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Mickey Devine, was known as 'Red Mickey', because of his ginger hair, although his strong political conviction could also have qualified the name. He was the third INLA Volunteer to join the 1981 Hunger Strike. He was 27 years old. Family Michael James Devine was born on 26th May 1954 in the Springtown camp (a former WWII American army base) just outside of of Derry city. Many Catholic families lived in these Derry Corporation ‘huts’, originally meant to provide only temporary accommodation; however this inadequate housing project was not officially closed until the early 1960s. In 1960, the Devines got their new home in Creggan, on the Circular Road. On Christmas eve 1965, when Mickey was only 11, his father fell ill and died six weeks later of leukaemia. In September, 1972, Mickey found his mother dead on the settee. She had unexpectedly died of a brain tumour. His only close remaining relatives were his sister Margaret, and her husband, Frank McCauley. Activism At the first civil rights march in Derry (5th October 1968), when the RUC batoned several hundred protesters at Duke Street, Mickey was only 14 years old. Mickey continued to witness sectarian oppression and hatred from the attack on civil rights marchers in Burntollet in January to the 12th August riots resulting in the ‘Battle of the Bogside’. On two occasions during this strife, Mickey was hospitalised due to police brutality. That summer Mickey left school, and Mickey was one of the volunteers manning the barricades during the Battle of the Bogside. Volunteer In 1971, Mickey became involved with the Labour Party and the Young Socialists. At this time he also joined the Derry Brigade of the OIRA. When british paratroopers brutally murdered 13 civilians on Bloody Sunday (30th January 1972), Mickey became a full-time political and military activist. Around this time OIRA leadership declared a unilateral ceasefire (unpopular with their Derry Volunteers). However, throughout 1973, Mickey remained connected with the Stickies but was becoming increasingly disillusioned by their openly reformist path. Irish Republican Socialist Party In late 1974, Mickey joined the newly formed IRSP; and, Mickey became a founding member of the PLA (People's Liberation Army). Then in early 1975, Mickey helped form the INLA (Irish National Liberation Army), initially created for offensive operational purposes out of the PLA. Incarceration Mickey was arrested, along with Desmond Walmsley and John Cassidy, on 20 September 1976, after an arms raid in Lifford, Co Donegal, from which the INLA commandeered several rifles and shotguns, and three thousand rounds of ammunition. He was held and interrogated for three days in Derry's Stand Road barracks, and then transported to Crumlin Road jail in Belfast. Hunger Strike He was finally sentenced in June 1977 (after 9 months on remand) to 12 years and immediately embarked on the blanket protest. In 1981 he became the seventh man to join the hunger strike. Mickey was due to be released from jail that coming September but instead he rejected the criminalisation and chose to fight and face death. Mickey Devine died at 7:50am on Thursday, 20th August 1981.
Mickey Devine Remembered by E�monn McCann Courtesy of B Spivey of Openly Classist On 23rd May 1981 — the day after Patsy O Hara and Ray Mc Creesh died — Kevin Lynch, a 25-year-old INLA Volunteer from Dungiven (North Derry), became the eighth republican POW to join the hunger strike for political status. Mickey Devine was one of the Hunger Strikers who died. First time I ever saw him, not the first times I saw him but as it wasn't at all the first time I saw him, Mickey Devine, was in 1968 he was a member of the Labour Party Young Socialists in Derry and I was a member of the Labour Party at the time. I remember when we were trapped between two Police cordons in Duke Street on October the 5th I was on the chair making a little speech through a megaphone. There had been various speeches made. A number of people like Austin Curry again and Ivan Cooper calling for "moderation", "peace", decorum", "good taste" and "for everybody to go Home!" (Laughter) You know, myself and one or two others made speeches that were later characterised in the magistrate's court as 'incitement to riot!' (Laughter) You know, when I remember that as I
stood up to speak, I just suddenly saw his little figure, Mickey Devine
who was 14 or 15 years old at the time. He was a we round chap, he
looked Well it was a bit distressing because I was trying to get my act together, and to be honest, because of all the confusion that we had at the time on the 'Left' about the, I wasn't quite sure what I should say sort of, to this crowd. Cops moving in on us and so on. The last thing I needed was someone shouting "WHAT ABOUT THE MEXICAN STUDENTS McCANN!" You know? (Laughter) But I suddenly remembered that as I stood there, on this little chair, what he was talking about! Do you remember 1968 with the
Olympic Games in Mexico City? When the Mexican cops or the representative's of
the regime massacred over 100 Mexican students who'd been demonstrating,
to try to draw attention to the oppression and exploitation that was going on
and black Mexico tried to take advantage of the big media presence for the
Olympic games. They had been MASSACRED! And the point that he was
making, Now Mickey Devine had an interesting political history after that, but he wasn't a great internationalist. I don't think he would have been. He never had any sort of great intellectual political discussion with me. But he left the Labour Party, at the time. Joined the, what was then the Official IRA. Joined the IRSP and the INLA when that split came about. Eventually finished up in Long Kesh. Went 'on the blanket'. Went on Hunger Strike and was of course the last of the Hunger strikers to die. And when we're taking about
international things you some times can see that we're talking about sort of
little struggles here and there that are disconnected and they ARE disconnected
in But I remember after Mickey Devine
died. Reading one of those little left-wing British papers, that are sort of, I
forget the name of it, on demonstrations. And it had one of these little 'lists
of events' down the sides, you know? Like a, PARIS DEMONSTRATION with a little
paragraph, demonstration about such and such. And In the middle of this, it said
"MEXICO!" It said "Last week in Mexico, students in Mexico University gathered
in thousands and stood for a minutes silence in memory of Michael Devine,
the WHAT WE'VE BEEN INVOLVED IN OVER THE LAST 20 YEARS HAS BEEN SOMETHING GREAT AND WE SHOULD BE PROUD TO HAVE BEEN INVOLVED IN IT! IT'S A GREAT THING TO HAVE BEEN PART OF! IT WOULD BE A GREAT THING TO SEE THE COMPLETION OF! LONG LIVE MICKEY DEVINE! To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] |
