Ireland: It Is Forbidden to Forget

Robert Gerard Sands, pseudonym Bobby Sands was born on March 9, 1954, in Newtownabbey, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, died on May 5, 1981, at the age of 27, in Maze Prison, Down County, Northern Ireland, from starvation, that is, from 66 days on hunger strike, he was a politician, social fighter, revolutionary, British parliamentarian and guerrilla of the Provisional IRA (Provisional Irish Republican Army).

Sands was born into a Catholic family.

In 1972, Sands decided to join the IRA, and in October of that same year he was arrested on charges of possessing firearms.

Then in April 1973 he was sentenced to five years in prison.

He was released from prison in 1976, and immediately resumed his activities within the IRA.

He was accused of being involved in the bomb attack at the Balmoral Furniture Company in Dunmurry in October of that same year, but was not convicted due to lack of evidence.

Sands and at least five other IRA members were accused of taking part in a shootout with the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

Although his active participation in it could not be proven, Sands was convicted of possession of firearms at trial, and sentenced to 14 years in the Maze prison.

In prison, Sands dedicated himself to writing, delving into both journalism and poetry.

In the late 1980s, Sands was elected Commanding Officer of IRA prisoners interned at Long Kesh, succeeding Brendan Hughes, who was taking part in the First Hunger Strike that followed the blanket protest.

The blanket protest was part of a protest movement framed by the Northern Ireland Conflict.

The protest began due to the progressive elimination, as of March 1, 1976, of the status of political prisoners for Republican prisoners.

The prisoners refused to accept these changes, refusing to wear the prison uniform.

The imminent disappearance of the category began to cause friction between prisoners and prison officials.

The protest began on September 14, 1976.

At the end of April 1978, a fight occurred between a prisoner and a prison officer in Block 6.

The prisoner was taken to solitary confinement, and a rumor spread through the wing that the prisoner had been beaten very badly.

On 27 October 1980, IRA members Brendan Hughes, Tommy McKearney, Raymond McCartney, Tom McFeeley, Sean McKenna and Leo Green and INLA member John Nixon began a hunger strike aimed at restoring the prisoners’ political status.

After a fifty-three-day hunger strike, during which McKenna fell into a coma on several occasions and was on the verge of death, the government seemed to recognize the prisoners’ five demands.

In January 1981 it became clear that the prisoners’ demands had not been granted.

On February 4, the prisoners issued a statement saying that the British government had failed to resolve the crisis and declared their intention to begin a new hunger strike.

Bobby Sands was nominated for deputy in the elections and won the seat on April 9 with 30,493 votes.

After Sands’ victory, the British Government led by Margaret Thatcher approved the Representation of the People Act of 1981, which prevented the nomination as electoral candidates of those prisoners serving sentences of more than one year in both the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland 🇮🇪.

The strike began on March 1, when Bobby Sands refused to eat, and ended on October 3.

Ten men, including Sands himself, died as a result of the strike.

Bobby Sands would die on May 5, 1981, after 66 days on hunger strike.

Simón Bolívar Coordinator

Rescuing Historical Memory.

Up those who fight! ! !

Without Memory there is no Victory

The only fight that is lost is the one that is abandoned! ! !

Only the fight will make us free! ! !

Sow Memory so that oblivion does not grow

From Venezuela 🇻🇪 Land of Liberators 534 years since the beginning of the Anti-imperialist Resistance in America and 215 years since the beginning of our Independence.

Coordinadora Simón Bolívar
Caracas – Venezuela 🇻🇪.
May 2026.

Coordinadora Simón Bolívar Venezuela, Resumen Latinoamericano, May 7, 2026.

RIP #BobbySands

45 years today...

Fun fact: #Tehran took their Winston Churchill Street and renamed it Bobby Sands Street a few decades ago.

