“We on the outside finessed…”
In today’s Belfast Telegraph, Liam Clarke observes Danny Morrison’s admission that “we on the outside finessed the sequence of events for the sake of morale” at the end of the 1980 hunger strike. This is a major admission, as it changes the whole narrative that had been pushed for years, and also removes the main defence that the Morrison narrative had employed as to why O’Rawe’s version of events was wrong. Previously, it had been argued that the reason why Thatcher’s July 1981 offer was not accepted was because of British duplicity over the deal secured during the 1980 hunger strike. With Morrison’s admission that no such deal existed, and that the British reneging was a false claim, that argument falls apart.
Quotes from Danny Morrison, Brendan McFarlane, Laurence McKeown and Gerry Adams on the end of the 1980 hunger strike:
Although it is now well-known that Brendan Hughes ended the hunger strike unilaterally, without consulting his O/C Bobby Sands, we on the outside finessed the sequence of events for the sake of morale and at a midnight press conference merged the secret arrival of a British government document (promising a more enlightened prison regime: falsely, as it turned out) with the ending of the hunger strike.
It was either that or admit – which to the republican base was inconceivable – that Brendan had ended the strike without getting a thing.
Bobby – who turned out to be right – did not believe the British had any intention of working the unsecured promises contained in the document. But we begged him to put them to the test and that if the administration made things impossible then it could be claimed that the Brits were reneging.
Had the British taken the opportunity to resolve the prison crisis at that juncture history certainly would have been different. Instead, the British crowed victory in their briefings to the press and the prison administration felt smug, unbridled and under no obligation.
This bitter experience was to sear itself in the minds of the prisoners who were determined that there would never be a repeat of that scenario.
Tragically, the stage was set for 1981.
- Danny Morrison, Andersonstown News, 2011
Previously:
The political responsibility for the hunger strike, and the deaths that resulted from it, both inside and outside the prison, lies with Margaret Thatcher, who reneged on the deal which ended the first hunger strike. This bad faith and duplicity lead directly to the deaths of our friends and comrades in 1981.
- Brendan McFarlane, Andersonstown News, 2005
The 1981 hunger strike was a direct result of the 1980 hunger strike. The British government had said that it would not act under duress but would respond with a progressive and liberal prison regime once it ended. The prisoners called off the fast to save the life of Seán McKenna. However, the British immediately reneged on their promises. Because of this duplicity the hunger strikers of 1981 were adamant that any deal must be copperfastened.
- Danny Morrison, Irish Times, 2005
The government had promised the same at Christmas 1980 when the first hunger strike ended, only to renege on its promises. Because of this duplicity the prisoners in the second hunger strike wanted any agreement to be copper fastened.
- Danny Morrison, Daily Ireland, 2005
Yes, offers were made and discussed and clarified but when we tried to tie the British government down on a mechanism for ensuring they could not renege (as they had at the end of the first hunger strike) they procrastinated. The hunger strikers – as Laurence McKeown made clear the other day – “wanted definite confirmation, not vague promises of ‘regime change’.”
- Danny Morrison, Daily Ireland, 2005
Strangely, there was nothing new to me regarding what was on offer from the Brits back in 1981. Whether it was the ‘Mountain Climber’ or the Irish Commission for Justice and Peace, we wanted definite confirmation, not vague promises of ‘regime change’. We had all of that in December 1980.
- Laurence McKeown, An Phoblacht, 2005
The 1981 hunger strike came out of the 1980 hunger strike. The British sent a document to the prisoners which they claimed could be the basis for a settlement. However, the prisoners had already ended the strike before they received the document. The British reneged on their assurances almost immediately. That was why the second hunger strikers were to demand verification of any deal to end their hunger strike.
- Danny Morrison, Daily Ireland, 2006
In December 1980 the republican leadership on the outside was in contact with the British who claimed they were interested in a settlement. But before a document outlining a new regime arrived in the jail the hunger strike was called off by Brendan Hughes to save the life of the late Sean McKenna. The British, or sections of them, interpreted this as weakness. The prisoners ended their fast before a formal ‘signing off’. And the British then refused to implement the spirit of the document and reneged on the integrity of our exchanges. Their intransigence triggered a second hunger strike in which there was overwhelming suspicion of British motives among the hunger strikers, the other political prisoners, and their families and supporters on the outside.
- Gerry Adams, Irish News, 2009
Topic: Politics
Region: Ireland, Northern Ireland
I love the way some people on this blog just ignore the facts. The fact is that Bobby Sands and the leadership on the outside tried to rescue the situation created by the collapse of the hunger strike. According to Denis O’Hearn, in his biography of Bobby Sands, after Brendan Hughes ended the hunger strike before the arrival of the British document the prisoners “would have to trust that the written agreement would be acceptable.”
