Marian Price (born 1954), also known by her married name as Marian McGlinchey, is a former

Provisional Irish Republican Army The Irish Republican Army (IRA; ), also known as the Provisional Irish Republican Army, and informally as the Provos, was an Irish republican paramilitary organisation that sought to end British rule in Northern Ireland, facilitate Irish reu ...

(IRA)

volunteer Volunteering is a voluntary act of an individual or group freely giving time and labor for community service. Many volunteers are specifically trained in the areas they work, such as medicine, education, or emergency rescue. Others serve ...

. Price was born into a strongly

Republican Republican can refer to: Political ideology * An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law. ** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...

family in

Andersonstown Andersonstown is a suburb of west Belfast, Northern Ireland, at the foot of the Black Mountain and Divis Mountain. It contains a mixture of public and private housing and is largely a working-class area with a strong Irish nationalist and Irish ...

, west

Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdom ...

. Both of her parents had been imprisoned for involvement with the

Irish Republican Army The Irish Republican Army (IRA) is a name used by various paramilitary organisations in Ireland throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. Organisations by this name have been dedicated to irredentism through Irish republicanism, the belief th ...

and their mother's sister, Bridie, who lived with them, had lost both hands and her eyesight while moving explosives.

Political activism and the IRA

Price and her sister Dolours participated in the Belfast to Derry civil rights march in January 1969 and were attacked in the

Burntollet Bridge incident Burntollet Bridge was the setting for an attack on 4 January 1969 during the first stages of the Troubles of Northern Ireland. A People's Democracy march from Belfast to Derry was attacked by Ulster loyalists whilst passing through Burntollet ...

. In 1971 together with Dolours she joined the

(IRA).

Old Bailey bombing

Price was jailed for her part in the

IRA Ira or IRA may refer to: *Ira (name), a Hebrew, Sanskrit, Russian or Finnish language personal name *Ira (surname), a rare Estonian and some other language family name *Iran, UNDP code IRA Law *Indian Reorganization Act of 1934, US, on status of ...

London bombing campaign of 1973. She was part of a unit that placed four car bombs in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

on 8 March 1973. The 1973 Old Bailey bombing and that of the Whitehall army recruitment centre saw 200 injured. A warning was issued an hour before the blast. One man died of a heart attack, although an autopsy found his heart attack had begun before the Old Bailey blast. She and her sister Dolours were apprehended along with Hugh Feeney, Gerry Kelly, and six others, as they were boarding a flight to Ireland. They were tried and convicted at the Great Hall in

Winchester Castle Winchester Castle is a medieval building in Winchester, Hampshire, England. It was founded in 1067. Only the Great Hall still stands; it houses a museum of the history of Winchester. History Early history Around AD 70 the Romans constructed a ...

on 14 November after two days of deliberation by the jury. Marian Price was sentenced to two life terms. The Price sisters, along with Kelly and Feeney, immediately went on

hunger strike A hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke a feeling of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most ...

in a campaign to be repatriated to a prison in Northern Ireland. IRA prisoners in Ireland at the time had

Special Category Status In July 1972, William Whitelaw, the Conservative British government's Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, granted Special Category Status (SCS) to all prisoners serving sentences in Northern Ireland for Troubles-related offences. This had be ...

(similar to

political status In international law three categories of Political status are usually recognized: #Independent countries e.g.: France, Canada #Internal independent countries which are under the protection of another country in matters of defense and foreign affa ...

), which was not granted to IRA prisoners in England and the IRA volunteers did not see themselves as criminals. The hunger strike lasted over 200 days, with the hunger strikers being

force-fed Force-feeding is the practice of feeding a human or animal against their will. The term ''gavage'' (, , ) refers to supplying a substance by means of a small plastic feeding tube passed through the nose ( nasogastric) or mouth (orogastric) into t ...

by prison authorities for 167 of them. In an interview with Suzanne Breen, Price described being force-fed:

Four male prison officers tie you into the chair so tightly with sheets you can't struggle. You clench your teeth to try to keep your mouth closed but they push a metal spring device around your jaw to prise it open. They force a wooden clamp with a hole in the middle into your mouth. Then, they insert a big rubber tube down that. They hold your head back. You can't move. They throw whatever they like into the food mixer – orange juice, soup, or cartons of cream if they want to beef up the calories. They take jugs of this gruel from the food mixer and pour it into a funnel attached to the tube. The force-feeding takes 15 minutes but it feels like forever. You're in control of nothing. You're terrified the food will go down the wrong way and you won't be able to let them know because you can't speak or move. You're frightened you'll choke to death.

