How he developed political career from barman to SF leader

FROM barman to republican leader – Gerry Adams has devoted more than half his life to Sinn Fein.

The 69-year-old was born in Belfast on October 6, 1948, to mill worker Annie and her labourer husband Gerry, a staunch republican.

His political journey began in a Belfast boozer with a distinctly British name above the door.

After finishing school he worked behind the bar in the Duke of York in the city centre.

The then 17-year-old is said to have been fascinated as clients talked politics – but was relieved of his duties for reasons unknown.

He became a political activist and despite denying membership of any terror organisation. He was jailed without trial under the Special Powers Act in March 1972.

He was held onboard a prison ship called the HMS Maidstone, but was temporarily released three months later at the IRA’s request to attend secret talks with the British government.

Within days of those talks, which failed to produce a ceasefire, 11 people died when 21 bombs exploded in one day – Belfast’s “Bloody Friday”.

Interviewed 30 years later after the IRA had apologised for the attacks, Adams strenuously denied having been the IRA commander who sanctioned them.

He was re-arrested in July 1973 and imprisoned at the notorious Long Kesh internment camp.

When he took part in an escape attempt he was sentenced to a further term of imprisonment.

Four years later he was acquitted of IRA membership. In 1983 he was elected Member of Parliament for West Belfast and Sinn Fein President – and became a household name almost overnight.

Adams’ popularity sky-rocketed after Tory Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher banned his voice from the airwaves. Adams survived two assassination attempts before being brought in from the cold by John Hume, then leader of the nationalist SDLP, to lead Sinn Fein to the negotiating table at Stormont.

Prior to that he was shot in the neck, shoulder and arm as several gunmen riddled his car with bullets in a daylight attack in 1984.

He once had a British Army issue hand grenade thrown at his home.

In time he persuaded the IRA to call a ceasefire, decommission weapons and sign up to a peace deal in the form of the Good Friday Agreement.

He nominated life-long friend Martin McGuinness to share power with the DUP’s Rev Ian Paisley.

Adams refused to swear an oath to the British queen – he refers to her to this day as Mrs Windsor – and in time swapped his Westminster seat for one in Dail Eireann.

In December 2009 UTV alleged his brother Liam Adams had sexually abused his daughter.

Gerry urged his brother to turn himself in to police. Liam Adams fled but was later convicted and sentenced to 16 years in prison for raping his own daughter.

During a first trial, which collapsed, the Sinn Fein leader claimed he first heard of the sex abuse claims in 1987 and his younger brother admitted it to him 13 years later.

The past haunted him and in 2014 he was arrested over the abduction and murder of mother-of-10 Jean McConville in 1972.

Her body had finally been located and recovered from an isolated beach in 2003.

Adams insisted he was “totally innocent” and was released without charge after four days of questioning.

To some he will always be seen as a terrorist alleged to have “blood on his hands”.

Others will remember him for his historic handshakes – from

President Bill Clinton to Prime Minister Tony Blair to Prince Charles.