10/09/2026
Below is the oration delivered by Sinn Féin Poblachtach Ard Chomhairle member Ciaran Dolan at 45th Anniversary Hunger Strike Commemoration in Bundoran
O’HARA, Hughes, McCreesh and Sands, Doherty and Lynch, McDonnell, Hurson, McElwee, Devine. Their memory is forever in my mind, pictures of their faces in my eyes. My sorrow and grief will not subside, and my love for them I will not disguise. In silence we walked through the streets, as one by one our hunger strikers died.
So says verse from the song Forever in my mind, written by Christy Moore, based on a poem by Pearse McLoughlin.
It aptly describes how I feel about the hunger strikers of 1981. I was just a boy, but I remember the events of that time. I remember seeing the news reports on TV of the riots up north, the funerals, the big demonstration in Dublin and the attempt to get to the British embassy and the Garda baton charge on the crowd. No matter where we travelled there was black flags up on lamp posts and ESB poles. The slogan “H-BLOCK” painted on walls and roads. Forty-five years later there is still a very faint reminder on a bridge in Athlone of a partial H-BLOCK remaining.
We gather here annually on the last Saturday in August in memory and admiration for the hunger strikers. “Greater love hasn't one than this: To lay down one's life for one's friend”. That is what these men and men like them in previous generations done. They willingly gave their own lives for their comrades and their country. There was no Mé Féiners on the Republican wings of the H Blocks of Long Kesh.
I have been coming here for many years, proudly taking part in the parade in adoration of our brave heroes. Today I carried our Cumann banner. It is the banner of the Seán Costello/Martin Hurson Cumann of Sinn Féin Poblachtach, Iarmhi (Westmeath).
This banner also symbolises the continuity of the Republican Movement, the continuity of the Irish Republican Army. Seán Costello of Athlone, Co Westmeath was killed in action in Dublin city on Easter Week 1916; he was wounded Easter Monday while carrying dispatches from the GPO to Boland's Mills. He died two days later on April 26. Seán was a member of the Volunteers. When the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizens Army stood together on that Easter Monday, they became the “Army of the Republic”, the Irish Republican Army.
Martin Hurson from Aughnaskea, Co Tyrone, aged 24 years after 46 days on hunger strike: he died on July 13. Martin was also a Volunteer of the Irish Republican Army. The same Army the same methods the same cause. That single line of unbroken continuity.
I have a bond with Martin Hurson and his comrades, maybe it's 1981 was my generation’s 1916. The 1981 hunger strikers have influenced me. Each year members of Sinn Féin Poblachtach from Longford and Westmeath gather on or close to Martin's anniversary and hold a wreath-laying ceremony or full commemoration in Mostrim, Co Longford where we erected a memorial stone in his honour.
This year was no different, a commemoration was held to mark the 45th anniversary. Likewise in Co Tyrone a wreath was laid on his grave on behalf of the Movement by Tyrone Republicans. On July 12, 2025 after holding a wreath-laying ceremony at Mostrim we travelled by bus to Galbally. It was a pilgrimage for me to go to his grave. Longford and Westmeath Republicans were joined there by Derry and Tyrone Republicans. I chaired that commemorative event. I was so proud to lay a wreath on behalf of our Cumann. His grave I always wanted to visit.
The bravest of the brave were the hunger strike martyrs from every generation, from Thomas Ashe in 1917, Terence MacSwiney, Denis Barry, Michael Fitzgerald, Joseph Murphy, Andy O’Sullivan and Joseph Whitty in the 1920s. Tony Darcy, Jack McNeela and Seán Mc Caughey in the 40s.
Michael Gaughan and Frank Stagg, 1974 and 1976 respectively. This year we held a 50th anniversary commemoration for Frank Stagg. We were told in the media that the official commemoration was another day. The official commemoration is the commemoration organised by the Republican Movement not by a political party. Ours was the official commemoration.
On March 1, 1981 Bobby Sands refused food. “I am standing on the threshold of another trembling world. May God have mercy on my soul,” he wrote in his prison diary. Sixty-six days later on May 5, Bobby Sands passed away. Bobby Sands was reared in Rathcoole, Belfast, a mixed area but predominantly loyalist. It is a sad thing that we say a mixed area. There would be no mixed areas if in the words of the Proclamation “the differences carefully fostered by an alien government which have divided a minority from the majority in the past”.
Bobby was a very talented writer and poet, he would regale his comrades with stories of films he saw or books he had read. While on hunger strike he was elected as a H BLOCK candidate for Fermanagh-South Tyrone on an abstentionist ticket. Republicans did not and still do not recognise partitionist parliaments in Ireland.
One week later May 12, Francis Hughes, “The Boy from Tamlaghduff”, Bellaghy, Co Derry died. Francis had a formidable reputation as a guerilla fighter and when finally wounded and captured, he took the fight to the Brits first with a blanket then with his body. After his death the RUC done their best to disrupt his funeral cortege home.