Political activity after prison

Marian Price was freed in 1980 on a

Royal prerogative of mercy In the English and British tradition, the royal prerogative of mercy is one of the historic royal prerogatives of the British monarch, by which they can grant pardons (informally known as a royal pardon) to convicted persons. The royal prer ...

when her

anorexia nervosa Anorexia nervosa, often referred to simply as anorexia, is an eating disorder characterized by low weight, food restriction, body image disturbance, fear of gaining weight, and an overpowering desire to be thin. ''Anorexia'' is a term of Gr ...

resulting from her hunger strike was deemed to put her life at risk. She resumed a private life, emerging only in the 1990s as a vocal opponent of

Sinn Féin Sinn Féin ( , ; en, " eOurselves") is an Irish republican and democratic socialist political party active throughout both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The original Sinn Féin organisation was founded in 1905 by Arthur G ...

's "peace strategy". Price has been critical of the

Good Friday Agreement The Good Friday Agreement (GFA), or Belfast Agreement ( ga, Comhaontú Aoine an Chéasta or ; Ulster-Scots: or ), is a pair of agreements signed on 10 April 1998 that ended most of the violence of The Troubles, a political conflict in No ...

, saying "It is certainly not what I went to prison for, and it is not what my sister went to prison for". Price was refused a visa to enter the United States on 15 December 1999. She had been due to speak at an

Irish Freedom Committee Irish may refer to: Common meanings * Someone or something of, from, or related to: ** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe ***Éire, Irish language name for the isle ** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...

fundraising event in New York. In 2000 Price gave the funeral oration for Joseph O'Connor, a member of the

Real IRA The Real Irish Republican Army, or Real IRA (RIRA), is a dissident Irish republican paramilitary group that aims to bring about a United Ireland. It formed in 1997 following a split in the Provisional IRA by dissident members, who rejected the ...

. As of 2003 she was a member of the

32 County Sovereignty Movement The 32 County Sovereignty Movement, often abbreviated to 32CSM or 32csm, is an Irish republican group that was founded by Bernadette Sands McKevitt. It does not contest elections but acts as a pressure group, with branches or ''cumainn'' org ...

and worked for a prisoners' welfare organisation. Interviewed in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' in 2003 she expressed no regrets for her past actions and her continued support for armed action.

Return to prison

On 17 November 2009 she was named as being one of two people arrested in connection with an attack on the Massereene Barracks in Northern Ireland in March 2009 in which two British soldiers were shot dead. In 2011 she was charged with providing property for the purposes of terrorism. Marian Price graffiti

On 15 May 2011, she was charged with encouraging support for an illegal organisation. This related to her involvement in a statement given at an Easter Rising rally in Derry in 2011. On the same day the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland,

Owen Paterson Owen William Paterson (born 24 June 1956) is a British former politician who served as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland from 2010 to 2012 and Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from 2012 to 2014 under Prime Minist ...

, revoked her release from prison on licence. Paterson said the decision was made because the threat posed by Price had "significantly increased". Price was the only female inmate at HM Prison Maghaberry near Lisburn from May 2011 until she was moved to the hospital wing of

HM Prison Hydebank Wood His Majesty's Prison, Hydebank Wood (normally known as just Hydebank) is a women's prison located in South Belfast. Young male offenders A young offenders centre (YOC) holding young male prisoners is located on the same site. The YOC houses y ...

in February 2012. In May 2012, at a rally in her support, Price's husband, Gerry McGlinchey, stated that his wife was near breaking point. The charges against Price and three men from Derry in relation to the Easter Rising rally were later dismissed at Derry Magistrates' Court in May 2012. On 7 June 2012, a protest close to

Times Square Times Square is a major commercial intersection, tourist destination, entertainment hub, and neighborhood in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is formed by the junction of Broadway, Seventh Avenue, and 42nd Street. Together with adjacent ...

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

, New York called for Price to be released from what her family describes as internment. On 30 May 2013, Price was released from prison after a decision by the Parole Commissioners.

References

External links