Poignant farewell to Portsmouth soldier killed by IRA in 1989

Pallbearers from the Royal Artillery carry Stephen’s coffin in the crematorium.

A gun carriage draped with the Union Flag carried his coffin to Portchester Crematorium.

Full military honours were afforded to the soldier who touched the nation’s heart with his poignant poem he left for his parents to read in case anything ever happened to him, and his regular love poems to his fiancée. He also left a letter asking his loved ones to forgive his killers.

But his fiancée Debbie Turley, 26, said she would never be able to show the compassion felt by the soldier she was due to marry in the summer.

Twenty-four-year-old Lance Bomboardier Stephen was one of two gunners killed the previous week when their patrol was hit by a 400lb IRA bomb on the outskirts of Londonderry.

Martin McGuinness, a Sinn Féin leader, said: ‘The tragedy of this conflict has been underlined by the deaths of two young soldiers and particularly by the moving letter written by Stephen Cummins.’