to the extraordinary context in which his move occurred, Walsh noted: ‘I was transferred on Home Office instruction … On passing through Reception at Parkhurst, the Reception Officer removed from my possession 34 LP (long-playing) records’ on the technical grounds that only nine had been listed on his property sheet and they could, therefore, be confiscated.261 The response of 11 May 1979 confirmed that the Secretary of State was ‘not prepared’ to return his albums.262 Walsh learned on 29 May 1979 that while solicitors Woodford & Ackroyd of Southampton were unable to pursue his mooted case with the European Court, Alastair Logan of George E Baker & Co, Guildford, had consented to add his complaint to those already in preparation at his office.263
Hull convictions
The 1976 Hull riot created English legal history in York Crown Court on 15 January 1979 when Justice Boreham conceded that police background checks could be conducted to ensure that no juror had a criminal record. Sixty potential jurors had their names submitted to Central Criminal Records delaying the start to proceedings for over two hours.264 Prosecutor Peter Taylor QC claimed that the thirteen defendants had assaulted prisoners in a ‘deliberate exercise in retribution’.265 Evidence on 17 January from one former Hull staff member then working in Wakefield claimed that the IRA had been ‘in the forefront of the riot’ and ‘still had channels of communication from prison to the outside world … IRA prisoners regarded themselves as prisoners of war’.266 This apparent bid to highlight the extenuating circumstances in play revealed something of the perceived role of the state employees, eight of whom were found guilty on 4 April 1979 of ‘conspiracy to assault’ prisoners after the riot. All received token suspended sentences from Judge Boreham. Four co-defendants and Assistant Governor Douglas McCombe were acquitted in rulings which lessened the impression that the violence of prison staff at Hull had been co-ordinated from the top. Brian Cooke, a Principal Officer and chair of Hull branch of the POA, expressed disappointment at the outcome and predicted that the ‘attitude’ of his members towards prisoners ‘would harden’.267 Dick Pooley of PROP, by contrast, welcomed the unusual convictions which he believed to be historic in their implications.268 The PAC were less enthusiastic and commented that a small number of those responsible for beating prisoners had received suspended sentences of ‘derisory’ proportions. If, as the PROP enquiry in London alleged, Irish and black prisoners had suffered disproportionate injury, the precedent of moderate punishment established in York did not auger well.269 The Observer queried in relation to those convicted: ‘Can the Prison Department claim to have any disciplinary standards at all if the men remain prison officers?’270
Gerry Cunningham, who had for tactical reasons set aside IRA reticence regarding court environs to give evidence at the trial, felt vindicated despite the partial nature of the legal victory. He had contacted his solicitor, Alastair Logan, and said ‘Right, ok, take the case to court. These people were effectively criminals at large at the time they made their statements against me and I want my thirteen months [loss of] remission back’. Eventually, in the face of obstruction from the Board of Visitors, Cunningham was apprised that he was entitled to make periodic requests for the restoration of remission. Whereas the Tyrone man was willing to demand the lost time, he refused to seek it by the demeaning avenue of repeated BOV applications. This principled and politically informed stance ensured that Cunningham spent thirteen months longer in jail than was necessary.271 He was ultimately and politely urged to exit Long Lartin in November 1988, a jail where he gained considerable influence among the prisoner population.272
The verdicts in York followed closely on the re-opening of Hull after a long period of renovation necessitated by the riot. Governor Parr was reinstated in what was interpreted by prisoners as a provocative move on the part of the Home Office. This view gained credence when the PAC ascertained, on the basis of reports from IRA prisoners transferred into Hull, that the stringent policies which had helped spark the riot were still extant. In the context of the minimal chastisement of men found guilty of assaulting inmates, republicans anticipated further grievances. Andy Mulryan, Ronnie McCartney and James ‘Punter’ Bennett were in Hull by May 1979, along with the innocent Dick McIlkenny of the Birmingham Six.273 A minor fracas in C Wing over recreational facilities had already occurred without detriment to the administrators. McCartney followed a stay in the Punishment Block with a twenty-eight day ‘lie down’ in Armley and it was reported that the slightest infringement in Hull resulted in fourteen days’ solitary confinement. With the doubling of staff on the wings from two to four, the risk of detection was raised in what remained a cloistered community.274 When, in July 1979, Joan Maynard MP sought statistical information on breaches of Prison Rules at Hull in 1978, Whitelaw responded with an unconvincing claim that such data was ‘not readily available’.275 Minute details regarding Category A prisoners were, in fact, meticulously logged by dedicated staff members and available to members of the Home Office ‘Category A Committee’.