On December 19th, 1980, the day after the strike ended, Bobby Sands issued a statement that the prisoners would not wear prison-issue clothing nor do prison work.
To quote O’Hearn again: the prisoners “agreed that it [the document] was nowhere near what they wanted. Yet they could try to use its ambiguities to win some rights. If the authorities met the ambiguities without generosity, the prisoners would have to intensify their protest anew.”
Bobby then began negotiations with the prison governor, Stanley Hilditch, for a step-by-step de-escalation of the protest. Quoting Bobby again: “The Brits are not going to give us a way out…There is no bend in them and we can’t accept conformity”.
After the authorities rebuffed their efforts, Bobby wrote: “We discovered that our good will and flexibility were in vain. It was made abundantly clear during one of my co-operation meetings with prison officials that strict conformity was required which in essence meant acceptance of criminal status.”
I am surprised Richard O’Rawe hasn’t confirmed that Bobby Sands and the outside leadership used the document to try and rescue the situation. After all, in his book he says that Bobby told him, “We didn’t get anything.” He wrote: “It had been a mammoth task to cover up the fact that the hunger strike had collapsed and that the five demands were as far from being met as ever…To keep up the illusion that we had gained something from the hunger strike, Bobby and Bik told us to put on an air of elation during visits with our families.”
Perhaps, Liam Clarke should have read ‘Blanketmen’ before making an ass of himself.
Firstly slappymcgroundout there you go again, off in a every long rant. I say rant because you make no attempt to argue the point, your post had more to do with a cowardly attack on Richard O’Rawe than trying to disprove what he is claiming.
I say cowardly because at least Richard O’Rawe and those of us who believe him have the guts to put our names to what we are saying, sure you are even able to address me as Thomas. Thats right Thomas [Dixie] Elliott from Derry. Any coward can spew the nonsense you have spat out in your posts about Richard as long as no one knows who they are.
Anyway back to what you say. Although your gutless attack doesn’t merit an answer I will anyway to prove you really haven’t a clue about what you are talking about.
You said…
“For more of your absurdity, if the Brits make concessions following, everyone and their dogs will understand that end of hunger strike = concessions. Notion of “decent interval” didn’t work for Nixon and Kissinger and it wouldn’t have worked here either.”
The Hunger Strikes ended because of family intervention on October the 3rd 1981 and on October 6th [3 days later!!] SoS Prior implemented exactly what was on offer from July 5th.
Now we must believe that the Brits waited until after the By-election which Carron won because the SDLP stood back and gave him a free run and then gave what could have scuttled Carron’s chances had they conceded them earlier because the SDLP would undoubtedly have stood against him.
We must believe that the Brits gave 4 of the five demands 3 days after the Hunger Strikes ended when by doing so in early July could have ensured that Carron didn’t get the seat.
Pat Mc Larnon, at least you make a challenging argument and that my friend is what this should be really about.
Firstly do you accept that the document referred to was in the hands of Gerry Adams in Belfast when he got word that the Hunger Strike had just ended?
It had been flown over by a courier and handed to Fr. Meagher who in turn gave it to Adams. All while the Hunger Strike was still ongoing, therefore the Brits couldn’t have changed the content, which as I pointed out, was Prisoners could wear civilian-type clothing during the working week.
As you say “Bobby Sands issued a statement that the prisoners would not wear prison-issue clothing nor do prison work.”
So what was ambiguous? The two main demands weren’t there from the start. In fact Bobby returned to the wing that very night and told us, as I’ve pointed out… “Ní fhuaireomar faic” [We got nothing!!].
You said…”Bobby then began negotiations with the prison governor, Stanley Hilditch, for a step-by-step de-escalation of the protest. Quoting Bobby again: “The Brits are not going to give us a way out…There is no bend in them and we can’t accept conformity”.
Exactly. Bobby met Hilditch to try and get something in return for an end to the protest, not try and get a deal they were reneging on. The words ‘The Brits are not going to give us ‘a way out’ are an indicator of this.
Again to quote you Pat…”I am surprised Richard O’Rawe hasn’t confirmed that Bobby Sands and the outside leadership used the document to try and rescue the situation…”
Richard O’Rawe never denied this, in fact the argument surrounding the 1st Hunger Strike was always the claims by Adams, Morrison etc that the Brits reneged on a deal/offer after the 1st Hunger Strike. Something which was untrue.
However Pat, they now like yourself are trying to cover their about turn by claiming it was about ambiguities and not about reneging on any deal or offer.
