Original subtitles

[RADIO STATIONS CHANGE]

Where's this, Ballymurphy?

See who I can see here.

I think that's my street.

Oh, Ballymurphy Road.

Flip me!

I felt a wee bit emotional there, looking back.

They were happy times, I suppose.

Your youth's always pretty happy, isn't it?

You think back, because maybe that's the innocence of the times,

where you don't really know

the stresses and the worries of the older people.

So you're happy in yourself.

You look back and think your life is happy.

It was good.

You don't really do many interviews like this, do you?

No.

I said I would do it for you, and I would just like to do it

and then get it behind me.

I was actually going to phone last week and say,

- "I'm not doing it." - Were you?

I was crying.

I've been crying an awful lot.

The feelings all come back out again,

so putting it out there for people to see,

our life had been on camera long enough, do you know what I mean?

But I'm OK. I'm OK, yeah.

I'm strong.

The Troubles, that's been our life from, you know,

from we were children, and the flick of a switch,

your life changed for ever.

You're brought into that that group of victims that have been affected

by the Troubles.

You're one of them.

It's turned out lovely. Look at that.

Somebody is looking down on you.

This is Upperlands.

We're about 40 miles from Belfast and 40 miles from Londonderry.

My name is June McMullan.

I'm just a country lass from Northern Ireland.

Upperlands, it's a quiet, quiet, sleepy wee village

in the middle of nowhere.

Everybody would know everybody.

I know our village was very much Protestant,

but that didn't mean we wouldn't have let Catholics in

or anything like that.

We were mixing together at school and youth clubs

and things like that.

I met Johnny on a Friday night at a wee tiny Orange Hall

in the middle of nowhere.

I was going with him when I was about 14 and a half

and I mind my mother chasing him from the door,

saying, "Away home, the boy, ye!"

But, no, he kept coming back.

He was a gentle person.

And he had a car.

If you know what a Lada is! It was like a skip

with a roof, and he loved them cars.

When you got a lift to a dance, you need to make sure

you got a lift home.

So he would take all us girls home.

When you're out in the country, like, the Troubles were happening

in other places.

There was nothing in our area, what were they going to blow up?

A couple of sheep, a couple of cows in the field,

like a tree or something like that?

Country life is so, so different to city life.

On the news, it was constantly talked.

IRA, IRA,

UDA, UVF.

Any kids that were reared in the city

couldn't have had much of a life.

There were so many bombs going off in the city.

This is the reality of Belfast today.

Bombs in the city centre,

so much disruption, so many explosions.

From time to time,

you forget that it's become part of everyday life.

And that really is one of the tragedies of it.

My name is Bernadette O'Rawe.

I grew up in the Ballymurphy area of West Belfast.

It wasn't much fun in Ballymurphy.

But you made your own fun in the area, you know?

I was just coming up for maybe 16, I think.

I hadn't really been anywhere outside the area

because you couldn't go into the town

because there was random bombs here or there.

So people tended to stay within their own areas

from both communities.

There was a community centre, that became one of the places to go.

I met Ricky in 1975.

We met in the community centre, and that's where we began our story.

We met at a dance.

She was four years younger than me.

Couldn't believe my good fortune.

I had the best-looking girl in West Belfast,

punching over my weight.

No, I just liked the look of him.

We got together, we went out together,

and then I got to know him.

And then I kind of liked what I got to know.

Maybe I got filled in about Ricky's family and his background

from my own daddy, who knew more about them

because he went about with his daddy.

And then I started to realise how much Republicanism

was in his family, because up till then, I didn't know

much about Republicanism.

In fact, I didn't know anything about it.

[NEWS REPORT IN GERMAN]

The future of Ballymurphy is very bleak.

That's me.

This German documentary team were looking for someone

to speak about Ballymurphy.

Really, there was no work and there was no money.

And it was a society that lived from hand to mouth.

I mean, for a revolutionary, it was tailor made.

I was involved in the IRA.

By the time Bernie came on the scene,

I'd been involved for almost four years.

She knew I was a Provisional IRA man.

I was known as a gunman.

And I liked it.

I liked the thought of taking the fight to the British.

And I was a committed Republican, I truly was.

