Bobby Sands

Bobby Sands was an Irish republican and Provisional IRA member who died in 1981 after 66 days on hunger strike in the Maze prison in Northern Ireland.

1981 Irish hunger strike: A prison protest in Northern Ireland in which ten republican prisoners died during a hunger strike in 1981. Sands was the first of the ten prisoners to die.
Special category status: A status granted to convicted paramilitary prisoners in Northern Ireland from 1972 to 1976, giving them some treatment as political prisoners. The British government’s refusal to restore this status was central to Sands’s protest.
Francis Hughes: An Irish republican prisoner who died during the 1981 hunger strike, shortly after Bobby Sands. Hughes was the second hunger striker to die.
Anti-terrorism legislation in the United Kingdom: UK laws granting authorities powers to prevent and prosecute political violence, especially in response to terrorism. The election prompted a change in eligibility rules that prevented prisoners serving long sentences from standing.
Maze Prison: A high-security prison near Lisburn, Northern Ireland, known for holding republican and loyalist paramilitary prisoners. Sands was imprisoned there and joined the hunger strike from the H-Blocks.
Blanket protest: A protest by republican prisoners who refused prison uniforms and wore blankets instead. It was an earlier stage of the prison protest Sands continued.
Raymond McCreesh: A Provisional IRA member and republican prisoner who died during the 1981 hunger strike. McCreesh died on the same day as Patsy O’Hara, after Sands.
Sinn Féin: An Irish republican political party active in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. The hunger strike helped strengthen the party’s electoral strategy.
H-Block protests: A series of protests by republican prisoners seeking political status in the Maze prison’s H-Blocks. Sands’s hunger strike followed years of protest over prison conditions and status.
Dirty protest: A protest in which prisoners refused to wash and smeared their cells with excrement. It followed the blanket protest and preceded the 1981 hunger strike.

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