There were no ambiguities except in the word ‘civilian-type’ clothing. And in fact the Brits tried to introduce that ‘civilian-type’ clothing and it was thrown back at them by us. Therefore they didn’t renege on even that.
Pat no matter how you spin it, as can be see from the statements from Adams, Morrison, Laurney etc in the main article it was being claimed that the Brits reneged on a deal after the 1st Hunger Strike, nothing else.
Why now are we seeing an attempt at tippexing this out?
Oh and Slappywhatsyurname, before you go off on another rant about Richard O’Rawe and Thatcher don’t forget that your party leader Martin recently had breakfast with her party The Tories…
And before we hear that he was there to oppose cuts, sure he could have done that after a fry in Frankie Ramsey’s in his own UK City of Culture with a few phone calls to the media.
Then again when he was there why didn’t he mention the fact that the British were spending billions on two corrupt wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while cutting billions from Health, education and benefits etc here in the North of Ireland?
Hypocrisy like the flu gets passed on from one to the other I suppose?
In fact why have none of them brought this up?
The last line should read…
In fact why have none of them brought this up?
Hypocrisy like the flu gets passed on from one to the other I suppose?
Are you not up on twitter yet Dixie ?
The PIRA/SF movement was a morally bankrupt organization in many respects, regardless of the fact that there were courageous and brave people in it. Whatever the truth of the hunger strike was, it couldn’t change either of those facts.
All those bombers, gunmen, etc in prison should have spent their time realizing that they were in a hopeless struggle that had no chance of success. They could have thought of ways to end the struggle instead of deepening the divide between the communities. Unfortunately near unconditional surrender was too much for their pride to handle, they had to plant many more bombs before they thought they got something they could show and bamboozle their stalwart supporters “look we won!”. Nothing was won. A united Ireland, let alone a socialist one, was not advanced one day sooner. If anything it was made less likely.
I have never understood what their end game would have been even if their fantastic dreams of victory ever occurred and they had ever managed to get the Brits to leave— there only would have been more violence and bloodshed. Unionists/loyalists weren’t going to disappear.
It’s sad in a way these former comrades at each other’s throats over the hunger strike. By now they have all realized the cult of gun was futile, harmful, and counterproductive.
(And I am a nationalist who thinks the PIRA had every right to take up arms initially to bring down Stormont and fight injustice. However, what they got in 98 could have been gotten more or less in the mid 70s.)
Can someone help me out here – I read an article recently about John Humes efforts to end the prison protest – John thought he had an agreement with the British Government that allowed the protesting prisoners to wear ‘civilian clothes’ i.e their own clothes ( and enough. according to John, to end the protest) but by the time the document had reached the prisoners this had been changed ( by whom?) to ‘civilian type clothes’ i.e clothes issued by the Prison Authorites – anybody cast any further light on this?
Thomas, let me refresh your recollection, from you on IrishRepublican.net:
“Exploitation
Martina talks about exploitation yet she and other members of her party have no problem claiming that IRA Volunteers who died for a 32 County Socialist Republic did so for what is basically a photocopy of the Sunningdale Agreement.
It might have a new name but it is no different.
That is the reason I today am totally against the use of armed struggle.
Attempts to smear those of us who resisted the beatings and everything the prison system threw at us and who watched as our ten comrades walked from the wings for the last time will no longer wash.
No amount of mud-slinging can bury the truth.”
And the one soul called you on it:
“No amount of mud-slinging can bury the truth that the real reason for this public spectacle is
resentment and nursing grievances over a (false) sense of betrayal, in that the armed struggle did not achieve unity.
(see above letter 2nd half )
Pat [as Patrick Henry is your nom de guerre on IR.net] why don’t you make that point alone
There’s no need to desecrate the memory of those brave men,
please stop using them as pawns in your game.
Let them rest in peace for christ’s sake.”
Then you went on to confirm his point, though you didn’t intend to do so:
“The main points
1. 3 days after Micky Devine died SF announced that in future it would contest all Northern Ireland elections…
This was likely the day of Micky’s burial and when were the grassroot membership given the chance to debate or vote on this decision?”
So there it is. Your main point isn’t that someone died and was lied to in the process, your main point is that you don’t agree with the switch from blowing things up to electoral politics and you didn’t have a vote. And as you made plain, the reason why you aren’t in the CIRA or the RIRA today isn’t that you don’t believe in the merit of their armed struggle, you’re simply afraid of being “exploited” once again. Did I get that right. Absence of the ? in favor of the . means statement and not a question.
