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RIP Bobby Sands

Discussion in 'TalkCeltic Pub' started by Rude Bhoy, May 5, 2013.

Discuss RIP Bobby Sands in the TalkCeltic Pub area at TalkCeltic.net.

  1. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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    It is.
     
  2. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  3. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  4. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  5. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  6. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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    Last edited: Mar 11, 2022
  7. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  8. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  9. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  10. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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    Last edited: Mar 11, 2022
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  11. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  12. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  13. Double Dutch

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    Enjoying your updates in this thread Notorious, the man was almost mythical.

    Also, I wonder if some of the * wallopers (especially if any of them have, say, anything to do with Irish Republicanism in their profile) in the Ukraine thread suggesting that they should just give in to Russia and Putin's aggression, in order to preserve human life, would have said the same about Bobby Sands and his comrades.
     
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  14. leeso-ardoyne

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    Agree!

    I look forward to reading them every day.

    A cousin of mine was on the same wing as Bobby and if I remember correctly, he was in the next cell to him the day he got wheeled off or walked to the hospital cell. Anything to do with the blanket, H blocks or hunger strike, I would always take time out to read and have some refection of that pierod in our recent history and it would always bring back my own memories of going up to long kesh for visits as a kid. At a guess I'd say there's be others on this forum that has similar reflection on this. Abit of contraction here and I think I've mentioned this on here before, but the older I get i start to feel some pain of how life was back then for all us growing up during the troubles and other times I would turn the channel over if anything came on the TV about it because it brings emotions out in me I don't want to feel.

    As for men like Bobby Sands, the rest of the hunger strikers and the blanket men. I don't think we'll ever see the likes of them again on this island! Very string willed people. I don't think I'd have the courage to go through what they did.

    Cheers Paul for continuing to post these everyday.
     
    Last edited: Mar 10, 2022
  15. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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  16. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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    THURSDAY 12TH
    Fr Toner was in tonight, and brought me in some religious magazines.

    My weight is 58.75 kgs. They did not take a blood sample because they want to incorporate other tests with it. So the doctor says they’ll do it next week.

    Physically I have felt very tired today, between dinner time and later afternoon. I know I’m getting physically weaker. It is only to be expected. But I’m okay. I’m still getting the papers all right, but there’s nothing heartening in them. But again I expect that also and therefore I must depend entirely upon my own heart and resolve, which I will do.

    I received three notes from the comrades in Armagh, * bless them again.

    I heard of today’s announcement that Frank Hughes will be joining me on hunger-strike on Sunday. I have the greatest respect, admiration and confidence in Frank and I know that I am not alone. How could I ever be with comrades like those around me, in Armagh and outside.

    I’ve been thinking of the comrades in Portlaoise, the visiting facilities there are inhuman. No doubt that *-hole will also eventually explode in due time. I hope not, but Haughey’s compassion for the prisoners down there is no different from that of the Brits towards prisoners in the North and in English gaols.

    I have come to understand, and with each passing day I understand increasingly more and in the most sad way, that awful fate and torture endured to the very bitter end by Frank Stagg and Michael Gaughan. Perhaps, — indeed yes! — I am more fortunate because those poor comrades were without comrades or a friendly face. They had not even the final consolation of dying in their own land. Irishmen alone and at the unmerciful ugly hands of a vindictive heartless enemy. Dear *, but I am so lucky in comparison.

    I have poems in my mind, mediocre no doubt, poems of hunger strike and MacSwiney, and everything that this hunger-strike has stirred up in my heart and in my mind, but the weariness is slowly creeping in, and my heart is willing but my body wants to be lazy, so I have decided to mass all my energy and thoughts into consolidating my resistance.

    That is most important. Nothing else seems to matter except that lingering constant reminding thought, ‘Never give up’. No matter how bad, how black, how painful, how heart-breaking, ‘Never give up’, ‘Never despair’, ‘Never lose hope’. Let them * laugh at you all they want, let them grin and jibe, allow them to persist in their humiliation, brutality, deprivations, vindictiveness, petty harassments, let them laugh now, because all of that is no longer important or worth a response.

    I am making my last response to the whole vicious inhuman atrocity they call H-Block. But, unlike their laughs and jibes, our laughter will be the joy of victory and the joy of the people, our revenge will be the liberation of all and the final defeat of the oppressors of our aged nation.
     
  17. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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    FRIDAY 13TH
    I’m not superstitious, and it was an uneventful day today. I feel all right, and my weight is 58.5 kgs.

    I was not so tired today, but my back gets sore now and again sitting in the bed. I didn’t get the Irish News, which makes me think there is probably something in it that they don’t wish me to see, but who cares. Fr Murphy was in tonight for a few minutes.

    The Screws had a quick look around my cell today when I was out getting water. They are always snooping. I heard reports of men beaten up during a wing shift …

    Nothing changes here.

    Sean McKenna (the former hunger-striker) is back in H-4, apparently still a bit shaky but alive and still recovering, and hopefully he will do so to the full.

    Mhúscail mé leis an gealbháin ar maidin agus an t-aon smaointe amháin i mo cheann – seo chugat lá eile a Roibeard. Cuireann é sin amhran a scríobh mé; bhfad ó shin i ndúil domsa.

    Seo é cib é ar bith.

    D’ éirigh mé ar maidin mar a tháinig an coimheádóir,

    Bhuail sé mo dhoras go trom’s gan labhairt.

    Dhearc mé ar na ballai, ‘S shíl mé nach raibh mé beo,

    Tchítear nach n-imeoidh an t-iffrean seo go deo.

    D’oscail an doras ‘s níor druideadh é go ciúin,

    Ach ba chuma ar bith mar nach raibheamar inár suan.