If you're going to be out on operations, sooner or later,

you're going to get caught or you're going to get killed.

One or the other.

I was 18, I was pregnant, and then we decided to get married.

I didn't really know what else to expect.

I knew I was going to be a mother.

When we got married, I knew he was in the IRA.

But I said to him, "No, I don't want you in the IRA because I don't want

"to be left sitting as a prisoner's wife."

And he said, "OK, then, I'll give it up."

But he didn't.

He didn't.

We got this house up in Moyard and he left the house one morning

and said he was going to look for a job.

I said, "Right, OK, then, I'll see you later."

What had you told her that morning?

That I was going to go out, looking for a job.

- Looking for work? - Yep.

To sustain their operations,

the Provisional IRA have launched a concerted campaign

of armed robbery,

and hundreds of thousands of pounds have been stolen,

much of it to fund the Provisional IRA.

We were asked to rob this bank for the IRA.

It was an order.

We robbed the bank, held up the staff, we held up

the customers and filled a pillowcase full of money.

It was a good old-fashioned Jesse James type robbery.

Cops were waiting on us outside the bank.

I ended up getting arrested and I remember actually saying

the words, "Mother Ireland, get off my fucking back."

Right?

He was sent out to rob a bank,

and I was absolutely flabbergasted.

Sent out to rob a bank? For who?

He's not in anything.

And I thought, how was I so stupid not to know that he was still there?

It was awful.

It truly was, it was awful.

And you feel like an absolute bastard.

And I let her down badly.

He was sentenced to eight years.

This was exactly what I didn't want.

I thought, "Oh, no, no!

"Now I'm going to be a prisoner's wife.

"Now I'm going to be a single mother."

I didn't have much of a dream prior to that

but we got married and I thought,

"Well, we have a baby now, so we'll make this dream along the way."

But this was a broken dream.

This turned into a nightmare.

And I was very, very angry with Ricky.

Very let down, very hurt.

And it was a very hard and very lonely time.

This is the home for the majority of those convicted of terrorist

offences in Northern Ireland.

It's called the Maze prison, where just over 1,000 prisoners

are kept in the so-called H-blocks.

The government ruled on March 1st last year that terrorists

convicted of crimes committed after that date would no longer

get special category status but must wear prison uniform,

just like ordinary criminals.

We were in prison because we were fighting the struggle

against the British government.

Prior to 1st March 1976,

all Republican prisoners didn't have to wear prison clothes.

They didn't have to do prison work.

They could be in their own cages, have their own command structure,

virtually political prisoners.

That was the prevailing wind until the Brits says

there will be no more political status. From here on in,

every prisoner is a criminal.

The Republican prisoners, they refused to be criminalised.

They refused to wear prison clothes.

They refused to do prison work.

And they were thrown into a cell and they were thrown a blanket,

hence the term "blanket man".

# I'm on the blanket protest #

# And my efforts will not fail... #

The time I was sentenced, for me not to go on the blanket

would have been very dishonourable.

# I would not wear their prison garb #

# I was a blanket man #

# I'll not accept their status #

# Never be criminalised... #

My hesitation was Bernadette.

After not telling her I was back in the IRA,

here I was going on this blanket thing, right?

That was going to ensure that every minute that I was on it

was a minute longer before I could get back to her.

Right? So in many ways, it was a double betrayal.

You had to get a minibus up to the jail.

You had a wee box.

And sometimes the prison officer just came in and stood right in

and you only got half an hour a month.

You're looking at a different man.

He was obsessed with his role and his Republicanism,

even though I was sitting there as his wife. I had to go up.

I wanted to go up, but I hated going up.

There were a lot of women out there.

There was a lot of, I would have called them now, looking back,

Republican groupies.

There were some women flocked to men.

They looked up to and admired these men.

You know, there was this machoism they thought came from them.

You know, Republicanism and that sort of life,

it was OK for them.

It just wasn't OK for me.

Women were left carrying the can.

You know, they'd to do the triple shift, is what they say.

You know, keep the men happy in jail and look after the kids

and run the house.

Women were like second-class citizens.

When most of the men were in prison,

their kids were reared by the women.

