"The Men Behind the Wire" is a song written and composed by Paddy McGuigan of the Barleycorn folk group in the aftermath of Operation Demetrius. The song describes police raids in Northern Ireland by British security forces during the Troubles, and the "men behind the wire" refers to those interned without trial at HM Prison Maze, HM Prison Magilligan and onboard HMS Maidstone.
A prison ship, also known as a prison hulk, is a current or former seagoing vessel that has been modified to become a place of substantive detention for convicts, prisoners of war or civilian internees. While many nations have deployed prison ships over time, the practice was most widespread in 18th- and 19th-century Britain, as the government sought to address the issues of overcrowded civilian jails on land and an influx of enemy detainees from the War of Jenkins' Ear, the Seven Years' War and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.
HMS Maidstone was a submarine depot ship of the Royal Navy. She operated in the Mediterranean Sea, Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean during the Second World War. She was later used as a barracks ship and then a prison ship in Northern Ireland.
Frongoch internment camp at Frongoch in Merionethshire, Wales was a makeshift place of imprisonment during the First World War and the 1916 Easter Rising.
Seamus Twomey was an Irish republican activist, militant, and twice chief of staff of the Provisional IRA.
Milltown Cemetery is a large cemetery in west Belfast, Northern Ireland. It lies within the townland of Ballymurphy, between Falls Road and the M1 motorway.
The blanket protest was part of a five-year protest during the Troubles by Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) and Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) prisoners held in the Maze prison in Northern Ireland. The republican prisoners' status as political prisoners, known as Special Category Status, had begun to be phased out in 1976. Among other things, this meant that they would now be required to wear prison uniforms like ordinary convicts. The prisoners refused to accept the administrative designation of ordinary criminals, and refused to wear the prison uniform.
The Curragh Camp is an army base and military college in The Curragh, County Kildare, Ireland. It is the main training centre for the Irish Defence Forces and is home to 2,000 military personnel.
Operation Demetrius was a British Army operation in Northern Ireland on 9–10 August 1971, during the Troubles. It involved the mass arrest and internment of people suspected of being involved with the Irish Republican Army (IRA), which was waging an armed campaign for a united Ireland against the British state. It was proposed by the Unionist government of Northern Ireland and approved by the British Government. Armed soldiers launched dawn raids throughout Northern Ireland and arrested 342 in the initial sweep, sparking four days of violence in which 20 civilians, two IRA members and two British soldiers were killed. All of those arrested were Irish republicans and nationalists, the vast majority of them Catholics. Due to faulty and out-of-date intelligence, many were no longer involved in republican militancy or never had links with the IRA. Ulster loyalist paramilitaries were also carrying out acts of violence, which were mainly directed against Catholics and Irish nationalists, but no loyalists were included in the sweep.
Máire Drumm was the vice-president of Sinn Féin and a commander in Cumann na mBan. She was assassinated by Ulster loyalists while recovering from an eye operation in Belfast's Mater Hospital.
Jimmy Steele was an Irish republican militant. He was one of the most prominent Irish Republican Army (IRA) men in Belfast after the Irish Civil War who held practically every senior position in the Northern Command of the IRA. Later in life Steele publicly denounced the leadership of the IRA which was a prelude to the split in the IRA. Steele founded and edited several Irish Republican publications. Steele spent a large portion of his life in jails as a result of his actions against British security forces.
HMS Argenta was a prison ship of the British Royal Navy.
Seán Keenan was an Irish republican from Derry, Northern Ireland. His father Seamus Keenan was a Quartermaster in the Irish Republican Army (IRA).
Sir Richard Dawson Bates, 1st Baronet, known as Dawson Bates, was an Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) member of the House of Commons of Northern Ireland.
The Civil Authorities Act 1922, often referred to simply as the Special Powers Act and known as the "Flogging Act", was an act passed by the Parliament of Northern Ireland during the partition of Ireland and shortly after the establishment of Northern Ireland. The Act was renewed annually and in 1928 was renewed for five years and made permanent in 1933 and not repealed until 1973. Its sweeping powers made it highly controversial, and it was seen by much of the Irish nationalist community as a tool of Ulster unionist oppression. The Act was eventually repealed by the Northern Ireland Act 1973, following the abolition of Northern Ireland's parliament and the imposition of direct rule by the British government.
Abercorn Barracks, sometimes referred to as Ballykinlar Barracks or Ballykinler Barracks, is a former military base in Ballykinler in County Down, Northern Ireland. The surrounding training area is retained by the Ministry of Defence.
Hugh Christopher Corvin was an Irish republican leader.
In October 1923 mass hunger strikes were undertaken by Irish republican prisoners protesting the continuation of their internment without trial. The Irish Civil War had ended six months earlier yet the newly formed Provisional Government of the Irish Free State was slow in releasing the thousands of Irish republican prisoners opposed to the Anglo-Irish Treaty.
Seamus Woods commanded a division of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) during a period of intense conflict and was a senior leader of the newly formed Irish Free State army.
Michael Joseph Whitty was an Irish militant and Republican activist who was the youngest of the 22 Irish republicans who died while under on hunger strike in the 20th century. Decades after his death another Volunteer also died on 2 August during the 1981 Irish hunger strike. Volunteer Whitty fought with the IRA in the Irish War of Independence, on the Anti-Treaty side in the Irish Civil War and died while under internment by the Irish Free State government.
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