COMMENTS DIRECTLY INSULTING AND DISRESPECTING OUR CLUB OR OTHER CLUBS WILL NOT BE POSTED!!

My first real encounter with the Druids North MC came way back in 1980. I'd seen the Druids at various sheffield nightspots including the Wop over the previous year or so but not really got a real impression of any of the members.

Anyways back then a few of us young uns got together socially at a pub called the Everest at the bottom of Handsworth for a few beers and bike chat once a week and word soon filtered back of the possibility of a new "club" in the sheffield area. Shortly afterwards we recieved a visit from Taff and prospect Animal. I remember Taff entering with Animal behind Taff in a donkey jacket, animal in a crombie. The place went silent and one whispered "thats Taffy, leutenant in the Druids" Both went to the bar and ordered pints, Animal remained at the bar and Taff wandered over, singling out the 3 of us wearing scruffy denims and leathers said "evening lads" and pulled up a chair. After a bit of awkward conversation and a few polite questions he was satisfied that the group had no intention of anything resembling becoming an MC or similar then things relaxed a little and the chat became more friendly. Later we moved upto the Anglers Rest on Richmond road and Taff became a regular visitor with his ol lady. After about 12 months or so 3 of us that he originally approached were honoured with a visit to his flat in sheffield to socialise.

I have a great respect for Taff, in those few months he showed not only pride in his colours but also the ability to carry his position without the need to force it. He was real gent of the road.

Live long Taff.

Tex ( the guy with the peaked hat)

Anybody remember Stammering Phil the Dealer at 78 William Street? Druids used to score of us really often. I just discovered this site. It's all so long ago - mid '80's - I've forgotten the names. Except Yetti. Never forget him. Welsh guy - had a bad thing about cats, did Yetti. I remember when he was round to score one day and our cat Olly walked into the room. Yetti jumped out of his chair:

"What's that cat doing 'ere boyo?" he hissed. "Get 'im away from me - I 'ate cats, me. They put the Evil Eye on you
they do - 'specially black ones!"

But I managed to calm him down:
"All right, Yetti. 'ee c-c-c-can't 'urt you. 'eez b-b-b-een n-n-n--eutered, see?"

"Oh, I suppose that does make a difference then". And he sat down again.

My first ever recolection of the druids waz when i wa less than 2ft tall at 2 or 3 year old.... snot round me face and a hand full o chocolate. My memories of that age are probably like most...nearly none... and the things ya do remember are verry blurry. i remember at this young age living at walkley sheffield..... running into the kitchen one day to be stunned by a blockade of dark looking figures. Look back at the archive pictures on ere at how club members used to be and thats what i was looking at. Jaw wide open i looked round at them all... mezmorized at all these horrible lookin blokes. I remember one of them pickin me up and takin me chocoloate off me... well.... maybe just some of it.
Later on in my youth i still had no idea about bike clubs or anything of the sort. what i did know was me dad was a biker.... everytime he built a new bike he would fire it up and with the outhouse bein connected to our kitchen via a home made porch the whole house used to fill up with smoke.... a funnier time was when he built a chop in the cellar... when he fired it up that time all the old folk living in the terraced house next door and next door to them etc thought there was a dam earthquake. you can only imagine the noise a chop would make underground.. under a load of terraced houses. at that age i never understood how he would ever get it up the cellar steps and out the door...later on i realised the chop was stripped and rebuilt on the kitchen table!! anyways back to growing up... i remember me dad sat with a set of patches in HIS chair... like i said before memories at earlier ages are blurry... all i remember from this point is i knew me dad was in a club called the druids. i used to practice drawing me dads patches over and over. at 7 year old i was tellin the teacher i wanted to be a biker and a tattooist when i became a mister. not sure why she used to look at me in disgust.... me mum and dad bought me a cut off and a patch sayin rebel from old coates car boot. God dam i though i was cool. with me boots on me feet and me bandana on me head. i was close to gettin a crack round head from me dad coz i nicked all the centre pages out of the stack of BSH magz he had saved. i pinned em all up around me bedroom. as i grew up i became familliar with guys such as greg (the founder of the druids mc north) and later realised the guy nickin me chocolate all that time ago was greg... who the other club members were there then i have no idea. but the stupidist things stick in ya memory and this was one of em. i have vauge memories of goin round to club members houses.... and seein em on tv!!
there are a lot of memories and most to blurred to talk about ... but growing up in this lifestyle... as ive said to many people already, it was inevitable what i was gonna do really. all i wanted to be was to be a druid.... when the time came and when i was ready, i went for it. absolutley shittin myself. fair does i grew up knowin a lot of the druids but they still scared the shit outta me. a couple of years later now a full member of the druids i regret nothing about my childhood and my upbringing...always bein the odd one at school... long hair, never gettin the newest pair of trainers that sort of shit... and that aint no sob story so keep the violins at bay!! Now being a young member in a culture where to be honest... most club members are twice my age is fuckin brill. but im in it because ive grown up with it and its just the norm...
im not old enough to have a midlife chrisis, go out buy a harley ,and say hey you know what darlin, i reckon i will be a club memeber now.
I dont have the stories some of our older guys have or the experience, but i sure as hell love listenin to them. going out and meeting other clubs and havin a blow out... Its funny because i waznt even born to remember the time that Red was talking about but as soon as i read it, it brought back my early memories of all the stories i used to listen to as a kid. the stories that have made me do what i do now. strange how despite guys comin from different clubs and different parts of the country, all the stories are the same in some way. they all even look the same on the pictures. maybe it will never be like it used to be but i love doin what im doin and will carrying on doing it as long as i can.Friends i have made in the club scene are the best guys i could ever meet. the scene is truely an entity of its own. one im part of and love....

