpses of Mayne’s cultured side. In episode 3, a voice‑over of Mayne reading a poem reveals his internal struggle: “When I find myself become a devil, he reminds me that underneath I am a poet” . On looking over the enemy, says, “They are just dead men waiting confirmation. Like me.” .

These monologues bring a lyrical quality that contrasts with the brutal desert warfare. Episode 4 captures his irreverence when Stirling invites him to announce the unit’s motto. Mayne quips that the new motto is “drink rum, fight dirty, fuck the rules,” before Stirling corrects him with “Who dares wins” . O’Connell delivers the line with a half‑smirk, hinting at a man who masks trauma with bravado.

Reviewers have praised O’Connell for resisting the temptation to portray Mayne as a one‑dimensional thug. In interviews he has emphasised that Mayne loved literature and had “a real compassionate side”. By combining feral energy with vulnerability, O’Connell restores Mayne’s humanity.