1981 remembered

[glens abu]

Tuesday 3rd March 1981

I'm feeling exceptionally well today. (It's only the third day, I know, but all the same I'm feeling great.) I had a visit this morning with two reporters, David Beresford of The Guardian and Brendan O Cathaoir of The Irish Times. Couldn't quite get my flow of thoughts together. I could have said more in a better fashion.
63 kgs today, so what?
A priest was in. Feel he's weighing me up psychologically for a later date. If I'm wrong I'm sorry — but I think he is. So I tried to defuse any notion of that tonight. I think he may have taken the point. But whether he accepts it, will be seen. He could not defend my onslaught on Bishop Daly — or at least he did not try.
I wrote some notes to my mother and to Mary Doyle in Armagh; and will write more tomorrow. The boys are now all washed. But I didn't get washed today. They were still trying to get men their first wash.
I smoked some 'bog-rolled blows' today, the luxury of the Block!
They put a table in my cell and are now placing my food on it in front of my eyes. I honestly couldn't give a damn if they placed it on my knee. They still keep asking me silly questions like, 'Are you still not eating?'
I never got started on my poem today, but I'll maybe do it tomorrow. The trouble is I now have more ideas.
Got papers and a book today. The book was Kipling's Short Stories with an introduction of some length by W. Somerset Maugham. I took an instant dislike to the latter on reading his comment on the Irish people during Kipling's prime as a writer: 'It is true that the Irish were making a nuisance of themselves.' Damned too bad, I thought, and bigger the pity it wasn't a bigger nuisance! Kipling I know of, and his Ulster connection. I'll read his stories tomorrow.
Ag rá an phaidrín faoi dhó achan lá atá na buachaillí anois. Níl aon rud eile agam anocht. Sin sin. (Translated this reads as follows: The boys are now saying the rosary twice every day. I have nothing else tonight. That's all.)

Too quick for me today Nally,I will have to get up earlier tomorrow

[Myles Na G.]

An hour after the explosion in the car park a local baker, Hugh Leith, was strolling along Bridge Street in Ballymena, on his way to the chemist shop. As he passed the Alley Katz Boutique it rocked to an explosion. A 9 year old boy, Denis Dunlop, came running out of the door shouting hysterically that his mother was in the toilet. Behind him the boutique was a roaring inferno. Leith sprinted to the back of the shop, spotted the toilet window and smashed it with a brick, shouting: 'Anyone in there?' There was no answer. Yvonne Dunlop, mother of three sons of whom Denis was the eldest, had been incinerated doing her own mother - the owner of the boutique - a favour; standing in for her while she was away on holiday.

Ten Men Dead, p243-244

[Rossfan]

Will you be following with details of the other 3,500 who died during the "Troubles" ?

[Nally Stand]

Sounds like a wager Glens!

[Myles Na G.]

In Anderson Crescent, in a Catholic enclave within Derry's predominantly Protestant area of Waterside, Joanna Mathers was going from door to door, collecting census forms. An honours graduate from Belfast's Queen's University and married to a farmer, she had given up a job with the Town and Country Planning services in the city to bring up her 2 and half year old son, Shane. To make some pin money, she had volunteered to help with the census. She had just got up to Patrick McLaughlin's house in Anderson Crescent when a masked man danced up to her, snatched the clipboard she was holding with one hand, put a gun to her head with the other and fired. The girl squealed and ran past McLaughlin, who was standing at the door. He slammed it shut, but the gunman crashed through it and, waving the gun, grabbed the census forms before disappearing. Inside the house Joanna was dead.

Ten Men Dead, p106

(printing these to give a bit of balance, to show the sort of thing the heroes of Ireland were locked up for in the first place)

[Evil Genius]

Will you be following with details of the other 3,500 who died during the "Troubles" ?

This thread is clearly intended to be an encomium towards the Hunger Strike - apparently the only memory worth recalling from 1981  - so why not  look more closely , including what caused its members to be locked up in the first place? I mean, it would seem only fair.

Of course, Myles Na G is usually more subtle than I, so I shall be direct and point out the full significance of his post, for the benefit of those less initiated in the reality of The Troubles.

That is, one was one Thomas McElwee. In October 1976 he, his girlfriend and his brother Benedict were part of a large group of Provos who went into Ballymena and planted 13 bombs in the town. One of the bombs was placed in a boutique being managed by 26 year old mother-of-three Yvonne Dunlop, who was burned to death in the ashes, whilst her son had to be held back from rushing in to try to save her. For a photograph of the scene, this site is illustrative:

http://victorpatterson.photoshelter.com/image/I0000P6haVGDp9Rw

Meanwhile, another bomb which McElwee was transporting by car went off prematurely, blinding him and causing the other occupants serious injury. Ironically McElwee was rushed to hospital in Ballymena (the town he was trying to destroy), by the  British Army (the enemy he was pledged to kill), before later having his sight partially restored in the Royal Victoria in Belfast, all courtesy of the British (the people he wanted out of Ireland).