Dan
Secretary
Druids MC North

I only visited the Druids a few times but boy i wont forget those times i was about 18 or 19 at the time dirty ,greasy and dressed like a salad in cammos not knowing if i would even make it home again one of the most memorable visits was when we went to a party at the quarry on the way we stopped at a pub there were so many of us if we didnt have a glass we couldnt have a beer the pub was by some traffic lights and a couple of normal bikers ??? were sat at the lights giving it all that and reving up their bikes the lights changed to green i think the one pulled a wheelie then some one out of our crowd threw either a big knife or bar at them they didnt come back when we got to the quarry i couldnt believe the mountain of beer it was a great night from what i can remember of it .next day was a bit different we had a slight problem with a plain police car the bastard ended up panicing, me and my mate were stood in front of the car he floored it i was on the bonnet going flat out down the road trying to grab whatever i could to stop me falling off then he slammed on the brakes whoosh straight off bouncing down the road he had hit my mates arm which had broke the screen i got up no broken bones (pissing blood for about a week later) we then went off to a pub called the barn i think and came across an accident in the road two big bikes and a step through had collided, from a distance it looked like he was lay in a patch of oil when we got closer it was blood his leg was missing not sure if the others survived but he didnt look good we rode past others were there already helping so off we went for a drink . i did make it home again that weekend and its one time i will never forget proud to have ridden with you thanks for a great time you were always welcoming shame i never kept in touch
Kev

