Mother courage The woman who pushed for peace in Northern Ireland
Susan Mchugh paved the way for an end to the Troubles and, 25 years on, has inspired a new TV drama. Judith Woods meets her
When Susan Mchugh, a bustling woman with a smile as wide as the river Liffey opens the front door of her house in a waterside suburb of Dublin, I can’t help but fling myself at her, giving her the sort of fierce hug you reserve for a favourite auntie.
Though she and I have never met, this is, after all, the woman who was a catalyst for the end of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Few people even remember her name now, but it’s there, in the history books; the story of an ordinary Irish mother who stood up to the IRA and unequivocally declared “Not in my name”.
And now, 25 years on, we are to be reminded of Mchugh’s courage in Mother’s Day, a powerful BBC drama airing tonight, depicting how she galvanised a nation and pioneered a peace movement in the wake of the 1993 Warrington bombings.
In the film, Mchugh is played by Line of Duty actress Vicky Mcclure (almost unrecognisable with short, curly hair and large glasses), who is entirely convincing in her portrayal of an unassuming woman for whom the political became deeply personal.
“I was really pleased with the finished result,” says Mchugh, 63. “Vicky is a superb actress and I thought the whole story was handled with sensitivity. It didn’t shy away from the controversy.”
Back in 1993, Susan Mchugh was 38, worked part-time in a crèche and was a devoted mother of a six-year-old, Charlie, and Emma, four. On Saturday March 21 of that year, the IRA killed three-year-old Johnathan Ball and fatally injured 12-yearold Tim Parry, as well as wounding 54 others in the packed town centre of Warrington,
Cheshire, where families were busy shopping for Mothering Sunday cards.
The bombs had been placed in two cast-iron rubbish bins, causing horrendous shrapnel wounds when they exploded – the second was detonated exactly where terrified pedestrians had fled after the first blast – and Johnathan died instantly. Tim was fighting for his life in hospital when Mchugh, who was listening to a live radio debate on the national broadcaster RTE, felt compelled to call in.
“I was so appalled at what happened in Warrington that I just had to do it, but I also knew it would be pointless if I just added my voice without actually having a plan,” she says. “I first of all called up Trinity College and begged them to let me have a meeting room for free, and
‘I was so appalled at what happened in Warrington that I just had to do it’
when I went on air I asked people to come along and share ideas.” Mchugh’s broadcast was so electrifying – and bearing in mind this was long before social media – the word spread like wildfire. By the time the meeting was due to take place, the room had to be upgraded to a theatre – and even then, hundreds of people were left standing outside. That initial meeting led to rallies in Dublin, where again she spoke with clarity and urgency. In Mother’s Day, when Mcclure delivers her fluent, forceful lines, they are the exact words spoken by Mchugh more than two decades earlier. “The IRA did not kill Johnathan Ball in my name or in your name,” she said. “I want to tell the world tonight they did not kill him in the name of Ireland… I feel horror, revulsion and sadness. But that’s not enough. Tonight I feel anger. “I feel angry and frustrated because the political will is not there to end the violence… Maybe it’s time it was looked at from a different angle. Maybe it’s time we asked for UN troops and independent arbitrators from Europe or the outside world.”
Ireland rallied to her call in the form of Peace 93, a group made up of the 20,000 people who took to the streets in protest, instigating a seismic shift in the political landscape that helped to lay the groundwork for the momentous events that followed.
Later that year the UK Government finally admitted it had long been in ongoing talks with the Provisional IRA. The British and Irish governments issued the joint Downing Street Declaration setting out a road map for peace, and in April 1994, the IRA announced a three-day “temporary cessation of hostilities”. In August, a “cessation of military operations” – or permanent ceasefire – followed.
Mother’s Day focuses purely on Mchugh’s role in providing a lightning rod for the grief and rage of families who had lost children: “Children have been my life,” she explains. “They have no part in adult conflict. At the rally in Dublin there was a little boy carrying a placard that read ‘I am not a legitimate target’; it was a profound truth.”
Meanwhile, as Peace 93 gained traction, Tim Parry’s brain injuries led doctors to turn off his life support after five days, with the agreement of his grief-stricken parents, Colin and Wendy.
A vast outpouring of sympathy from Ireland – thousands of cards and letters and of condolence were sent to the couple – led to contact between the Parrys and the Mchughs – Susan and her husband, Arthur. “When the BBC got in touch with me about Mother’s Day, I wasn’t sure so I called up Tim’s parents, Colin and Wendy, to gauge how they felt,” says Mchugh. “They wanted to go ahead with it, so I agreed, too. We watched a preview together at the Warrington Peace Centre set up after the bombing. Afterwards Wendy put her arms around me and thanked me; it was very emotional.”
Twenty-five years ago, Mchugh was headline news across the world and she found herself very much in the eye of the storm, juggling international interviews with personal appearances across the country.
“I refused to talk politics,” she says. “That was not my message. I was juggling the kids, doing the school run between media broadcasts, answering a phone that rang off the hook all day. It was hard not to feel overwhelmed; at one point a researcher for a documentary team was upstairs doing my vacuuming while friends took my kids out for tea.”
Mchugh’s crusade was not met with universal goodwill. A great many Irish families felt distressed and bitter that it seemingly took the deaths of English children for her to feel moved to take action.
“I didn’t think of Tim and Johnathan as English,” says Mchugh. “To me they were just children, but I could understand why bereaved parents might feel upset, so I went up to Northern Ireland to meet with them and express my sorrow for their terrible losses, too. There is no hierarchy in the death of children.”
One woman condemned Mchugh for not caring more about the murder of her husband – even though she’d been a schoolgirl when it happened.
“I tried very hard but I couldn’t be all things to all people,” she says, adding that she believes she was so affected by what took place in Warrington due to it happening in the close aftermath of her parents’ deaths the year prior, as well a friend’s young daughter. The memory leads her voice to trail away; a reminder that Mchugh is no politician – she doesn’t even consider herself to be an activist – despite her milestone achievement. She is first and foremost a wife and mother.
“There was huge pressure on me to do a tour of the States,” she says. “Everybody wanted a piece of me – and then one day when yet again I had no time to make food, my son Charlie turned round to me and groaned ‘Please Mummy no more Mcdonald’s’, and I realised that my own children needed me back. So I stopped and stepped away.”
Her husband remembers the time as one in which his role was “supporting Susan. She feels things very deeply and from the outset I could see what it meant to her as well as the emotional price she had to pay.”
After five hectic, hugely important months in which the numbers of people involved in Peace 93 had swelled, and groups were springing up across the country, Mchugh’s work was done.
“I would like to think that what we instigated was part of the whole process that eventually led to the Good Friday Agreement,” she says. “I just happened to be the person who spoke up and articulated the national mood.”
It’s a lesson to us all, as we wring our hands at society’s ills. Sometimes one person really can make a difference.
‘I just happened to be the person who spoke up and articulated the national mood’