Kesh. The business of Parliament halted while the benches were hastily cleaned and the splattered MPs refreshed.232 One of the protesters was Yana Mintoff, daughter of Maltese Prime Minister Dom Mintoff. The second was Irishman John MacSherry, who lived in London.233 Long Kesh and ‘solidarity with the H-Blocks’ was also the declared primary spur of IRA prisoner action in Gartee the following day.234
Gartree, 7 July 1978
The most serious Dispersal System incident occurred in Gartree where, on the morning of 7 July, Eddie O’Neill, Paul Holmes, Jerry Mealy, Ronnie McCartney, Phil Sheridan, Martin Brady, Brian McLaughlin and Paul Hill made it to the rooftop by the unconventional means of using John McCluskey as a human ladder.235 Aware that the staff expected something to occur, the chance to congregate in the yard and seize the initiative was not passed up. McCartney recalled: ‘We thought about the boys on the blanket and the women in Armagh … So the next day out on the yard we said: “Right, let’s hit the roof”’.236 Brady recalled: ‘McCluskey, a big giant … says, “I’ll push you up”’ and shoved the impressed Belfastman upwards ‘about twelve feet’.237 McCluskey, tall and powerfully built, boosted the others onto a low roof but could not follow before guard dogs approached at speed. O’Neill regretted that his ‘Uxbridge Eight’ co-accused had been ‘sacrificed’, but realised there was no other way of getting so many IRA men into position in the time available. McCluskey knew in theory how to neutralize trained guard dogs and was aware that a minor error in his unpractised technique would lead to a savaging. However, against all expectations, the trained dogs loosed on him were wary of approaching aggressively and he was not seriously hurt before being hauled off to segregation.238 Access to the upper roof of the prison services block was quickly gained from the lower level reached from the yard. Loyalist prisoner Sammy Carson, another ‘Mulligan’s Bar’ attempted pub bomber, tossed the republicans useful materials from his cell window.239 Banners and painted graffiti were displayed which referenced IRA demands for repatriation and political status, as well as affinity with the H-Block campaign.240 Slogans visible from the street stated ‘End H-BLOCK TORTURE’, ‘P.O.W. STATUS’, ‘SOLIDARITY’, ‘REPATRIATION’ and ‘H-BLOCK’.241 O’Neill had stitched a large Irish Tricolour together from three pieces of sheeting. This was held aloft by one of the protesters whilst showing the leftist revolutionary clenched fist. It was intended, from the outset, to remain on the roof until the London rally planned for 9 July had taken place. Two of the men donned blankets to visually bolster the connection with Long Kesh.242
Improved communications between the prisons and supporters ensured that the protests were backed up by the largest pro-Irish street demonstrations in several years. A sit down by a small group outside Buckingham Palace on 6 July led to four arrests when the women involved disrupted the ceremonies of the Household Cavalry.243 Other actions briefly impeded the first day of the hyped summer sales in Oxford Street, London while students protested in Edinburgh. The appearance of the four women in Bow Street Court on 7 July on charges relating to the Household Cavalry incident preceded an evening press conference in the House of Commons, convened by the new Irish Political Prisoners Support Group. Joan Maynard MP explained that the men were protesting their right to humane visiting conditions, political status and repatriation. She was assisted by Tom Litterick, MP for Birmingham (Selly Oak), one of several British parliamentarians refused permission to visit the H-Blocks.244 Alastair Logan supported Maynard’s accusation of the ill-treatment of Irish prisoners by reminding the audience that forty cases were pending at the European Commission on Human Rights. He specified the harassment endured by relatives of prisoners who travelled to England.245 Pro-Irish republicans in the US avidly followed such developments.246
The Gartree incident and subsequent discussion in the Commons attracted rare front page coverage from the Times. It was accepted that the complaints of the ‘Irish republican prisoners’ extended to ‘assault and prolonged solitary confinement’, although the published account did not allude to the MPs who had advocated redress. Instead, the conservative orientated daily restated the position Home Secretary Rees had outlined the previous year which they summarized as meaning: ‘There would be neither an amnesty nor the granting of political status for Irish prisoners’.247 Rees was in much closer contact with republicans than was desirable for a prime IRA target, and on one occasion unwittingly procured the plastering services of Cork man Tom Goodchild, mainstay of Harrow Sinn Féin and An Cumann Cabhrach.248
When a major PAC - sponsored rally met at Marble Arch on 9 July, it did so under the banner of ‘End silence on torture of Irish Prisoners of War’. This was boosted in terms of credibility by an Amnesty International report which accused the British authorities of standing over numerous acts of maltreatment in the North of Ireland. The damning text was read in its entirety into the Congressional Record in Washington DC.249 The PAC echoed what Maynard and Logan had asserted in the House of Commons in relation to excesses taking place within England’s Dispersal System.250 Around 5,000 marched in London, including contingents of the RCG, IMG, Big Flame, Workers Revolutionary Party, UTOM and IRSP, as well as leading elements of Sinn Féin and the PAC. Several trade unions were represented, notably branches of the ASTMS and TGWU.251 Deep ideological divisions within various far left organizations remained, but the display of unity on the prison question produced the largest republican march in London since 1972.252
Most of the Hyde Park speakers addressed the deepening H-Block crisis, although the English dimension to the wider prison struggle was well noted, and many of the placards listed the names of those held in the Dispersal System.253 Kaye claimed in an interview with Republican News that the ‘courageous stand taken by the prisoners’ in Ireland had been critical to the success of the London rally.254 Sinn Féin (Britain) was represented by Jim Reilly, who addressed the crowd.255 Vanessa Redgrave, a famous actress and leading WRP member, was widely quoted as saying on the occasion: ‘victory for the IRA in their struggle against imperialism’.256 Her comments exemplified the type of vigorous left cooperation sought by many inside Sinn Féin and the PAC in England. However, no platform was extended to the SWP in Hyde Park, owing to their visceral protest in the Commons three days earlier, which was regarded as undignified and potentially harmful.257 Despite the minor factional quibbling, Kaye was credited by sympathetic republicans with ‘unifying the fragmented left on this issue’.258 Orchestration favoured the requirements