The hunger strikes
Ten republican prisoners starve themselves to death demanding political status; one, Bobby Sands, is elected an MP before he dies.
- Ten Men Dead: The Story of the 1981 Irish Hunger Strike — David Beresford, Grafton (1987)
- Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA — Richard English, Macmillan (2003)
- Making Sense of the Troubles — David McKittrick and David McVea, Blackstaff Press (2000)
In 1976 the British government ended “special category status” for paramilitary prisoners, treating them as ordinary criminals. Republican prisoners in the Maze prison’s H-Blocks refused to wear prison uniform, covering themselves only with blankets, and later smeared their cells with excrement in the “dirty protest”.
- Ten Men Dead: The Story of the 1981 Irish Hunger Strike — David Beresford, Grafton (1987)
- Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA — Richard English, Macmillan (2003)
On 1 March 1981 Bobby Sands, the IRA’s leader in the prison, began refusing food, with others joining at intervals. When the MP for Fermanagh and South Tyrone died, Sands stood in the by-election and on 9 April won more than 30,000 votes. He died on 5 May after 66 days, and huge crowds, often estimated at 100,000, followed his funeral. Nine more men died before the strike ended on 3 October. Margaret Thatcher refused to concede political status, though most of the prisoners’ demands were quietly met afterwards.
- Ten Men Dead: The Story of the 1981 Irish Hunger Strike — David Beresford, Grafton (1987)
- Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA — Richard English, Macmillan (2003)
- Making Sense of the Troubles — David McKittrick and David McVea, Blackstaff Press (2000)
The strikes polarised Northern Ireland as nothing since 1972. They also pushed Sinn Féin into electoral politics, the “ballot box and Armalite” strategy, the slow first step towards the peace process.
- Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA — Richard English, Macmillan (2003)
- Making Sense of the Troubles — David McKittrick and David McVea, Blackstaff Press (2000)
Political prisoners who gave their lives rather than be branded criminals, defeating Margaret Thatcher morally if not on the day. Their sacrifice won international sympathy and transformed republican politics.
- Ten Men Dead: The Story of the 1981 Irish Hunger Strike — David Beresford, Grafton (1987)
- Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA — Richard English, Macmillan (2003)
Men convicted of murder and bombing demanding special treatment. The hunger strike was a propaganda campaign, and dozens of people, including police, soldiers and civilians, were killed in the violence that surrounded it.
- Making Sense of the Troubles — David McKittrick and David McVea, Blackstaff Press (2000)
- An Index of Deaths from the Conflict in Ireland — Malcolm Sutton, CAIN, Ulster University
Why it matters today
For republicans the hunger strikers are martyrs, and their faces still look down from murals in west Belfast and Derry. The election of Sands showed Sinn Féin that votes could win what bombs could not, setting it on the road to becoming the largest party. For many unionists the commemorations glorify men convicted of terrorism, and the summer of 1981 is remembered for the killings that went on around it.