Bereaved family’s hurt at ‘offensive’ hunger strike memorial

The Bellaghy Republican Monument Committee has applied for permission to place a Celtic cross close to Bellaghy Bawn next year – marking the 40th anniversary of the prison protest in which local men Francis Hughes and Thomas McElwee died.

The committee said: “There is already a plaque there for the republican dead of South Derry but we wanted something for the two local men.

“We hope that it will be looked at favourably and the council will back it. There are Celtic crosses in about every graveyard in Ireland, so I don’t think anyone should be offended.”

However, two sisters of Constable John McCracken, 22, – who was shot dead along with colleague Kenneth Sheehan – have said the memorial is a “divisive and backward” step.

Barbara McVeigh and Sally Boyd said their family members’ lives were changed permanently as a result of the attack on the road between Moneymore and Magherafelt on April 8, 1977.

“The Provisional IRA admitted responsibility for the murder of our brother and Francis Hughes was a key member of their South Derry group which carried out this atrocity,” they said in a statement.

“The suggestion that Hughes, a convicted murderer, along with Thomas McElwee, or indeed members of any terrorist organisation, should be presented as martyrs to a ‘worthy cause’ and have a memorial erected to them is, to us and many other grieving families, extremely offensive.

“In our society where the majority are trying to build bridges and live in peace, this seems a divisive and backward step. The outcome of the planning application is not yet known. However should it be approved then we challenge the elected representatives of Sinn Fein to demonstrate how genuine they are in working for a united Ireland by exclusively peaceful means.”

The sisters’ added: “The party and movement to which they belong has publicly claimed to have turned their backs on the bomb and the bullet so in the event this matter going before Council for the adjudication of councillors then they must vote against the erection of any such monument, demonstrating a willingness to promote an all-inclusive and peaceful society. We expect all other parties and independents to do likewise.

“Currently we are experiencing, throughout the democratic world, a revolt against statues which appear to glorify men and women who, it is now considered, behaved unacceptably.

“How will future generations view similar edifices to convicted terrorists/murderers in Northern Ireland?”

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