On May 21 the last two of the May Martyrs died. Raymond McCreesh, Irish Republican Army and Patsy O'Hara, Irish National Liberation Army. Ray joined the Movement at 16 as a Fian with Na Fianna Éireann, then went on to join the army, 1st Battalion, South Armagh IRA.
When in prison Raymond McCreesh never took a visit or wrote a letter to his loved ones. He would not don the prison uniform to take a visit nor would he let the prison censor read his private thoughts that he would write to his family. He communicated to them through smuggled comms. Patsy O'Hara, Irish National Liberation Army was from Derry City. He witnessed his brother being interned without trial, was present on the Bloody Sunday march. At 24 he was randomly shot by a member of the British army while coming out from a friend's house. Later he joined the fight for freedom as an INLA Volunteer. He ended up being sentenced to eight years in the H Blocks. He was OC of INLA prisoners but stood down from that position to take part in the hunger strike.
The hunger strike continued on but because it was a staggered hunger strike; there was a break in the deaths; the month of June passed. In July came in Volunteer Joe McDonnell died on July 8. Joe was a married man with two children. He had been interned twice 1972 and 73. He was captured with Bobby Sands on active service and was sentenced to 14 years. Joe like Ray McCreesh never took a visit, he would not wear a prison uniform for that walk to the visiting area. He communicated to family through smuggled comms. He only saw his family after commencing the strike.
Martin Hurson's death was a complete shock to everyone. Martin was born and reared in Aughnaskea, Cappagh, Co Tyrone. He lost his mother at a young age. Like many in his area he saw the British occupation and resisted it by Joining the IRA. Martin was lifted in a RUC/British army round-up of suspected IRA members. He was tortured along with his comrades, confessions were signed and the boys were convicted. He appealed and lost, got a retrial and was found guilty again. Martin was sentenced to 20 years. Martin was well liked, a jovial lad. He volunteered for hunger strike and during this time he was the H Block candidate in the Longford-Westmeath constituency. He received 4,573 first preference votes. After 40 days of hunger strike his health deteriorated rapidly and on the 46th day, July 13, Martin died.
August 1, Kevin Lynch of Dungiven Co Derry, Irish National Liberation Army Volunteer, died after 71 days of fasting. Kevin was a great athlete as a young man, he was an enthusiastic footballer and hurler, he captained a Derry under 16 hurling team to an All-Ireland win. He was also a member of a boxing club. He was away working in England for three years and returned home and joined the INLA. Kevin was picked up by the crown forces when they made a move against the INLA in the Dungiven area. Kevin was charged and imprisoned for 10 years. He joined the Blanket Protest and ultimately the hunger strike. Kevin was a H BLOCK candidate for the Waterford constituency and received 3,337 first preference votes.
The very next day after Kevin had died, August 2, Irish Republican Army Volunteer Kieran Doherty died. Kieran was from Andersonstown, Belfast. He joined Na Fianna Éireann in 1971 and became known to the British establishment forces. He graduated to the Irish Republican Army and was very active. He was interned in Long Kesh from February 1973 to November 1975. He reported back for IRA duty and was again captured on active service, he ended up in the H Blocks after a year and a half on remand. He was sentenced to 18 years. Kieran was a tough cookie, he would not bend the knee to the screws and suffered terrible beatings and torture because of that, while on the Blanket Protest. While on hunger strike Kieran was elected as a H Block candidate for the constituency of Cavan-Monaghan. Kieran’s fast lasted 73 days.
Volunteer Tom McElwee from Bellaghy, Co Derry died on August 8 after 62 days on hunger strike. He was a first cousin of Francis Hughes, and they operated together. Tom was arrested after an explosive device he and comrades were travelling with prematurely exploded. Tom lost an eye and his brother Benedict was badly burned. Both brothers were in the H Blocks but rarely saw each other, only sometimes at Mass or wing shifts. When Tom was dying his brother was granted permission to visit him, but delays in the prison hospital meant Tom had died before Benedict could get to see him.
INLA Volunteer Mickey Devine of Derry City was the last hunger striker to die. Mickey was only 11 years old when his father died and his mother died when he was 18. His only family was his sister Margaret. Michael was married at 19 and that marriage produced two children. Mickey was appointed OC of the INLA prisoners after Patsy O'Hara went on hunger strike. After Kevin died Mickey stepped in and commenced his strike. Mickey now really had no one but his sister and her husband to visit him; the Republican Socialist Movement appointed IRSP members to pose as relatives and the prison authorities obliged. By the time his two children were brought in to see him, his eyesight was very bad and he could hardly make them out. On August 20, 1981 Mickey Devine breathed his last.