Those kids were... They were lost as well.

There was a whole generation of kids lost.

They grew up and it was such an unbalanced society.

They grew up without their fathers, without a father figure.

I'm Bernadette McDonnell.

I grew up in Lyndon Avenue, it was just off Andersonstown.

There was me, my mummy, Joseph, and my daddy when he was there.

I can remember Mummy saying that it was a thing then,

like, fellas didn't push prams. It was a woman's job.

She says, "Your da, when he came back,"

she said, "He pushed yous up and down them hills,"

and, you know, he was so proud.

He was always, you know, hands on. Whenever he could, he would.

He was there.

My daddy was my daddy.

My daddy was just an ordinary man.

Nobody knew you were in the IRA.

I sort of can't remember the bomb itself.

It would have been just on the news.

I can remember them coming in saying they got my daddy.

He was sentenced, when he went to Long Kesh,

got sentenced for 14 and a half years.

So when he went there, he decided there and then

that he wasn't taking visits and would not let me or Joseph see him.

- So you didn't see your dad? - No.

Four and a half years.

The only communication we had with him was wee letters

that were smuggled in and out of the prison.

And there was nothing worse than your mummy,

if you were messing about, or you'd done something,

and she'd have said, "I'm writing to your daddy."

The thought of it would have killed you!

And it was... We laugh about it now. Like, what could he have done?

You know, when you get older you realise,

"Sure, what could he have done?"

But then it was, "Oh, she's going to write and tell him."

My mummy just had to get strong.

Mummy had two young kids to look after.

[NEWSREEL]: The number of killed and injured have made this

the worst weekend for months in Northern Ireland.

But as in the case of most reprisals,

the people who suffered weren't the ones who started it all.

Just innocent customers sitting in a bar.

[NEWSREEL]: A bus carrying workers to their homes in Bessbrook village

was stopped by gunmen and ten Protestants shot in cold blood.

A Republican group admitted responsibility.

A Protestant paramilitary organisation is thought responsible

for the bomb, which killed two and injured five members

of Lisburn's Hibernian Club last night.

I hated to see the news.

I hated to see another... somebody had been blew up,

somebody had been shot.

[NEWSREEL]: It's the first time in several months that the letter bomb

has been used as a weapon in Northern Ireland,

and this will no doubt be seen as an escalation

of the Provisional IRA's campaign against prison officers.

A number of the devices have been delivered

in and around Belfast today.

I thought we were lucky out in the country.

I thought it was a safe haven out there.

There's one of Johnnie and Adrian at the front door of the flat.

That's a good one.

At that stage, Johnnie was working in a mechanic's place,

and he says, "I think I'll hand in my job and join the police."

There you see it's the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

The first time he brung the forms home,

I threw them in the bin. I thought, "No, I will not.

"I'll not go that road." It wasn't... it wasn't safe.

[SIREN WAILS]

[ARCHIVE REEL]: By any standards, the RUC is unique.

No other force in the United Kingdom is permanently armed with guns.

Our main problem, of course, is the fact that we undertake

policing in a province that's divided against itself.

And it's against that background that the police have to perform

their duties, which are in service of both and all sections

of the community.

You could hear in the news that police were being targeted.

Probably the Republican side of the community would have seen

the police as representing the Queen and the British government,

and they didn't want that.

I just thought we'd be better not going down that road

and staying away.

And Johnnie said, "No, it'd be a better job, better pension,

"better life, better pay." So he joined.

It was a good job. It was a good living.

There wouldn't have been any riots down in round where we lived.

So Johnnie's way of life would have been just doing his job,

but being extra careful.

He loved going out in the community and doing the work of the police.

We were very happy.

We weren't getting a great deal of traction from outside in general,

because we were lying there every day and we were doing nothing

on the blanket and nobody had much interest in us.

And the dirty protests started and a bit of momentum gathered.

[ARCHIVE REEL]: These are the first pictures to be taken

of the protesters.

We put shit on the wall and piss out the door.

We were doing something positive,

as we seen it, we were fighting back.

There was actually a fight.

We're political prisoners! We want political status!

We're political prisoners!

We didn't shave, we didn't wash.

