Tag Archives: David Fleming

force feeding hunger strikers: Frank Stagg documentary on TG4

Tonight TG4 is screening a documentary about Frank Stagg in the Finné series. The programme will look at the events that followed Stagg’s death on hunger strike on 12th February 1976. His brother George will tell the story of how Frank’s remains were seized by the Irish government in an attempt to prevent him receivingContinue reading “force feeding hunger strikers: Frank Stagg documentary on TG4”

The IRA’s ‘Northern Campaign’

Did the IRA mount a ‘northern campaign’ in 1942-43? According to some historians the IRA began a campaign against the northern government in 1942, which most call the ‘Northern Campaign’. Oddly, though, there is no evidence to suggest that the IRA ever formally began such a campaign. In early 1942, under Sean McCool then EoinContinue reading “The IRA’s ‘Northern Campaign’”

British rule in Ireland may, owing to gerrymander, be ballot proof but it is definitely not bullet proof…

I had written previously about David Fleming, who undertook several prolonged hunger strikes in 1944 and 1946, which had a severe impact on his health (and appear to have contributed to his early death in 1971). This month sees the 70th anniversary of his and Sean McCaughey’s parallel protests which ultimately ended in McCaugheys deathContinue reading “British rule in Ireland may, owing to gerrymander, be ballot proof but it is definitely not bullet proof…”

David Fleming: 155 days on hunger strike in 1946

While the horrific circumstances of Sean McCaughey’s death on 11th May 1946 after a 23 day hunger and thirst strike are well known, less people are aware of the story of David Fleming, from Killarney, in County Kerry, who was serving a 12 year sentence on a treason-felony charge in Belfast prison since 1942. FlemingContinue reading “David Fleming: 155 days on hunger strike in 1946”

The 1946 hunger and thirst strike

This is a brief account of a hunger and thirst strike that two prisoners staged in 1946. One involved David Fleming, a southerner imprisoned by the northern government, the other Sean McCaughey, a northerner imprisoned by the southern government (more precisely, De Valera’s Military Tribunal). While Fleming’s hunger strike began first, the agony of McCaughey’s death after aContinue reading “The 1946 hunger and thirst strike”

Some notes on the prison experience in Crumlin Road in the 1940s.

Here are some notes on the conditions in Crumlin Road by 1943-44. They cover the deaths of seven prisoners, conditions inside the prison and accounts of beatings handed out to individual prisoners over that two year period. The dismissal of a prison officer and warders from A wing following the report into the January 1943 escapeContinue reading “Some notes on the prison experience in Crumlin Road in the 1940s.”