Next, your whole point over concessions following end of hunger strike rather entirely misses the point. You weren’t striking for concessions. You instead were striking in favor of political status and against criminalization. That was the point of the exercise. The concessions were made to everyone, including the criminal, so you didn’t get “politics”, you got “criminal”. Crime is crime is crime…as illustrated by crime getting the same as you. No one thinks that in granting all murderers the right to wear their own clothes, Prior removed the purported “badge of criminality”. They were still convicted murderers, like some of you were and are convicted murderers as well. No formal recognition was made of your “political status”. No differentiation whatsover was made between you and them.
To repeat, so it can sink in, you didn’t go on strike to merely improve your condition. You went on strike to separate yourselves from mere murderer and rapist. That isn’t what you got. You got treated just like every other murderer and rapist. In other words, 10 men died so that murderers and rapists could wear their own clothes. That’s the British interpretation of the event. And since murderers and rapists got to wear their own clothes, kinda hard for you to dispute their point. Uniforms, work, whatever, none of that mattered. What you wanted was formal recognition that you weren’t, to borrow from some here who shall remain nameless, a mere “sectarian murder gang”. That appellation was only confirmed by the grant of concessions to all murderers, including the criminal gang, with its own command structure rather similar to yours.
Lastly, loved your reference to Afghanistan. In light of the same, perhaps you won’t mind if I call you by my new name for you, the Irish Taliban (or does some other Irish person already own the name?). Thomas, as I said early on here, I have no horse in your race. I’ve defended Gerry here in the past in relation to claims made that are defensible. I have never argued, however, that the one soul isn’t correct in signing on as Gerry Loves Castro. That’s a position that Gerry has that I find entirely and utterly repugnant. Leaving all else aside, and there is much else, the main inhabitants of Cuba’s prisons are black Cubans. Fidel & Co make the KKK proud. So if you’re going to speak to human right and anti-racism, at least be consistent and Gerry isn’t. So don’t think that I believe that he’s above criticism, as he isn’t. That said, you can judge for yourself whether O’Rawe is sincere, but he has been quoted as saying:
I think Gerry Adams is owed a huge debt. I don’t think anyone other than Adams could have brought an end to an unwinnable war and kept republican communities united. But six of my comrades died that should not have, and it’s important the truth comes out warts and all.
If sincere, what he claims to want to do with “truth” is apparently not what you want to do with “truth”. You weren’t going to win the war military. That would likely have been seen at the outset, except some got swept away in the emotion of the time. The plan from the beginning should have been military action to achieve a political and not military solution. That’s what you ended up with. It was the only practical solution. And for those in the CIRA and RIRA, all that I would say is that they ought stop the lethal Irish tradition of allowing dead Irishmen to kill just that many more of you. It doesn’t matter what Bobby Sands died for. What matters is, which is the best way forward for the Irish today. And if turns out that this way works out best for Irish standard of living, then you can tell Bobby when you visit his grave that he has his revenge, the laughter of your children. To borrow from the one soul at the one Ard Fheis, the laughter of your children is the principle, all else is tactic.
Dixie,
I would take issue with you that this is some sort of argument, it is not. You also admonish Slappy for not going into substantive issues and accuse him of ranting while at the same time you accuse me of trying to ‘spin’ and ‘cover’.
Anyway, what is clear is that the events of the 18th December unfolded very quickly and that it was a very fluid situation. It is also clear that the leadership in the Blocks but especially those on the outside were facing a profound and immediate problem in trying to rescue a sustainable position from the jaws of outright defeat.
It is true that Fr Meagher had delivered the document to leadership figures on the outside before taking it into the Blocks. Here is what Fr Meagher said of the events at that time.
The document was being analysed [by republicans on the outside] and was being highly criticised when [I] took a phone call from the chaplain in Long Kesh, Fr. Toner, who informed [me] that the hunger strike had ended.
‘Now the document was the only available exit from an embarrassing situation and it would be submitted, though with misgivings, to the strikers and to the world as sufficient reason for the ending of a strike that had, in fact, already fragmented.”
This supports the narrative already given by Bobby, Danny Morrison and Richard O’Rawe.
Fr Meagher further stated that he went to the Blocks and watched,
“‘Bobby and the Dark, in a tangled discussion, considered the two page ‘solution’.
‘“It’s full of holes, it won’t work”.
‘“Let’s give it a run and if it fails we will set out on a second hunger strike”.
‘“Okay, let’s give it a try”. ‘
Meagher says that Bobby said: “They will never give in ‘til coffins come out of here and I will be in the first one.”
‘So the first hunger strike ended and there came a short period of respite.’
Meagher was chosen as a ‘guarantor’ in a step-by-step approach to the implementation of the British ‘solution’ to the prisoners’ demands. He was constantly in and out of the Kesh, meeting with Bobby, Bik, the governor Hilditch, the Northern Ireland Office and with Sinn Fein.