Subsequently he was sentenced to Life imprisonment for his part in the Murder of Ms. Dunlop, later downgraded on Appeal to Manslaughter.

"No Justice for the Irish at the hands of the Brits", eh? 

[fitzroyalty]

Can we merge the above post with the irony thread?

[lynchbhoy]

Knew a couple of hunger strikers - before they were locked up. One of them said that as a single man he would rather take the place of a man with a family and kids, that he wanted his own family to rear their kids in peace and he did what he had to do to try to win this right.
He's dead now, but his family have kids that are prospering and the man himself would be taking huge delight in how they are now able to do - with a part of this freedom and equality he and his comrades helped win.
this is what a lot of loyalist/unionists cannot stomach. they dont have anyone with the guts to do anything heroic in their triumphalist history. then again the establishment and aggressors generally never do.

The IRA won nothing and achieved nothing. They brought death, injury and suffering to thousands of families on this island. They set back the cause of Irish reunification by at least a couple of generations. In the end, they settled for an outcome that John Hume had been promoting for 30 years. Heroes my arse.

Interesting opinion but all completely incorrect - including yor wayward assertion that a power sharing elective was available in the 70's - not only was that impossible but I believe posters on here have tanked you over this previously!
....and you call others revisionists!

You can't say all of the hunger strikers planted bombs etc etc so yer wee stories might be sad but pointless as usual evil myles

[glens abu]

Wednesday 4th

Fr Murphy was in tonight. I have not felt too bad today, although I notice the energy beginning to drain. But it is quite early yet. I got showered today and had my hair cut, which made me feel quite good. Ten years younger, the boys joke, but I feel twenty years older, the inevitable consequence of eight years of torture and imprisonment.

I am abreast with the news and view with utter disgust and anger the Reagan/Thatcher plot. It seems quite clear that they intend to counteract Russian expansionism with imperialist expansionism, to protect their vital interests they say.

What they mean is they covet other nations' resources. They want to steal what they haven't got and to do so (as the future may unfortunately prove) they will murder oppressed people and deny them their sovereignty as nations. No doubt Mr Haughey will toe the line in Ireland when Thatcher so demands.

Noticed a rarity today: jam with the tea, and by the way the Screws are glaring at the food. They seem more in need of it than my good self.

[Myles Na G.]

In Dublin, in room 3074 of the Arts Block at Trinity College, the 35 year old Director of Employee Relations and Services from British Leyland in Coventry, Geoffrey Armstrong, was delivering a paper to 64 members of the local Junior Chamber of Commerce. At 2.20pm, in the middle of his talk, the doors at the back burst open and three men in combat jackets, masked by balaclavas, marched to the front. Some of the audience thought it was a student prank, but then two of the hooded men produced guns. 'Everybody freeze, nobody move, this action is in support of the H Blocks,' one of them shouted. For a moment it looked as if they were going to shoot a woman in the front row. But a gunman turned back to Armstrong, who had retreated from his podium, and shot him three times in the flesh of his legs. Armstrong turned pale, started shaking and collapsed. The gunmen ran out.

Ten Men Dead, p100

[Fear ón Srath Bán]

Totally agree with some of the very valuable contributions hereon bemoaning the lack of balance. So to that end I hereby post a comprehensive list of all unionists/loyalists who have so selflessly and painfully self-sacrificially given their lives up for their fellow man:







erm...








erm...






erm...

[dillinger]

Totally agree with some of the very valuable contributions hereon bemoaning the lack of balance. So to that end I hereby post a comprehensive list of all unionists/loyalists who have so seflessly and painfully self-sacrificially given their lives up for their fellow man:

The Commonwealth War Graves Commision has quite a list i believe.

[Fear ón Srath Bán]

The Commonwealth War Graves Commision has quite a list i believe.

So, name me one who died on hunger-strike (selfless and painfully self-sacrificial).

[dillinger]

The Commonwealth War Graves Commision has quite a list i believe.

So, name me one who died on hunger-strike (selfless and painfully self-sacrificial).

You didn't say that the first time. None that i know off. The Prods were stupid, but not that stupid.

[Fear ón Srath Bán]

The Commonwealth War Graves Commision has quite a list i believe.

So, name me one who died on hunger-strike (selfless and painfully self-sacrificial).

You didn't say that the first time. None that i know off. The Prods were stupid, but not that stupid.

Yeah, I'd assumed that you might have understood selfless and painfully self-sacrificial, i.e., giving up one's own life without trying to take someone else's (like those on your list). Plainly not.