There is a lot going on in this image: pedestrians pass in front of a row of boarded-up shops, above them is written “Until the last prisoner is free we are all imprisoned” with posters of the hunger strikers, an Irish tricolour and “If they die, you die”; on the left “No, not a dog, but a POW” and a version of the five demands, concerning prison uniforms, work, association, parcels, and remission.
Ballymurphy shops, west Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00058
The names of seven of the 1981 hunger-strikers – “POWs” Kieran Doherty, Joe McDonnell, Kevin Lynch, Martin Hurson, Tom McIlwee [McElwee], Paddy Quinn, Michael Devine – are placed next to outstretched arms wrapped in barbed wire.
The hands-in-barbed-wire design is by Jack Clafferty of Troops Out.
Beechmount Street, Belfast.
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00120 M00055 M00119
“The right honourable Bobby Sands Esq MP – Murdered by his fellow members of H.M. Govt”, “I have the spirit of freedom that cannot be quenched by even the most horrendous treatment. Of course I can be murdered, but while I remain alive, I remain what I am, a political prisoner of war, and no one can change that.” Barbed wire stretches over an Irish tricolour next to an image of Sands.
Shaws Road, west Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00140 M00133 M00054
“They die, you die – Brit Govt”. Above are posters of hunger strikers, some marked with dates of death. From right to left, smaller posters show Sands, Hughes, McCreesh, and O’Hara. From left to right, the larger posters show [McDonnell out of frame?], Doherty, Lynch (both marked as deceased), McElwee, Quinn, Devine, McKeown, McGeown, Devlin.
If the posters are an accurate guide, the date is somewhere between August 2nd and 8th, the dates on which Doherty and McElwee died. Liam McCloskey would join the strike on August 3rd.
The dentist’s office round the corner from Ballymurphy shops, Belfast.
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00049
“Keep RUC out”, “INLA”, “IRSP”, “IRA”, “UTP”. somewhere in Turf Lodge, Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00048
“13 Gone [Bloody Sunday, January 1972] But Not For Gotten. We got 18 and Mountbatten” [Warrenpoint and Mullaghmore, Co Sligo, both on 27 August, 1979], “IRA”, “UTP” and an armalite
Falls Road Library, Sevastopol Street, Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00047
Republican graffiti somewhere (in the Markets??), Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00046
locationunknown
“The Right Honourable Bobby Sands M.P. RIP” in front of a burning van in Islandbawn Street, west Belfast.
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00045 M00053
The saying comes from Mao Zedong and appears in the Little Red Book (WP).
“T” block in Turf Lodge, west Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00043
Falls Road, Belfast (opposite Beechmount Avenue). The offices shown are of “P. F. McDonnell Ltd. Building Supplies – cement, plaster, brick, timber, drainage goods, doors & windows.
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00041
Peter Moloney Collection 