I remember a time way back in the late Seventies when we were all very much younger. On the dole, living in a bed sit with your bike next to your bed. Living on cuppa soups so you could afford a bit of chrome or paint. No chop shops then so old rigid British bike frames were used, Bates headlights were pinched off JCBs and chromed. Sissy bars made from twisted steel rod from building sites. My first 16" wheel was a rim off a Fantic Chopper, remember them? One pair of jeans, filthy jeans all patched up. Matted long hair down your back, beard, or the beginings of one. No job, no money, and no hope. except for your club. Mine was the Chosen Few MC Staffordshire of which I was Pres for 15 years. Runs to Wales in the pissing rain. Standing at the bar soaking wet in some Welsh pub in the back and beyond, leaking filthy black water over the floor as your originals melted. Running with the North West; Devils Disciples, Sons Of Hell, Dragons, Lone Wolfes, Henchmen and those wierd purple guys from Sheffield The Druids MC North. Some of the guys we rode with back then are dead, some gone off their heads, sold out and gone straight, some clubs folded and one turned away from us, but for some of us we are still here and stood the test of time. It was a fantastic time back then. We didn't have the stress of the life we have now, like mortages, jobs club house up keep etc If you had your chop and £50.00 in your pocket you were sorted. Beer and petrol were cheap as fuck. Week ends away turned into weeks. When you finally did get back to base; Oh dear another old lady left, on to the next .
It all started to change around 89 90 I lost touch with people. They lost touch with me and the crazy hazey days of our youth, our formative tears were done. We all seemed to do our own things and kept ourselfes to ourselfes, we still heard about each other here and there......................Move on 18 years give or take a few ,now a proud member of Hells Angels MC Wolverhampton .Bulldog Bash 2008 and Bang! Right out of the blu, or purple I should say. Druids MC North and my old mate Junky. The memories and the special times came flooding back. Over a few beers or 10 in the club bar the years fell away, The runs to Colwyn Bay; mammoth week ends at Taffs house The legendary quarry parties, the escapades of 'Don De Pablo' the scourge of the North Wales Coast, names times and memories. The good ,the bad, the ugly and the down right despicable. As when old friends meet up after a long time It was as though we had only seen each other last week. Druds I salute you. You have been right from day one and stuck to your guns. Proud honourable men! Hard core bikers. 1%ers from the North of Engaln. DFFD

'We know. Cause we were there'!.

Red. HAMC Wolvo

I gotta tell you, in my formative years, which to me were not 13-15, as per normal, they were from when i started reading Easyriders, till when i got me a set of apehangers, at 18/19; i was fkin terrified of the Druids. I used to drink (Cola) in Beethams, Doncaster, the local biker's haunt, and to me it was an education to sit quiet on the sidelines to watch the badass bikers, one of which i had aspirations of being one day, do their thang. Didn't take much figuring out, even as a naive 18 yr old, that there was some kinda heirarchy going on here, right in front of me. Not that i understood a thing, but i saw what i saw, and drew my own conclusions. eg. one night i stood and watched a patchless biker who'd appeared from nowhere (ie. down south) on a HD 45 chop and seemingly settle in Doncaster out the blue, approach a local patch club member and whisper a word in his ear, for no more than 15 seconds, and the guy took his denim cut-off off and flipped it, to hide his patch. Oh my word thought i, this never happens in Rips Run, or Bandits Ramblings (Easyriders was the only magazine pre BSH) but never said shit, it weren't my place, i knew that much.
Give it a year or so, i was totally embroiled in the bad ass biker thing, (ie. I read all the mags regularly) so thought it was time i had one of these back patches, i'd seen 'em in the mags and they were cool as fuck. So i commisioned the local back patch provider (my girlfriend) to stitch and embroider me one up. 'DONCASTER' it said, as a bottom rocker. Piece of me old blue jeans turned over, and stitched in best red embroidery cotton. Proud as punch i was. Didn't know shit about what it meant or represented, but my fucking GOD i was proud to fly Donny.
Cuople of weeks later, Druids came into Beethams. I knew this was summat special, i'd seen em before and they scared the shit outta me. The other club, who'd flipped their patches at a whispered word, had been in and said diddley shit ( dont matter who they were no MOR, TIS long gone now, but these other guys were the big hitters. Proper dirty beardy faced bullies, on proper chops an that, not the bus.)
Well one of em, the biggest 'orriblest of em, nodded me into the bogs, it weren't my place to plead that i didn't need a wee, so i toddled in behind, couldn't have done one anyway if i'd of been stood with me legs crossed for an hour, i was shitting bricks. 'Whats that patch' 'It's a Donny patch' 'What clubs it for?' 'No club, our lass made it for me' 'What colours is it?' Well this strange question meant nothing to me, 'Errr,well its kinda the back of me old jeans, with red letters on em' The words i was lookin for, were 'Red on White', but i just didn't understand the significance of this seemingly important detail. 'Anyway, they gotta come off' 'Okay' said i ,terrified, 'I'll take em off this week' 'No', said the tattooed monster, 'They gotta come off now.' ' Well they're stitched on' said i, oblivious to the significance of my attire, 'Just take em off' said The Thug, "If any more of our guys come in, especially any prospects, they'll make a big show of it, best you lose em now", then produced a blade, possibly as a protest to my lack of embroidery negatation tools, and did just that. Felt two inch tall when i came out the bogs, although i didn't know the importance of what i'd worn, i knew everybody could see it had gone, people who knew more than the mere gimpse i thought i knew.
Roll on 24 yrs, i was drinking (ale by now, i'd grown up...) in the Hells Angel bar at the Bulldog Bash, a Hells Angel event, and the same big 'orrible scarey bastard came up to me AGAIN, the first time since Beethams. "Alrayt Taff", "Alrayt Moz, aint seen you for a while", "No must be 23/24 yrs", "In fact last time i seen you you was slicing a patch offa me back." "Yeah, sorry bout that".
I gave up lying a long time ago, i aint clever enough to carry it off, so i don't bother trying, it always catches up, so i said to Big Moz,as i'd always known him, due to his historic entourage of questionable brothers, "You done exactly the right thing, if I, now, as a full England Hells Angel, walked in a pub and seen what you seen then, i'd of done exactly what you done then. You done it right, you saved me a kicking, and you taught me a lesson i needed to learn, and i wont forget." And i meant it, and i never will forget the lesson i learnt that night.
Glasses were clanked together, and that incident was laid to rest.
I'm glad to see, that a major influence as a 1%er in my formative years, has been 100% true to what he believed and portrayed, is still a 1%er, still a Driud, and still scares the shit outta me. I aint kissing nobody's ass here, i dont need to nowadays, but what's right is right, and do 'em a favour or piss 'em off, Hells Angels DONT forget. Ever.
Cheers Moz.
Taff
Hells Angels MC.
The Mighty Fucking Ashfield.
England.

