Crumlin Road Gaol Visit

On Thursday the 15th November Abhaile Aris the republican ex prisoners group based in Letterkenny organised a trip to Crumlin Road Gaol Belfast for republican ex prisoners and their families.

This particular trip was a prelude to further trips that Abhaile Aris will be organising in the New Year under their counselling services programme. Two members of staff accompanied the group Gerry Mc Monagle Outreach Worker and Administrator of the project Laura Duddy.

On Arrival at the Gaol we were introduced to our guide Michael who then took us on a tour of the gaol. The Crum as it was best known has a long history of penal confinement being built in 1845 and staying open until 1996. From the outside the Crum is an intimidating place and does not get any better on arriving inside.

We were first took to the entrance hall which leads into the circle area were the four wings that make up Crumlin Rd gaol radiate from the circle. In the main hall our guide Michael gave us a brief talk on the early history of the Crum. Outlining the reason for having such a large gaol in Belfast at that time with the building of it coinciding with the Great Famine and the massive influx of people from throughout Ireland to the Town as a result of the famine.
There was such an influx of people from the west of Ireland that a part of Belfast, ‘Smithfield’ was known as the Irish quarter due to the fact that Irish was the prevalent language with large numbers of people from the West relocating to Belfast because of the famine, people from Counties Donegal, Galway and Mayo making up the most of them.

In the main hall we were shown some of the artefacts of the old penal system namely the Cat O Nine Tails that was used to administer so called justice to the unfortunate inmates. We also seen the manacles that were used to control the prisoners and the uniforms that they and the prison guards wore within the gaol.

Crumlin Rd gaol also housed many women prisoners in the early part of the last century with many suffragettes imprisoned for fighting for equal rights for women. There were children as young as 10 years old imprisoned with one really sad case of a young 10 year old taking his own life in one of the cells. Such were the times in the late 1800s were it did not matter what your age or circumstances were.

During the years that the gaol was open there were 17 public executions with some of the first executions drawing crowds of several thousands to witness the hangings. With the result that they moved later executions further into the gaol to prevent public unrest. The first man was hung in 1854 and the last in 1961 probably one of the most famous hangings was that of Vol Tom Williams in 1942. Tom was hung for his part in the killing of an RUC man on Belfast’s Falls Road in that year. He was one of six IRA men who were arrested following the shooting Joe Cahill was another. Joe who went on to become an iconic leader of the modern day IRA and was interred next to his former comrade at Milltown Cemetary, Belfast in 2004. Of the six that were sentenced to death Tom Williams was the only one who did not get a reprieve and his death sentence was carried out on 2nd September 1942. Tom was buried in the prison yard and from that day Joe Cahill his comrade and friend campaigned to have him reinterred at the republican plot in Milltown Cemetery Belfast. In 1999 the campaign ended when Tom’s remains were finally interred at Milltown along side his comrades in the republican plot with full military honours which were duly given by his comrades in the Belfast IRA with one of the biggest funerals that the city had seen since the burial of Bobby Sands in1981.

Crumlin Rd became one of the main detention centres during the recent conflict with thousands of prisoners both Republican and Loyalist being incarcerated within the jail it was the prison were prisoners were held on remand until their trial which took place at the Belfast City Commission’s court as it was known this courthouse was directly across the road from the jail on the other side of the Crumlin Rd and indeed was attached to the Gaol via an underground tunnel that ran from within the prison under the road and up into the courthouse. Prisoners made the weekly journey along the tunnel handcuffed to prison warders and policemen to the court for their remand appearance and then finally for their trial in the infamous Diplock Courts.

The jail had been home of many high profile prisoners down through the years, Rev Ian Paisley, Gerry Adams and the recently deceased Martin Meehan from Belfast who escaped from the prison in the early seventies after hiding in a manhole for several hours and making good his escape by scaling the walls in the hour of darkness. In all 13 prisoners escaped from the jail all republican in the 70s and then we had the great escape in June 1981 were 8 republican prisoners shot their way to freedom via the front gate. During the period of the troubles there were many disputes and protests within the gaol around the issue of segregation of republican and loyalist prisoners culminating in rooftop and dirty protests throughout the eighties and nineties with an explosive device being detonated in ‘A’ Wing resulting in two loyalist prisoners being killed. In retaliation for this loyalist on the outside fired an RPG Rocket at the republican canteen from the outside of the jail no one was injured in this attack.

The jail was eventually closed in 1996 and is now open to the public for tours. Whilst it still holds many secrets and stories it is undoubtedly one of the most interesting sites to visit in Belfast. It has played host to a wide range of members of civic society since first it opened its gates in 1845 from those that were transported to van demons land to the suffragettes to the17 people who were executed through to the political prisoners of the last century Crumlin rd gaol has many stories yet to be told.




Gerry Mc Monagle
Outreach Worker Abhaile Aris