Peter Brush

Lieutenant Colonel Edward James Augustus Howard Brush, (5 March 1901 – 22 July 1984), known as Peter Brush, was a Northern Irish unionist politician and paramilitary leader. In later life Brush was also known by the nickname "Basil", as a joke based on the television puppet Basil Brush. Background Brush was born in Fermoy, County Cork, the son of Major George Howard Brush and May Florence Farrell. Educated at Clifton College and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, Brush spent his early teenage years at his father's citrus plantation in Canada, later returning to Drumnabreeze House, Magheralin, County Down.

He had a distinguished career in the British Army and during the Second World War he was wounded in France in 1940 before being held as a prisoner of war for three years. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Order for his actions during the defence of Calais in 1940.

By the time he retired from the army he had reached the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. Settling in County Down he took up farming but remained involved in military activity with the Territorial Army. While a prisoner of war Bush wrote a textbook about horses which was later published. In civilian life he was a member of the Irish National Hunt Steeplechase Committee and a committee member of Down Royal Racecourse.

Brush first received public attention in 1973 when stories appeared in the press that he had been drilling his own right-wing loyalist private militia force. Claiming 5,000 members, the group, known as Down Orange Welfare, became involved in the Ulster Workers' Council strike of 1974, with Brush taking a leading role in planning the stoppage as a member of the Ulster Workers' Council's Co-ordinating Committee. Brush was also president of the South Down Ulster Unionist Party Association and represented the constituency in the Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention. He left the public eye after a second less successful loyalist strike in 1977.

Interviewed in 1980, Brush said he "liked" Ulster Defence Association (UDA) chairman Andy Tyrie but disagreed with the idea of an independent Northern Ireland, believing it could be exploited by the Soviet Union to undermine Britain's western seaboard ("a plum for Brezhnev"). He also believed if the Republic of Ireland joined the Commonwealth then unionists would be obliged to come to an agreement with the Irish government.

In 1935, he married Susan Mary Torbett; they had one daughter, Maureen Rosemary Brush (born 1940). He died, aged 83, in Dublin.