Martin Brady, O/C of the IRA prisoners in Hull at the time of the riot, was returned to A Wing of the Yorkshire prison. His first impression was that the wing was being used as a ‘punishment’ area for ‘anyone that was unruly’ and that the prison as a whole was ‘worse’ than before.276 Paul Hill was also transferred back to Hull and was in Brady’s company when a very serious assault occurred in the TV room. An Australian prisoner reputed to have killed another inmate in Wakefield was badly burned when a man he had angered threw a pot of boiling water mixed with sugar over his body. The rudimentary facilities of the infirmary proved insufficient to treat the wounds inflicted and the Australian was quickly taken by ambulance to an outside hospital. Hill had noticed the attacker preparing the infusion in the kitchen but heeded Brady’s warning to ‘stay away from this’.277
Jackie Kaye addressed a Conference on European Political Prisoners hosted by Sinn Féin in Liberty Hall, Dublin, on 21–23 April 1979. Attention was drawn to the PTA, which had already resulted in the deportation of around 200 Irish people from Britain and 4,000 temporarily detained.278 Pat McCarthy of the National Council for Civil Liberties in Britain appeared in a private capacity and explained how the PTA was being used to process exclusion orders against defence witnesses in political trials and increasingly targeted Britons who had protested Westminster’s policy in Ireland. Des Warren, a communist trade unionist whose activism had resulted in prosecution for illegal picketing, addressed the theme. Warren was one of the ‘Shrewsbury Three’ jailed in 1973 and was widely regarded in consequence as a former political prisoner.279 Fellow ‘Shrewsbury Three’ member, trade unionist turned actor Ricky Tomlinson, was less tolerant of mixing with IRA Volunteers in prison.280
Maintaining a physical presence in locations where IRA prisoners were held was an ongoing problem. Despite the best efforts of the small Tyneside Irish Solidarity Campaign, it required the input from Birmingham Sinn Féin’s Pearse/ McDaid cumann to bring the numbers protesting outside Durham on 27 May up to a modest fifty. The Midlands delegation, aided by members of the city’s UTOM group, traversed 430 miles to attend. Anne and Eileen Gillespie were in Durham, as was Hugh Doherty. Similar protests took place outside Wormwood Scrubs on 2 June, Wakefield on 24 June and Hull on 29 July 1979.281 British-based supporters of the Gillespies realised that if spared the constant stress of being ‘ghosted’, the sisters were far from their parents in Gweedore, Donegal, and the only republicans in the all female H-Wing.282 Unsympathetic authorities regarded them as having formed part of a Manchester ‘sub group’ of the major IRA network in Birmingham. It was noted that their brother, former resident of Manchester, was ‘wanted in the UK’ in relation to political offences but was living in the Twenty-Six Counties in 1978.283 The FCO was, nonetheless, sensitive to public claims that the Irishwomen were either innocent or worthy objects of interest by Irish politicians. On 26 May 1978 HAJ Staples of the FCO reported that he had taken Donegal Fine Gael TD Paddy Harte ‘mildly to task for having referred to the Gillespie case by name at last week’s Ard Fheis’. According to Staples: ‘He took this quietly and almost looked abash. He implied that he had let the name slip out unintentionally, and he had subsequently ensured that it did not appear in the written record’.284
The sisters improvised day-to-day strategies to preserve their personal security, composure, dignity and identity. To avoid seeking favour from a position of permanent disadvantage,
