IRIS
1983 escape IRIS
24/07/2008
15:00
Page 1
the republican magazine Autumn 1993
NUMBER 18 (reissued)
• “Open up the Long Kesh gate, meals on wheels for 38” — the abandoned Long Kesh ‘takeaway’ food lorry • Gateway to freedom!
• Óglaigh from South Armagh Brigade with the weaponry they were armed with in the back-up operation for the 1983 escape. The photograph, taken shortly before Volunteers forced down a Wessex helicopter in May 1985, shows one of two .50 Browning heavy machine guns which were mounted on the back of a lorry, along with an M60 machine gun and another Volunteer with a Cal assault rifle.
THIS ISSUE OF IRIS, first published in the Autumn of 1993, on the 10th anniversary of the 1983 escape from H-Block 7 represents the prisoners’ own account of that escape. The core of the material was prepared and written by the escapees themselves. The rest of the material was prepared under the supervision of an editorial committee in the H-Blocks. For this 25th anniversary re-issue, the chapter Where are they now? has been updated. Otherwise only slight additions and corrections have been made where necessary.
CONTENTS
Introduction ..................................................... 2 An escape committee is formed ....................... 3 Germ of an idea .............................................. 5 Briefings and preparation ................................ 8 The morning of the escape ............................. 11 The takeover of H7 ........................................ 12 Arrival of the food lorry ................................. 17 Trouble at the tally lodge ............................... 20 Capture... and escape .................................... 24 Rearguard and the aftermath ........................ 36 The road to Scrava ......................................... 38 The ‘rare character’ and the thinker .............. 40 Closing the stable door — The Hennessy Report ...................................... 41 Where are they now? ..................................... 44 Sentences and compensation ......................... 54 They played a crucial role... ........................... 55 Clarke/Finucane judgement .......................... 56 The safe house .............................................. 59 1