this was way back in 1970 something were i met a few bikers who came into a pub in doncaster that me and my mates used as a watering hole,it was called the black bull in doncaster market place and it was allways playing rock n roll and was often full of teddy boys but a really good atmophere as bikers and teds allways got on well,anyway i got talking to these guys who said they came from sheffield , these were back patch members but not druids.there was about five or six of them names i cant recall coz im a old fart but some i do remember are (taff) (carnaby) and (laney) laney by the way was a woman and taffs ol lady, the night progressed and had a good time and we were asked by some donny teds if we wanted to go to a party they was having (wot a party) of course thank you very much but sorry to dissapoint you but i cant remember much about it only as these sheffield dudes left next morning i got a invite over to sheffield to meet the rest of the clan, i was given a address by taff.......about six months later i was in sheffield and i decided to go to the address that i had been given i knocked on the door and it was opened a girl who said her name was sparrow and i asked for taff she told me he didnt live there but his brother does and that he was called gregg and was president of this outfit but gregg wasnt there either she explained to me that he had gone to wales his hometown and was was due back to sheffield and was going to start a new club, ok that was that....untill about a year later i was back in sheffield for a night out and crawling around the biker/rock bars in the city centre and i bumped into taff again we had a few drinks and come closing time he decided we should go and see his brother (gregg ) whose flat i had been to earlier in the year .we got there went in and got my first glimps of the druid colors different to patches i had seen before i was told these were runes and it spelt druids north mc with a coffin centre patch .there were quite a few people in the room all seemed to be club members and it was a bit of a party atmosphere i remember this dude called rick and another called reverend mick i remember a couple of lesbians who said they wanted get married this was the first time i had seen reverend mick do a marriage ceromony and i think a couple of the vows mentioned were (ride her hard and keep her well oiled) lol. anyway off they went into a bedroom for their night of passion and none of use peeped in on them........i thought this is ok these dudes even have their own vicar...one of the things i remember about greggs flat that it was on the second floor and just a load of steps to get in or out but in his living room there was a nearly compleat harley trike i never asked him how the fuck he got it out .to be continued.