What is agreed by all sides is that Bobby tried to work on the ambiguities of the document supplied by the British to Fr Meagher.
Fr Meagher goes on, ‘The adherence to a step-by-step resolution of the demands was never going to happen once the implementation of the steps was left in the hands of the Governor and the prison staff. The reconciliation process soon faltered and then stopped and a second hunger strike was announced to be led by Bobby Sands.’
The most important point is that Bobby, the IRA staff in the prison and the leadership on the outside were at one. According to Fr Meagher, the British contact had told him: ‘There would be a genuine response from the British government to the “five demands”.’
Thus, given what happened after the ending of the first hunger striker, it is clearly the case that the British RENEGED on the promise of implementing a progressive liberal regime!
I see Pat’s been sent in to clean up Danny’s mess. Sleight of hand won’t rectify this, nor will shouting “Bobby!” or “Brendan!” in the hope that blaming everything on dead men will get the leadership a free pass. The most important point is, Danny has started telling some truths – which he should be commended for.
The sleight of hand being applied here by Pat is shifting the timing of when the British “reneged”. But Danny has throughly exploded that myth. No amount of backspin now can save it.
There was no deal, no offer, no promises. “We got nothing,” Brendan Hughes said, “‘Ní fhuaireomar faic”, as Bobby Sands put it. Brendan called the strike off to save Sean McKenna’s life, with no thought to any promise, deal or document. It was done.
Bobby knew immediately there would be a second hunger strike.
He was also angry at reports that Sinn Fein was spinning the end of the hunger strike as a victory, unhappy with “a buoyant Danny Morrison”, saying he had a “brass neck”.
Danny Morrison now eloquently describes what was on offer from the British at that time: unsecured promises. The first word negates the second. In other words, absolutely nothing.
But face had to be saved, and momentum towards the second hunger strike had to be built. So in this, Pat’s important point is correct – Bobby, the prison leadership and the leadership on the outside all eventually agreed to present a united front, to put pressure on the British, to give cover to the claim that the British had reneged. But they all knew that was a fig leaf designed to spare their own blushes. The British had reneged on nothing, as there was nothing there to renege on.
And Danny now admits the truth of it in his Andersonstown News article.
“We on the outside finessed the sequence of events for the sake of morale”
“At a midnight press conference [we] merged the secret arrival of a British government document (promising a more enlightened prison regime: falsely, as it turned out) with the ending of the hunger strike”
“It was either that or admit – which to the republican base was inconceivable – that Brendan had ended the strike without getting a thing.”
“Bobby – who turned out to be right – did not believe the British had any intention of working the unsecured promises contained in the document. But we begged him to put them to the test and that if the administration made things impossible then it could be claimed that the Brits were reneging.”
The importance of all this is that it is the first time Danny Morrison has admitted it.
The fiction that there was a deal that the British reneged on underpinned Morrison’s, and those who carried the can for him, claims about the handling of the second hunger strike. He’s now exploded that myth and with it the legs out from under him when his argument attempts to stand against O’Rawe’s.
By the time of the July, 1981 offer from Thatcher, things had radically changed from where they stood in December, 1980. Not least was the amount of people who had already died on hunger strike, and those who were poised to. In addition to that, Thatcher was dealing directly with the IRA through Adams and his cadre. The prisoners all knew the truth of how the first hunger strike had ended, and they knew too the fiction of the document they pretended to work, the happy face they were forced to put on. Did Danny and company decide a second time to “finesse” the situation, for the sake of appearances?
Rusty I have no more been sent on to clear anything up than you are being worked from the back to fulfill some agenda and who would think such a thing?
As for the use of the names of ‘Bobby’ and ‘Brendan’ they are direct quotes for Fr Meagher at the time. Are you accusing Fr Meagher of lying in his accounts of the Hughes and Sands discussion?
It is agreed there was no deal, if you read the quotes of Fr Meagher (reprinted again)
‘Now the document was the only available exit from an embarrassing situation and it would be submitted, though with misgivings, to the strikers and to the world as sufficient reason for the ending of a strike that had, in fact, already fragmented.”
There was no deal but there was the document that had been passed to Fr Meagher and there was the pledge given by the British Government contact that ‘There would be a genuine response from the British government to the “five demands”.
It is in those circumstances that Bobby Sands tried to flesh out, with Fr Meagher acting as guarantor, what was in the document. Again as Father Meagher pointed out this approach was frustrated by the governor and prison staff at that time.
It is that salient point that needs to be taken on board here. That any future deal should not have rested solely on words or guarantees or indeed be left to local officials to impliment.
