Introduction
The Bobby Sands Trust was formed after the 1981 hunger strike when ten republican prisoners died, to assert the political status denied them by the British government and its repressive prison regime.
Twenty-seven-year old Bobby Sands, after enduring years of solitary confinement and beatings, led that hunger strike, during which he was elected as MP for the constituency of Fermanagh and South Tyrone. He died after 66 days on hunger strike on May 5th, 1981.
During his imprisonment Bobby wrote poetry, short stories, a poignant account of what the prisoners suffered (One Day in My Life), and kept a diary for the first seventeen days of his hunger strike.
The Trust holds the copyright on all Bobby's poetry and prose and was established to publish, promote and keep in print the extraordinary writings of this young Irish man, who from prison isolation became an international figure in 1981, and who to this day continues to inspire Irish republicans in their pursuit of freedom from British rule.
The Trust is made up of comrades of Bobby. The civil rights lawyer Pat Finucane, an advisor to the Trust, was assassinated by loyalist paramilitaries in collusion with British intelligence in 1989. His legal firm continues to act for the Trust.
In 1996, on the fifteenth anniversary of the hunger strike, the Trust recommitted itself to promulgating the works and writing of Bobby Sands in Ireland and abroad.
For further information contact:
e-mail: info@bobbysandstrust.org
The Secretary
The Bobby Sands Trust
Conway Education Centre
Conway Street
Belfast
BT12