We didn't brush our teeth for three and a half years.

You walked in the H Block,

you were hit with an abominable smell.

Bloody drain running.

I hated maggots. Hated them.

The next thing, these fucking things came and started to emerge.

And I was aghast. Never seen a maggot in my life.

Dozens of them!

Here's me, "Fuck! What are we going to do?"

But there was other guys, their hair was just full

of dozens and dozens of maggots.

It was horrendous.

But the camaraderie was just incredible.

That was the one thing that kept the blanket men together.

And did Bernadette visit you? Every month, religiously.

It was very, very unpleasant.

I don't think I would ever forget the smell.

Ever forget the smell, or ever forget what it was like

even kissing Ricky.

I used to go home and try and rub my lips,

you know, because I could feel that smell on my lips.

And this was horrendous.

It was a horrific experience.

She had to kiss me because I had to give over

wee letters, wee communications... we called them comms...

to the outside leadership.

It was wee tissue papers and when Ricky came on a visit

then you had to kiss it over.

There was just this assumption, you'll be brought down,

you'll go in there, you'll get that letter.

It was just this expectancy.

I was told what to do, as if they owned me.

When you say they owned you, who is the "they"?

The Provos, the Sinn Fein. The Provos, you know,

they were the ones the letters was coming from, back and forward.

I just felt I'm drawn into this wee world here

where I don't want to be.

All the time all this anger was growing inside of me.

I got by, but I hated it.

I hated every minute of being a prisoner's wife.

I never knew the word hate until I got married,

until this happened.

[MARGARET THATCHER]: Her Majesty The Queen has asked me to form

a new administration. Where there is discord,

may we bring harmony.

And where there is despair, may we bring hope.

[NEWSREEL]: Lord Mountbatten has been killed by an explosion on his yacht

off the west coast of the Irish Republic.

The Provisional IRA have said they did it.

The blast also killed his grandson, Nicholas, who was 14.

A member of the crew died as well.

Lord Mountbatten was a close relative of both the Queen

and the Duke of Edinburgh.

[NEWSREEL]: It was at Warrenpoint last week that all the British Army's

fears about the new Provisional IRA organisation and tactics

were confirmed.

[NEWSREEL]: This multiple killing, the worst the security forces

have ever suffered in Northern Ireland, coming as it does

after the Mountbatten tragedy, must serve to only further

heighten tensions in Northern Ireland.

Now, don't move.

Can you please stand still? And I will move.

I will move to see the people. How are you?

Lord Mountbatten was Britain, and Britain was Lord Mountbatten.

Raze the H Block! We want H Block wiped out!

We want freedom for our country!

And your soldiers out!

[NEWSREEL]: The British government have made it clear

there's no going back to the pre '76 arrangements and meanwhile,

neither the blanket protest nor the dirty protest

have had the slightest effect in persuading the authorities

that those convicted of terrorist offences

should have political status.

The British government just sat back and said,

"Fuck them. Who cares?"

We were on the dirty protest for the guts of three and a half years

and it had run its course.

The British conceded none of our five demands.

So we had to end it.

Something needed to present itself.

And what presented itself was the hunger strike.

Well, there was a huge list.

There might have been 70 or 80 names on it,

with people wanting to go on hunger strike.

And our job was to pick people who would die.

It's as simple as that.

Bobby Sands went on hunger strike, on his own, on 1st March.

[MARGARET THATCHER]: We have a hunger strike at the Maze prison

in the quest for what they call political status.

There is no such thing as political murder, political bombing

or political violence.

There is only criminal murder, criminal bombing

and criminal violence.

We will not compromise on this.

There will be no political status.

Everything got more tense.

You know, when you went up for a visit,

things were getting worse on the outside and, you know,

the whole thing was gathering momentum.

[SHOUTING, DRUMS BANGING]

[CROWD]: Brits out!

People who had no interest were putting their weight

to get behind the prisoners, to get this situation resolved,

in the hope of trying to save lives.

You thought by putting your face in the crowd and building the crowd

that maybe the numbers here on the streets will get this stopped.

The torture must be called by its proper name.

So must all forms of oppression

and exploitation of man by the state, of one people by the other.

