Pete Doherty has courted a multitude of controversies during his life, but one aspect that people may not be aware of is his time growing up in Belfast during the Troubles.
The Libertines frontman and solo star, who has just published his first (ghostwritten) memoir, talks about his time in the Northern Irish capital as a child in 'A Likely Lad'.
His father, Peter Snr., was in the British Army at the time and was stationed in Belfast for a period of the 1980s, moving his family there when Pete was 3 years old.
"He was a sergeant major when we were in Belfast, but we never talked about his Army life at all," he says in the book. 'Being in Belfast with him when he was stationed there in the early ’80s is the first strong memory I have of living anywhere.
'Belfast was one of the few times during my childhood when we didn’t live on a barracks. I suppose living in a Protestant community, in Army-provided housing, in Belfast was the equivalent of being on a barracks.
“The kids at the primary school I went to would say, ‘Hey, we love your daddy, he kills Catholics’. We looked under the car every morning for car bombs."
He also revealed that his father's decision to join the British Army, even though he himself was of Irish origin, proved divisive amongst family members.
"I adored my dad, absolutely idolised him," he said. He was born in London, grew up in a tight-knit Irish Catholic community. His dad, Ted Doherty, came over to England from Ireland just after the Second World War, in 1946.
"Ted would sing rebel songs in the pub, so it was quite controversial when dad joined the British Army. He was an airborne soldier, a paratrooper, but he wasn’t in the Paras, the Parachute Regiment. He was in the Royal Corps of Signals who were attached to the Paras, 216 Parachute Signal Squadron."
Doherty has been living in France with his wife in recent years, and has claimed to be free of drugs since 2019.