#Ireland #Iran #Imperialism

RT by @M_AndersonSF: Óglach Bobby Sands MP 💚🇮🇪
Fuair sé bás ar son Saoirse na hÉireann.
#BobbySands

Óglach Bobby Sands MP 💚🇮🇪
Fuair sé bás ar son Saoirse na hÉireann.
#BobbySands

Video
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https://nitter.net/Ogra_SF/status/2051436478031356181#m

Today in Labor History May 5, 1981: Bobby Sands (1954-1981) died from starvation, ending his 66-day hunger strike. Sands was an Irish political prisoner and member of Parliament who had been locked up in the notoriously brutal Maze Prison near Belfast. The strike was an attempt to get the British government to grant political prisoner status to Nationalist inmates, rather than treating them as common criminals.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #ireland #republican #IRA #BobbySands #HungerStrike #maze #prison #PoliticalPrisoner

45 anni dalla morte, in carcere per sciopero della fame, del politico e militante dell'#IRA #BobbySands. Hunger - Streaming ITA - Streaming-Community https://streaming-community.team/titles/3835-hunger/watching.html

@cultura

#Irlanda #Ireland #film

Today in Labor History March 1, 1981: Provisional Irish Republican Army member Bobby Sands began his hunger strike at HM Prison Maze against the removal of Special Category Status, which had effectively granted them Prisoner of War status. POW status, under the Geneva Conventions, gave them special privileges not given to other prisoners, like not having to wear prison uniforms or do prison work, being housed within their paramilitary factions, and being allowed extra visits and food parcels. Sands had been in prison for his role in the Balmoral Furniture Company bombing in 1976. During the hunger strike, he was elected to parliament. 10 prisoners died from starvation during the strike, including Sands. 100,000 people attended his funeral.

Hunger striking had a long tradition in Ireland, going back to pre-Christian times. In the 20th century, 12 men died from Hunger Strikes prior to the 1981 strike. The Special Category Status that Sands and his comrades were fighting for was first implemented as a result of a Hunger Strike by republican prisoners in in 1972. British removal of this status was part of an attempt to change public perception of, and sympathy for, the republican cause, by making it seem like they were common criminals, gangsters, thugs, without any political agenda. Kieran Nugent, the first republican prisoner to lose this status (1976), refused to wear the standard uniform, telling the warden that he’d half to nail it to his back. Instead, he wore a blanket, leading to a blanket protest by other prisoners. In 1978, this escalated to the Dirty Protest, where prisoners refused to wash and smeared their excrement on the walls of their cells. This protest spread to the women’s prison in Armagh, where prisoners also smeared their menstrual blood on the walls.

The mural shown here is at Sevastopol Street, in Belfast. Many artists contributed to its design, including Danny Devenny, Marty Lyons, Michael Doherty and Gerard ‘Mo Chara’ Kelly. It depicts Bobby Sands with two quotes from him. On either side of him are images of his Belfast IRA comrades in the blanket protest, Kieran Doherty (left) who was elected to the Irish parliament while also on hunger strike in 1981, and Joe McDonnell (right) who was arrested with Bobby in October 1976. At the bottom of the mural is a lark breaking free from its cage/chains and at the very top is the mythical phoenix, a bird symbolizing rebirth and renewal which at the end of its life cycle is said to burst into flames but to arise anew from its ashes. The mural also shows republican Sean McCaughey who died on hunger strike in Portlaoise Prison in 1946. To the right of this image are lines from ‘The H-Block Song’ by the late Francie Brolly:
 
I’ll wear no convict’s uniform
Nor meekly serve my time
That Britain might brand Ireland’s fight
Eight hundred years of crime

One of the Bobby Sands' quotes on the mural reads: “Everyone, Republican or otherwise, has their own particular role to play. Our revenge will be the laughter of our children.”

#workingclass #LaborHistory #IRA #bobbysands #hungerstrike #maze #prison #starvation #bombing #ireland #irishrepublicanarmy #prisonerofwar