The shock here, pushed by the likes of yourself and Clarke, is that we are all supposed to be shocked that the leadership inside and outside the Kesh tried to make the most out of a disastrous set of circumstances in order to shore up morale.
What book are you quoting from Pat?
Pat I take it you are quoting from Denis O’Hearn’s book? Fair enough but you omitted to refer to what Fr Meagher said about in the most important line in the British document. See age 302…
“The prisoners would have to wear prison-issue clothing during week-days, when they were engaged in prison work.
This clearly failed to meet their bottom line. As far as he [Bobby] was concerned, the document was severely lacking in it’s provisions on clothes, work, and association, the three most important of their five demands.”
You also said…
“What is agreed by all sides is that Bobby tried to work on the ambiguities of the document supplied by the British to Fr Meagher.”
But Seanna Walsh didn’t agree. On page 304 Seanna is quoted…
“Seanna Walsh, OC of H4, did not believe any of this positive spin. He could tell from Bobby’s demeanor that there was little hope of getting anything from the document. He expected that Bobby’s appeals to the governor would fall on deaf ears.”
To quote you again Pat…
“Thus, given what happened after the ending of the first hunger striker, it is clearly the case that the British RENEGED on the promise of implementing a progressive liberal regime!”
Where was the ‘promised progressive liberal regime’ when it didn’t even meet ‘the three most important of their five demands?’
Tell me Pat if it did not meet even these three demands what else did they offer which was progressive or liberal as conforming prisoners already had what was on offer?
You see what is happening here is clearly spin, trying to find something to cover the nakedness of earlier statements from Danny, Adams etc.
By July 5th 1981 the British were offering 4 of the 5 demands. Not prison-issue or civilian-type clothing to wear during work-days. A massive step forward which had cost by then 4 lives. These deaths had effectively smashed criminalisation in the eyes of the world. It saw the election of Bobby, Big Doc, and Paddy Agnew with other close calls.
This was nothing like the pressure brought to bear on the Brits by December 18th.
Taken from an article by Jim Gibney for Bobby’s 50th Birthday…
The point is…..Why would Bobby Sands be writing a comm on the night the first Hunger Strike collapsed about going on another Hunger Strike if there was an alleged deal or if he thought there was ambiguities that could be worked out or overcome?
Danny Morrison appeared on RTE, the same day Jim received this comm, saying that Bobby was ‘’jubilant.’’
“Bobby at 50 – BY JIM GIBNEY
Irish Republican Media 10/03/04
It was 18 December 1980. It was late afternoon.
The phone rang in the Mountjoy Square office of the H-Block/Armagh Committee. It was Gerry Adams. In a hushed but firm voice he told me to ring him from a pay phone in the street. I did.
“The hunger strike is over. Can you come back to Belfast?” he said. The news shocked me. I had been in Dublin for several months building support for the Hunger Strike and now it was suddenly over. Over without prior warning.
I was at a loss as to what to do, what to say. But I knew it would soon be on the radio and TV news and the people in the H-Block/Armagh office had to hear it from me before they heard it over the airwaves.
We gathered around the office in a sombre mood. These were the people who had campaigned tirelessly, who had helped to build a national movement to support the prisoners’ cause over the previous two or three years.
I told them what Gerry told me. There was a mixture of disbelief that the Hunger Strike was over and relief that no one had died; people had tears in their eyes.
Five years of campaigning, six weeks of a Hunger Strike… now ended, confusion reigned.
The following day back in Belfast, I met Gerry in a house in Clonard owned by lifelong republican Alfie Hannaway.
I was shown a comm written by Bobby Sands that had come out of the prison the previous day. The following sentence stuck out: “I will begin another hunger strike on the 1st January.”
“What? We can’t go through that again,” I blurted out.
And that was the sentiment, obviously more considered, that I was to tell Bobby the following day. A visit had been arranged for me with him.
Danny Morrison who had been the outside contact for the prisoners during the Hunger Strike had been banned from the jail a few days previously by the British Government and I had been selected to replace him.
I waited in the visiting area for Bobby not knowing what to expect. I hadn’t seen him since we were both in the Crumlin Road Jail three years previously.
He literally bounced towards me with a smile on his face and his hand stretched out. I hadn’t seen him coming into the visiting area.
He looked tired, his eyes were red rimmed and the years of brutality were obvious in his gaunt features and bedraggled long hair and beard.
With two prison warders hanging over his shoulders, we engaged in an intense conversation.
He was adamant that another hunger strike should begin on the 1 January and that he would lead it. He had others lined up to join him.
