West Belfast Ógra Shinn Féin got a very rare opportunity this week to get an inside look into the “hell” of Crumlin Road Gaol and to witness the conditions endured by republican prisoners down through the generations.
Tom Williams, a young republican aged only 19, was hanged and buried in Crumlin Road Gaol in Belfast after he was convicted of involvement in the killing of RUC man Patrick Murphy in West Belfast on Easter weekend of 1942. Williams was one of six IRA men and two women, including senior republican Joe Cahill, who were convicted of Murphy's killing. Before Williams’s death he left some messages on the back of playing cards. One message said,
“To ever who receives this to pray for me always & pray for the cause for which I am dying. God Save Ireland.”
Paul Mc Cann of West Belfast Ogra had this to say,
“To be in a building where some of Ireland’s bravest men and women were killed for simply trying to get rid of the British occupation in Ireland was an experience in itself for me. Every republican should think of the effort put in by Prisoners like Tom Williams and Joe Cahill. They were men who didn’t wish for a united ireland but worked for it and gave their lives for Ireland."
Paul also added,
“The presence inside the jail on a cold dark wet evening made the hairs on the back of my neck stand, when we learnt of the conditions that the prisoners faced. I struggle to see how any republican could find it comfortable to be in a place like Crumlin road with its history.”
“Also in the prison we learnt of some of the brutality which the prisoners had to face, and in todays society it would be seen as inhuman. The prison also had its own diplock court room, and gallows.”
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