To hunger strike for your cause, for your comrades it is the most courageous act a man or woman can do. It is a slow and deadly protest. Denying your body food in the hope that your tormentors will be shamed into giving into your just demands. The body finally turns on itself, sacrificing organs one after another until such time life ends.
Those parents did not want their sons to go on hunger strike, they did not want their sons to die. The mothers who because of that maternal bond they went against their own wishes they went against nature, out of undying love for their sons, who had asked them to stand by them and respect their decision to go on hunger strike. The mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters went through as much anxiety and turmoil as their imprisoned loved ones.
The hunger strike martyrs rejected the claim by the British that they were criminals. They were young idealistic men committed to the cause of Irish Freedom. They resisted the British presence in Ireland. Resistance to that occupation is legitimate. There is only shame in turning your back on your country and people for personal gain to be obtained from the occupier.
The brave stand made by the ten men in Long Kesh was witnessed throughout the world. As the men died, marches and demonstrations were held at home and abroad. Monuments have been erected in Havana, Cuba, Australia and the USA and across this country. Bands have been named after them indeed we had the Kevin Lynch band here today. Streets have been named; in fact the Islamic Republic of Iran named the street where the British Embassy was after Bobby Sands. I'm thinking today of the Islamic Republic of Iran today who are under a onslaught by terrorist United States of America, Nato and Israel, they are all part of it with the EU as well.
A chairde, just five years after their deaths the seven IRA hunger strikers were betrayed by some of their closest comrades. The majority, though a gerrymandered majority of IRA Volunteers and Sinn Féin members, heavily influenced by British agents went the reformist road. The decision taken forty years ago by the majority to drop the abstentionism from Leinster House by Republicans, meant acceptance of partition by them. It was the start of the so-called peace process that has led to the Stormont agreement being operated today.
Those who sold out the hunger strike dismissed themselves from the Republican Army and Sinn Féin, as they broke both constitution.
Like ’69, ’70 the minority remained faithful. We in Sinn Féin Poblachtach still hold the Republican constitution. Those 1986 reformists or as our Uachtarán would call them “renegades” continued to use the name of Sinn Féin, their military wing used the title of Óglaigh na hÉireann just as the Free State army and the “Stickies” before them. The reformist leadership while on the road to a British-inspired settlement still sent out their volunteers to kill and be killed. Over the decades that passed since 1986 they have dragged the names of the IRA and Sinn Féin through the gutter. May 6, 2023 saw Michelle O'Neill attending the coronation of Charles Windsor as King of England and feasting with the British establishment. The day before I'm sure she was mourning for Bobby Sands on the 42nd anniversary of his death.
Their “micro” ministers have called those that would resist British rule in Ireland “traitors”. They committed acts of treachery by destroying arms, their surrender was not just military, it was political also which is worse. Pearse made a military surrender at the end of Easter Week but did not relinquish the right of the Irish people to struggle for freedom. With their political surrender they put faith in a “border poll” to be called at Britain's pleasure. Well, we see how that went for them. Andy Burnham has just told them and he told them straight that their border poll is off the table. It was never there.
In 1981 Neil Blaney, Síle De Valera and Dr John O'Connell went in to see Bobby Sands. Their visit was humanitarian, Near the end Dr John O'Connell asked Bobby to end his strike. Bobby would not compromise. They were to hold a press conference in Belfast but the RUC would not allow it. They held a press conference in Dublin at which they said they would try and speak to Margaret Thatcher. Margaret Thatcher was in Saudi Arabia at the time and her reply when asked about it by the media was “It is not my habit or custom to meet MPs from a foreign country about a citizen of the UK, resident in the UK”. That was the British Establishment opinion in 1981, that still is their opinion and it will be forever because they will not give up the Six Counties, they have to be taken back from them.
We in the Republican Movement want a Free and Independent Ireland. No role for Britain, the Stormont Agreement which was negotiated and signed up to by the Traitors has it in it that even in the event of a United Ireland the British Monarchy would have a role in it. Never.
The Republican Movement is about Irish Freedom and Independence, not just about ending partition. We had a United Ireland for 800 years under British rule. The Republican Movement stands for a Sovereign Nation, a Sovereign People. Sovereignty cannot be shared. Ireland Free from the centre to the sea.
All branches of the Movement is recruiting. Sinn Féin Poblachtach (Republican Sinn Féin) is the public face of the Movement. I call on all those who would describe themselves as Republican, especially the youth, turn your back on the politicians who play out that they are Republicans but in reality administer the Six Counties for Britain. Join us, the Movement of Sands, Hughes, McCreesh, McDonnell, Hurson, Doherty and McElwee who died alongside O'Hara, Lynch and Devine in 1981. The seven were of our Movement, we hold the same Republican constitution these men fought and died under. We have never broken it, all others left it or never belonged to it.
Continuity not Compromise
Long live the memory of the ten.
An Phoblacht Abú.”