I put the leadership’s views and he listened carefully, shaking his head in disagreement occasionally. Time up, we embraced and parted company. He was to consider what I said, consult with others inside and communicate the views to the leadership outside as soon as possible.
The next time I saw Bobby he was on hunger strike. I would see him several times before he died….”
Slappy over on Ir.net I do use the name Patrick Henry but as you are well aware I announced to the whole forum last year that my name was Thomas [Dixie] Elliott because I would not hide behind a false name and support Richard O’Rawe in my belief that he was right.
In fact several posters there refer to me as Dixie which normally results in a ban [identifying a poster]. This however doesn’t now include referring to my true name and being a poster there, well you know that…
The rest of your post isn’t worth the time Slappy.
Pat I rechecked your quotes from Fr. Meagher in Denis O’Hearns book and they don’t actually come from there.
Do you mind if I ask where you got them from?
When Brendan called off the strike did he know that republicans on the outside were looking at a document the Brits had given them via Meagher? Or did he find out afterwards and the two were merged and represented as being connected for the public’s eye?
Or, did he know there was some kind of vague offer and decided to save Sean’s life hoping against hope that the offer would be sufficient?
I’ve been thinking that aswell Brian . All deals start off verbally , then you negotiate, you try to get what you what you can. Then when you think you have an agreement , you put it down on paper .
It’s not beyond the realms of possibility that what was agreed verbally on a friday , was’nt down in black and white on the sunday .
Typo ,
All deals start off verbally , then you negotiate , you try to get what you can .
Mark and Brian,
This has been previously discussed in detail on Slugger, comments 20 & 21. It is also archived on the longkesh.info site.
To wit:
“If you take a look at page 299 of Denis O’Hearn’s biography of Bobby Sands, Nothing But an Unfinished Song:
“The movement had sent comms to let him (Sands) know that the British government was sending a courier with a document that might be a solution. But Bobby never got the comms until the next day because “the lad had to swallow them”. It would not have made any difference because the authorities refused to let Sands go to the hospital, where the drama of the negotiations and pressures on Brendan Hughes was unfolding…”
“The next thing he knew, he was taken to the prison hospital at 6:45 in the evening. What he found there shocked him.
And also look Adams’ description of the end of the first hunger strike as he writes of it in A Farther Shore, pages 12-13:
But with the commencement of the hunger strike, the British government opened up contact with republicans. Through this contact in the British Foreign Office – code-named “Mountain Climber” – a channel of communication which had been used during the 1974 IRA-British government truce was reactivated. Father Reid’s role had been filled by another Redemptorist priest, Father Brendan Meagher. The British said they wanted a settlement of the issues underpinning the protest and committed to setting out the details in a document to be presented to all of the prisoners formally and publicly after they came off their hunger strike.
Mountain Climber brought the document to Father Meagher, who delivered it to Clonard Monastery where I and a few people who were assisting the prisoners were waiting for him. As he was briefing us, Tom Hartley, the head of our POW department, burst into the room where we were meeting to tell us the hunger strike was over in the blocks.”
See also pages 108-109 of Richard O’Rawe’s Blanketmen:
By 18 December the hunger strikers had not eaten for over seven weeks. Bobby was summoned to the camp hospital about ten o’clock that night. (We later found out that while there, he had met Father Meagher, who presented him with a document from the British government on prison procedures.) You could feel the tension on the wing as Bobby got ready to leave for the hospital. Everyone knew this was an important meeting, because reports had been circulating that Sean McKenna was in a critical condition. After an hour and a half, Bobby returned with the news that the hunger strike was over. My immediate reaction was one of huge relief, but this was tempered when Bobby said, “Ní fhuaireamar faic.” (‘We didn’t get anything.’)
Brendan Hughes had made a commitment to Sean McKenna that he would not let him die, and when he was close to death, he kept his word and called the strike off, before any British documents came in or any deal could be done.
As he wrote in a letter to the Irish News, 13 July 2006, “Risking the lives of volunteers is not the IRA way”:
In a recent BBC documentary Bernadette McAliskey said she would have let Sean McKenna die during the 1980 hunger strike in order to outmanoeuvre British brinkmanship.
Implicit in her comments was a criticism of those senior republicans who decided against pursuing the option favoured by Bernadette.
As the IRA leader in charge of that Hunger Strike I had given Sean McKenna a guarantee that were he to lapse into a coma I would not permit him to die.
When the awful moment arrived I kept my word to him.
Having made that promise, to renege on it once Sean had reached a point where he was no longer capable of making a decision for himself, I would have been guilty of his murder.
Whatever the strategic merits of Bernadette’s favoured option, they are vastly outweighed by ethical considerations.
