This week Miriam O'Callaghan meets Raymond McCartney and Pat Sheehan. Both men are now members of the Northern Ireland Assembly. Both joined the IRA in the early 1970s, served time in the Maze Prison and took part in the hunger strike protests of 1980 and 1981.
Raymond McCartney tells Miriam of growing up in Derry and the impact of the events of Bloody Sunday, 30 January 1972 on his family. His cousin, Jim Wray, was among those killed that day. This lead the seventeen year old Raymond to join the IRA. Pat Sheehan tells Miriam of how he grew up in Belfast with Protestant neighbours. He describes the unfolding events, including a loyalist attack on his home when he was fifteen, that lead him to join the Fianna at fifteen and the IRA at seventeen.
Both men reflect on the choice they made to join the IRA and why they didn't choose the constitutional route taken by others in the North who felt equally aggrieved.
In the late 1970s, both men began lengthy jail services in the Maze Prison. The blanket protest and the no wash protests were underway and they found themselves among other prisoners who were actively considering hunger strike. When the decision was made to organise a hungerstrike in late 1980, both men volunteered. Raymond MacCartney was among the seven men who started their hunger strike in October 1980. Pat Sheehan joined that strike in December 1980.
Both men tell Miriam of how they told their parents of their decision to go on hunger strike. While Raymond MacCartney's parents were supportive, Pat Sheehan's parents found his decision to volunteer for the second hungerstrike more painful. His sister Louise had just been diagnosed with terminal cancer and died before his release from prison.
Raymond McCartney was on hunger strike for fifty three days in 1980 while Pat Sheehan was on hunger strike for fifty five days in 1981. They tell Miriam of how the strikes ended, their reflections on the death of Bobby Sands and how, for Pat Sheehan, the grieving for his death and that of the nine other men, only began after his release from prison.
Looking back, both men discuss regret, the impact of parenthood on their understanding of life and whether or not they would make the same decisions today as they did almost forty years ago.