    Chuala mé éan ‘s ni fhaca mé geal an lae,

    Is mian mór liom go raibh me go doimhin foai,

    Ca bhfuil mo smaointi ar laethe a chuaigh romhainn,

    S cá bhfuil an tsaol a smaoin mé abhí sa domhain,

    Ni chluintear mo bhéic, ‘s ní fheictear mar a rith mo dheor,

    Nuair a thigeann ar lá aithíocfaidh mé iad go mor.

    Canaim é sin leis an phort Siun Ní Dhuibir.



    I awoke with the sparrows this morning and the only thought in my head was: here comes another day, Bobby — reminding me of a song I once wrote a long time ago.

    This is it anyway:

    I arose this morning as the Screw came,

    He thumped my door heavily without speaking,

    I stared at the walls, and thought I was dead,

    It seems that this * will never depart.

    The door opened and it wasn’t closed gently,

    But it didn’t really matter, we weren’t asleep.

    I heard a bird and yet didn’t see the dawn of day,

    Would that I were deep in the earth.

    Where are my thoughts of days gone by,

    And where is the life I once thought was in the world.

    My cry is unheard and my tears flowing unseen,

    When our day comes I shall repay them dearly.

    I sing this to the tune Siun Ní Dhuibir.

    Bhí na heiníní ag ceiliúracht inniú. Chaith ceann de na buachaillí arán amach as an fhuinneog, ar a leghad bhí duine éigin ag ithe. Uaigneach abhí mé ar feadh tamaill ar tráthnóna beag inniú ag éisteacht leis na préacháin ag screadáil agus ag teacht abhaile daobhtha. Dá gcluinfinn an fhuiseog álainn, brisfeadh sí mo chroí.

    Anois mar a scríobhaim tá an corrcrothar ag caoineadh mar a théann siad tharam. Is maith liom na heiníní.

    Bhuel caithfidh mé a dul mar má scríobhain níos mó ar na heiníní seo beidh mo dheora ag rith ‘s rachaidh mo smaointi ar ais chuig, an t-am nuair abhí mé ógánach, b’iad na laennta agus iad imithe go deo anois, ach thaitin siad liom agus ar a laghad níl dearmad deánta agam orthu, ta siad i mo chroí — oíche mhaith anois.


    The birds were singing today. One of the boys threw bread out of the window. At least somebody was eating!

    I was lonely for a while this evening, listening to the crows caw as they returned home. Should I hear the beautiful lark, she would rent my heart. Now, as I write, the odd curlew mournfully calls as they fly over. I like the birds.

    Well, I must leave off, for if I write more about the birds my tears will fall and my thoughts return to the days of my youth.

    They were the days, and gone forever now. But I enjoyed them. They are in my heart — good night, now.
     
    Last edited: Mar 14, 2022
  18. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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    SATURDAY 14TH
    Again, another uneventful somewhat boring day. My weight is 58.25 kgs, and no medical complaints. I read the papers, which are full of trash.

    Tonight’s tea was pie and beans, and although hunger may fuel my imagination (it looked a powerful-sized meal), I don’t exaggerate: the beans were nearly falling off the plate. If I said this all the time to the lads, they would worry about me, but I’m all right.

    It was inviting (I’m human too) and I was glad to see it leave the cell. Never would I have touched it, but it was a starving nuisance. Ha! My *, if it had have attacked, I’d have fled.

    I was going to write about a few things I had in my head but they’ll wait. I am looking forward to the brief company of all the lads at Mass tomorrow. You never know when it could be the last time that you may ever see them again.

    I smoked some cigarettes today. We still defeat them in this sphere. If the Screws only knew the half of it; the ingenuity of the POW is something amazing. The worse the situation the greater the ingenuity. Someday it may all be revealed.

    On a personal note, Liam Og (the pseudonym for Bobby Sands’ Republican Movement contact on the outside), I just thought I’d take this opportunity tonight of saying to your good hard-working self that I admire you all out there and the unselfish work that you all do and have done in the past, not just for the H-Blocks and Armagh, but for the struggle in general.

    I have always taken a lesson from something that was told me by a sound man, that is, that everyone, Republican or otherwise, has his own particular part to play. No part is too great or too small, no one is too old or too young to do something.

    There is that much to be done that no select or small portion of people can do, only the greater mass of the Irish nation will ensure theachievement of the Socialist Republic, and that can only be done by hard work and sacrifice.

    So, mo chara, for what it’s worth, I would like to thank you all for what you have done and I hope many others follow your example, and I’m deeply proud to have known you all and prouder still to call you comrades and friends.

    On a closing note, I’ve noticed the Screws have been really slamming the cell doors today, in particular my own. Perhaps a good indication of the mentality of these people, always vindictive, always full of hate. I’m glad to say that I am not like that.

    Well, I must go to rest up as I found it tiring trying to comb my hair today after a bath.

    So venceremos, beidh bua againn eigin la eigin. Sealadaigh abu.

    (Translated, this reads as follows

    So venceremos, we will be victorious someday. Upthe Provos.
     
  19. Henrik 07 Gold Member Gold Member

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    SUNDAY 15TH
    Frank has now joined me on the hunger-strike. I saw the boys at Mass today which I enjoyed. Fr Toner said Mass.

    Again it was a pretty boring day. I had a bit of trouble to get slopped out tonight and to get water.

    I have a visit tomorrow and it will be good to see my family. I am also looking forward to the walk in the fresh air, it will tire me out, but I hope the weather is good. I must go.
     
  20. jake10

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    I still remember the pride it gave us in Glasgow when he was elected, stupidly hoping that thatcher wouldn’t murder a sitting MP.
    R.I.P. Bobby Sands MP