Terrible things happen in the course of any war and those of us who feel obliged to fight wars must take responsibility for the terrible consequences of actions we initiate.
I can live with that – in war we kill enemies and expect to be killed by them.
I can stand over the military decisions I made during our war against the British.
But there are no circumstances in which I was prepared to make a cynical decision that would have manipulated events to the point where a republican comrade would forfeit his life.
Twenty-five years on, I have no reason to change my mind that the decision I made to save the life of Sean McKenna was the proper one.
Faced with similar circumstances I would do the same again.
History may judge my actions differently but preventing Sean McKenna from becoming history rather than my own place in history was my prevailing concern.
Brendan Hughes, Belfast.
At the meeting in Derry, this was discussed and former blanketmen Gerard Hodgins, Tommy Gorman, Dixie Elliott and Gerard Clarke, and Richard O’Rawe, were all very clear that there was no deal for the British to renege on, and that those inside the prison at the time knew this. They had decided to save face, however, and claim that was what ended the hunger strike in order to keep the pressure on the British. This discussion should be available in the You Tube videos and when I have time I will find it for you later, if you have not already viewed them.
So the idea that the rejection of the British offer in July during the second hunger strike was based on the prisoners’ fear of the British ‘dirty joeing’ them again is a nonsense. The Brits could not renege on a deal that had not been struck. It is propaganda, nothing more.”
Rusty ,
Thanks for your non – confrontational response . I wish the rest of the Tag Team could follow suit ( haha ) .
Let me come to you. Thanks
I just don’t buy it Rusty . These men were practically all the same age , knew eachother well , they all had a cause to believe in and the thought that a handfull would just turn on the rest . It’s very hard to believe .
Dixie,
it seems we are agreed that what was contained in the British Government document was so far off the wall in terms of what the prisoners wanted that it was worse than useless.
The real politik of the situation was that the first hunger strike collapsed with nothing at all achieved. That fact was recognised by Bobby Sands and that was why he wanted to begin a new hunger strike almost immediately.
It is here that your quotation from Jim Gibney is most relevant,
‘Five years of campaigning, six weeks of a Hunger Strike… now ended, confusion reigned.’
The momentum in support built up during the Hunger Strike was in danger of dissipating on the back of a comprehensive defeat. That then begs the question of how to maintain some sort of momentum and support? In that respect trying to resurrect the Hunger Strike campaign on January 1st would have been a virtually impossible task given the confusion that reigned post 18th December.
Bobby Sands was adamant that a second Hunger Strike campaign was to take place. It is logical, from a campaign point of view that the second hunger strike should be launched against a back drop of British bad faith.
Unfortunately the only thing that the campaign had to work with was the British Government document and the verbal commitment from the British to work on the five demands to impliment a liberal prison regime.
It is clear from the testimony of Fr Meagher that when left to their own devices the governor and prison regime blocked any attempt by Booby Sands to flesh out what was in the document.
However, your spin on what Seanna Walsh believed (rightly) that the appeals to the governor would fall on deaf ears does not negate the fact that Bobby Sands attempted to use the ambiguities in the document to test the good faith of the British.
Walsh and Sands believed that the initiative would fail. In order to create the circumstances to justify the second Hunger Strike it had to be seen to fail.
Dixie,
summaries in ‘Nothing But An Unfinished Song’ by Denis O’Hearn and direct quotes from Fr Brendan Meagher who wrote a chapter for ‘Hunger Strike’, a book of essays published by the Bobby Sands Trust in 2006 on the 25th anniversary.
Pat you said:
“Dixie,
it seems we are agreed that what was contained in the British Government document was so far off the wall in terms of what the prisoners wanted that it was worse than useless.”
Exactly therefore there was nothing to renege on. That was our point all along Pat.
I disagree with you on Jim Gibney’s article.
The quotation most relevant was that Bobby had wrote a comm on the 18th of December the night the Hunger Strike ended saying, “I will begin another hunger strike on the 1st January.”
Obviously he saw then, that very night, that there was little hope of getting anything, therefore he realised that the Brits had given nothing to renege on otherwise he would have waited to see what could be gained.
Again you said:
“However, your spin on what Seanna Walsh believed (rightly) that the appeals to the governor would fall on deaf ears does not negate the fact that Bobby Sands attempted to use the ambiguities in the document to test the good faith of the British.”
What spin Pat?
“He [Seanna] could tell from Bobby’s demeanor that there was little hope of getting anything from the document.”
Pat you have to agree therefore that the Brits didn’t renege on a deal/offer during the 1st Hunger Strike?
In regards ambiguities in the document. If the document, to quote Fr Meagher, “clearly failed to meet their bottom line.” then what was ambiguous about it? You must point this out.