Millwall Bushwackers

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Millwall Bushwackers is a hooligan firm associated with Millwall FC that originated in the early 1980s, an era of prominent football hooliganism. [1]

[edit] Background

The original firm associated with Millwall was known as F-Troop.[2] The Bushwackers were one of the most active firms in the 1980s. Their primary purpose was to cause trouble and fights at Millwall football matches. On occasion they were blamed for causing some of the worst acts of rioting in British football.

The Bushwackers took their name from groups during the American Civil War who would ambush certain individuals and towns, known as Bushwhackers.

The hooligan firm still exists today. However, the firm is not as large as it was at its height in the 1980s. This is due in part to ex-Millwall chairman Theo Paphitis' introduction of a membership scheme following the events outside the New Den Stadium on the evening of the Birmingham City play off semi-final in May 2002. Sergeant Russell Lamb of the Metropolitan Police Service, a veteran of the May Day and Poll Tax riots, described this as the worst violence he had ever experienced.[3]

[edit] See also

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ "Undercover with 'the firm'", BBC News, 2002-05-10. Retrieved on 2007-09-02. 
  2. ^ Nicholls, Andy; Nick Lowles (September 2005). Hooligans: The A-L of Britain's Football Hooligan Gangs. Wrea Green: Milo Books, 210. ISBN 1903854415. 
  3. ^ "Injured officer describes 'battlefield'", BBC News, 2002-05-03. Retrieved on 2007-02-20.