[ARCHIVE REEL]: Britain's problem does not end with Sands.

Behind the corrugated defences of the Maze prison,

there are three other men in the queue

for an agonising martyrdom.

The IRA has phased the hunger strike to maximise pressure on the British.

As the hunger strikers near the critical stage,

the atmosphere will become more tense.

The temperature will raise.

The frustration will become more intense.

And eventually there will be a confrontation.

You did feel sorry for them, but I didn't think they would go

as far as what they did.

I thought they would have called it off, like the dirty protest.

Like, who in this day and age would starve themselves to death

for a cause?

The wing itself became like a morgue.

It was a death march.

Because we all knew Bobby wasn't going to stop.

Unless the British moved...

...substantially, he was going to die.

Mrs Sands, when are you coming to see your son again?

Tomorrow. Tomorrow again.

Do you think if he does go into a coma,

you would give the authorisation for him to be intravenously fed?

No, he told me not to.

It's a sad thing to say, and I would feel...

I love my son, just like any other mother does,

but I wouldn't.

After 21 days or something, he left our wing

and was taken up to the prison hospital.

I remember just talking,

just having a quiet word with him. "How are you, Bob?"

And there was an awful sadness in his eyes.

He didn't want to die.

He was hoping against hope that some solution could be found.

[NEWSREEL]: An IRA man on hunger strike in the Maze prison,

Bobby Sands, has been left with a straight fight

against the official Unionist candidate, Mr Harry West,

in next month's Fermanagh and South Tyrone by-election,

after the withdrawal of the independent candidate.

Sands, Bobby.

Anti H Block, Armagh. Political prisoner,

30,000... [CHEERING]

...492...

[ARCHIVE REEL]: Hunger striker prisoner Bobby Sands

has won the by-election in Northern Ireland by a narrow majority,

but it's still a propaganda boost for the IRA.

There was a hope.

It was a very faint hope that maybe because he was now an MP,

Thatcher would be reluctant to let him die.

I understand Mr Sands is still on hunger strike and I regret

that he has not decided to come off it.

No concessions as they have asked for?

No. There can be no possible concessions on political status.

[ARCHIVE REEL]: Bobby Sands, IRA man serving a 14-year sentence

for arms offences, begins the 61st day of his hunger strike.

How's your son, Mrs Sands?

My son's dying, and I would like to appeal to the people...

...for to remain calm

and to have no fighting or cause no death or destruction.

Take it away.

Thanks very much.

[NEWSREEL]: In the last hour, the news has filtered through

to this community that Bobby Sands has died after 66 days

of hunger strike.

It was just awful. It was just...

...incredibly, incredibly sad.

You know?

It was a blessing...

...to have met him.

[BIN LIDS RATTLE]

I can remember hearing the bin lids when Bobby Sands died.

There was a lot more rioting.

It definitely did up the ante, there's no doubt about that.

Belfast was ratcheted up to boiling point, you know.

It was craziness.

The tribal thing split the two communities in half.

But the Catholics would be mourning the death of the hunger strikers,

and we'd be praying for them to die, you know what I mean?

[GUNFIRE]

Oh, I just get the shivers, even thinking about it.

The atmosphere was so heavy.

You felt it and you heard it.

You just knew it's going to just explode.

I think those, for me, are probably the worst times that I remember,

whenever Northern Ireland was very, very close to all-out civil war.

Let's have you, you fucking bastard!

[EXPLOSIONS]

Can I ask you how you feel about Bobby Sands' death?

Delighted. Delighted.

Here, yo, yo, yo!

I mean, there was 100,000 people or something

at Bobby Sands' funeral.

There was so much fear and anger and hopelessness.

[GUNFIRE]

I carried a wreath at Bobby's funeral, behind the coffin.

Bobby was just my daddy's friend.

I can remember Bobby's family.

Bobby's son.

Heartbreaking.

Heartbreaking seeing them standing at the grave.

Did you ever think when you saw that that you would be in that position?

No, never.

It was Friday night and my mummy got us before we went to bed.

Just got us, me and Joseph together and told us.

Explained to us what was happening.

That my daddy was going on hunger strike the next day.

