MAYOR AND MARTYR WHO INSPIRED W MANDELA
Medical records from 100 years ago reveal the deathbed agony of hunger striker Terence MacSwiney, who spent 74 days refusing food in prison for his beliefs
ONE hundred years ago this week, the Lord Mayor of Cork, Terence MacSwiney, died in London’s Brixton Prison on the 74th day of hunger strike.
The news led to protests not just in Ireland, but across the world, which had watched in horror at the daily updates on his condition. Within six months, the War of Independence escalated to the point where the British realised they had no choice but to negotiate a truce, and the value of hunger strike as a weapon of resistance was copied all over the world.
Tomorrow night on RTÉ, a major new documentary, 74 Days: The Hunger Strike Of Terence MacSwiney, presented by NUIG social historian Sarah-Anne Buckley, tells the story. Compellingly, it uses contemporary medical reports to analyse the day-by-day effects on the body and mind, with contributions from physician Dr Philip Kieran ( of You Really Should See A Doctor) and clinical psychologist Dr Eddie Murphy (of Operation Transformation).
Terence MacSwiney was born in 1879, one of a family of eight children. His father, John, emigrated to Australia in 1885 after his businesses failed and Terence later was orphaned and reared by his eldest sister, Mary.
He was a bright boy, and ultimately gained a degree in Mental and Moral Science at the Royal University, now University College Cork. He also was an ardent nationalist, a co-founder of the Celtic Literary Society, for which he wrote plays, and also a co-founder of the Cork Volunteers of the IRA. At the December 1918 election, he was elected as a Sinn Féin TD
WHEN Tomás Mac Curtain was shot and killed by the Royal Irish Constabulary i n March 1920, MacSwiney succeeded him not only as Lord Mayor but as leader of the Cork No.1 Brigade of the IRA. That August, he was arrested for possession of ‘seditious articles and documents’, and also for possession of a cipher key used to break British Army codes. Tried by military court, he was sentenced to two years imprisonment in Brixton.
In the short term, he was held in Cork Prison, where 11 others already had started a hunger strike in protest at their military trials and MacSwiney joined them out of solidarity. Immediately, the world took note. There were protests in the Basque Country and Catalunya. In Brazil, 300,000 signed a petition for his release. In New York, longshoremen refused to unload British goods from ships, but the British authorities dug their heels in and transferred MacSwiney to Brixton.
This proved a mistake. Cork was a relative backwater, but every newspaper in the world had correspondents in London, and daily they waited outside the prison for news of MacSwiney’s condition from his wife Muriel and his sisters Mary and Annie.
All the notes kept by his doctors were preserved and it is from these, and the contemporary accounts by his family, that we now know the traumas Terence MacSwiney suffered.
On arrival, he was noted as being five feet nine-and-a-half inches and 136lb (176cm, 62kg). As the programme notes, by the third day, he already would have been suffering the effects of hunger though they would be mild compared with what was to come.
By the three-week mark, he was much weaker, more listless, and scarcely spoke. Muscle mass and fat reserves were being depleted quite rapidly, and in an attempt to persuade him to change his mind, the authorities daily left food in the cell. His resolve was absolute, t hough, and he r efused all attempts to convince him to eat.
On Day 40, the family released a statement that he now had lasted longer than Jesus’s hunger in the wilderness, which caused widespread outrage among those who f elt such a comparison was blasphemous.
His sisters defused the situation but it led to another theological question – was he committing what then was the mortal sin of death by suicide? Bishops intervened and said no, this was not the case – his intention was the pursuit of justice, not the pursuit of death, and whi l e the first might ultimately lead to the latter, there could not be sin without intent.
By Day 50, MacSwiney had succumbed to involuntary eye movements and twitching of the limbs.
Laurence McKeown, who two generations later was one of the Maze prison hunger strikers and lasted 70 days before his mother gave permission for him to be fed, explains how it felt. ‘You’re cold – I had ten blankets on me at one stage – and you’re seeing double,’ he says in the documentary. ‘If you think about the times you’re tired, multiply it by a hundred.’
By Day 65, MacSwiney was unable to lift his arms, his fingers were jerking uncontrollably and he was sore to every touch.
Two days later, he was diagnosed with scurvy, which i s caused by Vitamin C deficiency, and was bleeding from his mouth and gums. Offered l i me juice with his water, he refused. At this point, he wa s expected to have been long since dead, and many questioned if the entire thing was a stunt, and wondered if food was being smuggled in to help him cheat. A thorough examination of his cell conclusively debunked the theory.
In Cork, one of the other hunger strikers, Michael Fitzgerald, died, and this caused Muriel MacSwiney’s resolve to slightly weaken. She asked the Lord Mayor of Dublin to intervene; the sisters, though, were adamant that he should not do so.
On day 68, the authorities forcefed MacSwiney anyway, and he became distraught and started suffering from delirium. He was violently sick – he filled half a basin with green liquid, the doctors’ notes say – and it was obvious to all that it was too dangerous to continue feeding him.
At 5.30am on Monday October 25, 1920, Terence MacSwiney died.
He was 41. As well as Muriel, he l eft a two- year- old daughter, Máire. She l ater became an actress and a t eacher, and married Ruairí Brugha, son of Cathal Brugha, who was killed fighting on the anti-Treaty side in the Civil War. Ruairí would later serve as a senator, a TD and a member of the European Parliament. Máire died in 2012 at the age of 93.
Terence MacSwiney had three funerals. The first was in Southwark Cathedral, where thousands lined the streets, many of them with no interest in Irish nationalism but who had been caught up in the story of a man willing to die for his principles and the three women who had become famous supporting him.
ASECOND f uneral was planned for Dublin but the British could not allow that happen, and wrested the coffin from the family’s control and shipped it straight to Cork. A ‘funeral’ took place in Dublin anyway, without a body.
In Cork, the planned massive funeral was banned, though thousands were allowed f i l e pass MacSwiney’s body, and were shocked by the emaciated state in which his life ended.
Only 100 people were allowed in t he f uneral cortege and the British Army took to the streets in armoured cars, with machine guns trained on anyone who might have stepped out of line.
In that tense atmosphere, retribution was inevitable. That night, six RIC officers were killed in raids across the country. Conflict escalated everywhere.
The six months that followed before the Truce saw the events of Bloody Sunday, the burning of Cork, and 70% of all the deaths in the two-and-a-half year War of Independence.
In forcing the British to negotiate, though, MacSwiney achieved his aim – and in doing so, he inspired everyone from Ho Chi Minh to Mahatma Gandhi to Nelson Mandela to do the same.
74 Days: The Hunger Strike Of Terence MacSwiney is on RTÉ One tomorrow night at 9.35pm