We got up the next day and the cameras were all

outside the front door.

My husband could die.

I know he could die.

And if my husband did die, I would still... I will continue

and fight until every man, every Irish man is free.

I'm young, I want my husband, and my children need their father.

We got to see my daddy on hunger strike.

That was the first time in four and a half years.

So to see your daddy after four and a half years,

it was very special. Very special.

I can remember just seeing him standing there.

He was gorgeous. He was lovely. He was just my daddy.

To me that day, he was Joe McDonnell, my daddy.

He wasn't Joe McDonnell, hunger striker.

He put us on his knee, he let us sit on his knee.

And I remember my aunt saying, "Get off your knee,

"get off your daddy's knee."

He says, "I'll hold them here as long as I can."

It was really, really lovely.

A week later, Frank Hughes is dead.

[BIN LIDS RATTLE]

I would just like to say that Margaret Thatcher,

the British government, has murdered my brother.

Francis' blood is on Margaret Thatcher's hands.

Thatcher was as static as ever.

"Fuck them. Let them die. Bring it on."

It's a tragedy that young men should be persuaded, coerced

or ordered to starve themselves to death for a futile cause.

It would seem that dead hunger strikers who have extinguished

their own lives are of more use to the Provisional IRA

than living members.

Two weeks after that, we had the deaths of Raymond McCreesh

and Patsy O'Hara.

So there was four hunger strikers dead.

So you had this sort of cycle of death.

There was quite a lot of murders during the hunger strike.

Another policeman, another soldier.

Johnnie had been on the police for about a year.

We were scared.

[NEWSREEL]: The bomb went off and the policeman who died

was 23-year-old Kenneth Atchison, who lived with his wife

and baby son in Armagh.

The IRA have always viewed the RUC as legitimate targets.

They've always viewed them as the defenders of the state.

This was Constable Robinson's local pub.

The gunmen were obviously aware of his movements and were waiting

for him to leave.

And did the IRA make a distinction between good cops and bad cops?

No such thing.

As far as the IRA was concerned, they were all bad cops.

Did you ever consider that police officers have families?

No. It is never the individual. The IRA attacked the uniform.

They didn't attack Henry Jones or Bertie Smith.

They attacked the uniform.

In our village, there had been a young man going home from work

on the main road when another car came up behind him

and tried to shoot him.

Only the gun jammed and the magazine fell out.

Then that heightened the whole security thing.

You were just... You knew this had come home.

This had touched our village.

You know, the Troubles had come to sleepy Upperlands.

You'd have been going shopping and watching,

was there anyone following you, or was there a car sitting about?

When you had someone in the security forces in your family,

that was your way of life.

Constantly living the fear of not knowing

when it would be your turn.

Every time you turned the TV on, somebody was dead.

Six IRA men were killed, there were 13 paratroopers were killed.

Another policeman was killed.

Just so much killing in this place, and it's becoming so normal.

But we were a very dysfunctional and broken society.

I don't think Berna...

Bernadette didn't handle the whole thing well at all.

Bernadette came up on a visit.

And all I talked about the whole visit was the hunger strike,

and she snapped.

And she says, "I don't... I don't give a fuck about you.

"I don't give a fuck about your hunger strike."

I was so angry. So angry.

I didn't want to go up there and listen about the so-called war.

I think at that stage, they must've thought I was having the breakdown,

because they sent somebody up to the house.

This was after a visit.

And I said, "Fuck you and fuck the IRA.

"Fuck Maggie Thatcher and fuck Richard O'Rawe."

So it wasn't a good place.

It wasn't a good place.

We were going up to see our daddy.

And because he was on hunger strike then, we got to see him more.

Two fellas in America had decided that they were going to try

and take kids out of the conflict from both sides

over to America to give them a break during the summer.

And Joseph decided he wasn't going.

So I says I wasn't going.

My daddy says to me, "Please go. Go, love."

He says, "Go there and tell everybody.

"Tell everybody what's happening here."

So I did. I just wanted to make him proud.

[ARCHIVE REEL]: Over 700 children from both sides of the divide

are flying to America to holiday together.

I'm going to Upper State New York. New York.

What are you going to do out in the States?

- Play football. - Get a girl!

Well, we're here on Flight E435,

and it's just a few minutes before take-off.

It was difficult because I was leaving my daddy.

I was leaving my mummy and Joseph, but I knew I had to do it.

I went on TV. I went on the radio.

Papers, anything just to try and keep my daddy alive.

[ARCHIVE REEL]: I was out playing on the swing,

and I heard five big shots going off,

and you'd think the sky was just coming in on you.

Now, your dad, I think we should say your dad is in prison, right?

- Yes. - And he's also one of the hunger strikers, isn't he? - Yes.

Can anybody help the situation, do you think, in Northern Ireland?

Well, if the people of America would write to President Reagan,

he might phone Mrs Thatcher and then the pressure

would be put on Mrs Thatcher and she will have to do something.

Unbelievable, isn't it, like, for a ten-year-old?

You know, we had to let the world know.

You felt that responsibility? Yes, I did feel that responsibility,

yeah.

[ARCHIVE REEL]: Ten-year-old Bernadette McDonnell is visiting

a Long Island, New York family.

Her father, Joseph McDonnell, is seven weeks into a hunger strike

in Maze prison. He's fighting for his country.

When you saw him last Saturday, how was he?

Well, his teeth was starting to stick out.

And he was spitting up water.

Is he?

And every day, Bernadette awaits her aunt's telephone calls

on her father's condition.

She knows she'll lose him, but she says the struggle

to get the British out of Northern Ireland will go on.

We'll just go on doing what we've been doing.

Helping on the streets and watching.

I can't remember that one.

That was a wee bit more...

...harder to watch that one.

- Why? - Erm, I seen a child holding back.

Holding back in crying.

Holding back in maybe just wanting to run home.

Maybe just... Just holding back.

Well, tonight, the man with most at stake is the hunger striker

Joe McDonnell, now about to enter his 61st day without food.

He's said to be very weak, and his family are at his bedside.

I can remember getting phone calls.

I knew my daddy wasn't good.

I just knew by the phone calls.

And I wanted home.

And my aunt came and got me from the airport.

And we were coming up Kennedy Way onto Andytown road,

and there was a bus burning.

And I says, "What's the bus burning for?"

And they shouted, "Joe McDonnell's dead."

So that's how I found out my daddy was dead.

[BIN LIDS RATTLE]

At that time my daddy's body was home.

And I can remember looking at him and crying.

I cried and I cried hard.

And that was it, I didn't cry again.

I wasn't going to do this.

We just kissed the coffin.

And that was my 11th birthday.

My daddy was buried on my 11th birthday.

All I ever wanted when I was a kid was my daddy.

Just my daddy to be there. I think any wee girl wants their daddy.

That poor wee girl, I remember her mummy and I remember

what they went through.

You didn't think you were ever going to come out of it.

You didn't know... Does anybody want to resolve this?

And you were going, "There's lives here.

"There are lives, there are men dying.

"Somebody swallow your pride, do something."

The thing was like a juggernaut, an out-of-control juggernaut.

[NEWSREEL]: With six hunger strikers now dead and two more likely

to die within a few days,

the IRA protest, far from fizzling out

as some people thought it might,

seems to be making a growing impact.

Nobody knew where it was going or how it was going to end.

[SHOUTS AND GUNFIRE]

[NEWSREEL]: Now nine prisoners dead, the strike has still not ended.

Another IRA man began refusing food today.

There were violent scenes in Dublin as a demonstration in support

of the hunger strikers was broken up.

By then it was clear this war could have no winner.

This is where they were planning to come to live.

It's decorated to perfection.

Oh, they had done very well, you know,

to have this house finished for the new baby coming home on Friday.

We actually had moved house and I was papering.

I was putting wallpaper on and I went into early labour.

So I went into hospital on the Thursday morning.

And then Johnnie was born on the Thursday night.

- How was that? - That was quick!

That was quick, when he wasn't due for another five weeks.

On the Saturday night when I was still in hospital,

my friend and neighbour had been shot dead in the village.

And Johnnie had come up to the hospital that night to tell me.

That was a shock.

Alan was security forces as well.

So that would be the first night that it brought it home to him

that he had a target on his back.

Johnnie went to his funeral and carried his coffin.

Then he came up that night to visit.

I can still recall that day, that night.

Still recall waiting on Johnnie coming to the hospital.

It's husbands only at night,

so no-one else is allowed in to visit.

And he'd come in and we had sandwiches in the ward.

Somebody had brought sandwiches up, and we were having tea

and sandwiches, and we were still chatting.

Then it come that time, it's time to go home.

You know, you can still see yourself walking down the corridor,

saying goodnight and hurrying back up the corridor

to the window and then standing there to wait for his car

to come up, which never came.

You know, you're standing at the window

and the gunmen's car come up.

I was only in hospital for five days,

and within five days,

the IRA had everything set up, you know,

for to kill him that night.

[GUNSHOTS]

[NEWSREEL]: John Proctor was the 17th policeman to be killed

in Ulster this year.

But the cold-blooded cruelty of John Proctor's murder

has left people shocked and horrified.

He was just getting into the car.

We'd bought a new car and he was getting into the car,

so it was, and Johnnie didn't see them.

And they shot him in the back. In the back.

Of all places, in the back.

Our whole families were just ripped apart.

Like, the hunger strikers, they had a choice on their life,

whether to starve themselves and give up their life,

whereas Johnnie didn't pick that he wanted to be killed that night

outside the hospital, you know.

He got no choice in that.

That night, he wasn't a policeman.

He was a father and a husband going up to see his newborn son.

[ARCHIVE REEL]: The day after the funeral,

June returned to the hospital where John was killed

to collect the new baby.

Is that our wee baby? Is it?

- Coat? - No, that's not a coat. That's his shawl.

- Shawl? - Shawl. You have to wrap that round him and keep him warm.

That's to keep him warm.

June had intended to call the new baby Ryan,

but he'll now be christened John, after his father.

That's your wee brother! Isn't it? Baby! Baby.

Everything changed.

It's going to be a whole new world.

Not one we had planned, but...

Two boys and no father.

Did you sort of wonder why it had to be your dad?

Not then, no.

Afterwards maybe.

I can't imagine a life...

...with him being there, because he wasn't, you know what I mean?

But I can tell you what he missed.

Yeah.

He's missed a life with my mummy.

He's missed watching me and Joseph grow up.

He's missed out on life himself.

But he done it for us.

Done it for his country.

I still get people that come to me and say he was a hero.

How does it make me feel?

Proud. Very proud.

Everything about the Troubles was sad.

Every life that was lost during the Troubles was sad.

Whether you were a police officer or a soldier,

a UVF man, an IRA man, a hunger striker.

Every life was precious.

And yet life here meant nothing.

So many broken hearts.

So many broken hearts in this country.

I left prison. Bernadette said to me,

"Look, I want you out of everything."

And, erm... She says, "It's like this here.

"It's either the Republican movement, or me and your daughter."

So I left the movement.

And I think I put her through hell, and I regret that.

We made it through.

Surprising as it was, and tough as it was.

We are lucky that we're still alive and we're still together

and we got here, because so many people from that period of time...

...didn't make it through.

- You're still married. - Still here!

- You did it. - Yeah.

- 46. - 46 years now.

46 years married.

46 golden years!

No comment!

[NEWSREEL]: The principal strand of evidence linking this man,

Seamus Martin Kearney, to the killing was a cigarette butt

found close to the getaway car.

The judge imposed a life sentence.

We were robbed of our justice.

I've had good times. I've remarried.

I've had more family.

I've grandchildren.

But it's always been there.

The hatred is there. I've lived my life with that.

My prayers at night, I could never say

"and forgive those that trespass against us".

I can't say that. I can't say that in my prayer.

[ARCHIVE REEL]: Do you know who does all this?

Our life was living a lie all of the time.

Did I say something? Did I slip up?

[EXPLOSIONS] Jesus!

[GUNFIRE]

A terrorist is a terrorist is a terrorist.

You've got to remove those people from society.

One wrong word can lead to somebody dying.

Loose talk costs lives.

To watch exclusive interviews about the making of this series,

visit...

...and follow the links to the Open University.