Martin McGuinness – a hard man to replace.

Comrades

The peaceful night that round me flows,

Breaks through your iron prison doors,

Free through the world your spirit goes,

Forbidden hands are clasping yours.

The wind is our confederate,

The night has left her doors ajar,

We meet beyond earth’s barred gate,

Where all the world’s wild Rebels are.

Eva Gore-Booth

Eva Gore-Booth, poet and activist, was the sister of Constance Markievicz. Both from privileged backgrounds yet Constance became a revolutionary nationalist while Eva chose pacifism and social reform. Initially, Martin McGuinness, a working-class boy from Derry, chose the revolutionary path before committing himself to social reform. Was he the most important leader of contemporary Ireland? Two polar opposites, Martin McGuinness and Ian Paisley formed a power-sharing government in Northern Ireland. A journey, now made into a film of the same name, many felt impossible yet McGuinness had the potential of becoming the President of Ireland, if not in the last election but the next. Unfortunately, it was not to be, he passed away on 21 March 2017 in his native city.

I watched his funeral in St. Columba’s Church, Long Tower, Derry, a church I know well. I did not know him but like Martin, I went to the Christian Brothers School, and maybe he too, on a Thursday, once a month, we went to that chapel for confessions. His burial in the City Cemetery where I have many close relatives buried, including my Great Grandfather, Hugh McMahon, who on a few occasions in the early 1920’s organised the local Dockers to protect the Long Tower Church from marauding Protestant rioters. Hugh lived opposite the Protestant St. Columb’s Cathedral within the 17th Century walls of Derry and through a close friendship with the minister there, he allowed his home to become a cloakroom for the marching Orange Men, parading to the church. His daughter, Priscilla told me the coats, even had wallets in them.

Martin McGuinness, also formed close friendships with the Protestant clergy, in particular the Rev David Latimer’s “unbelievable friendship”, who believed the Republican leader underwent a radical change and fully embraced peace and reconciliation.

My wife lived in the same street as Martin McGuinness, and he was often seen armed, driving around with his fellow volunteers. Garbhan Downey, a Derry writer reflects:

“Ultimately Mr McGuinness, for all the flaws of youth, was the embodiment of our fight against injustice. He was the measure of our determination. Whereas John Hume epitomised our yearning for agreement, partnership and mutual compassion, Mr McGuinness symbolised our resistance and defiance. And at times, unfortunately, it was necessary to resist and defy – even if we disputed or abhorred the methods. It is easy to forget today the institutional prejudice, discrimination and outright anti-Catholic hatred that existed in the North before Civil Rights. Just as it is easy to forget the extreme vulnerability of the Catholic population. There was a very specific context behind the growth of the IRA, which far too many revisionist commentators are still unable, or unwilling, to acknowledge.”

Some say, it’s not where you start, but where you finish. Martin McGuinness was a friend of Brendan Duddy, the back-channel intermediary between the IRA and the British Government. For weeks in 1981, he was billeted on a couch in Brendan Duddy’s study, while both he and the mediator engaged in hour-by-hour telephone negotiations with the British to revive and reinforce the Christmas 1980 deal that the Northern IreIand Government, and the Prison Service, had reneged on. Duddy and the Rev Latimer,  all strove to enable, “Martin McGuinness to push open a door to reveal a better and a different way of bringing about change and to tirelessly strive to shape a brighter shared living space for all.”

“There are times when a leader must move out ahead of the flock, go off in a new direction, confident that he is leading his people the right way.”  Nelson Mandela’s words reflect McGuinness’s move to that “brighter shared living space.” A measure of the faith and trust that rank-and-file IRA men and women had in Martin McGuinness is reflected in the sentiment Peter Taylor heard from many of them that "if it's good enough for Martin, it's good enough for us". Such sentiments showed the esteem in which he was held as IRA leader. Peter Taylor was the BBC reporter who had revealed Brendan Duddy as the back-channel intermediatory. Taylor was present at a candle-lit procession that wound its way to a church after Bloody Sunday, when British paratroopers shot dead 13 civil rights marchers in the Bogside of Derry and where the coffins of the dead were lying and being told by the leading nationalist politician, John Hume, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, to keep an eye on one of the mourners, Martin McGuinness. Buy the books here 

McGuinness’s handshake with the Queen in 2012 was seen as another crucial milestone in the peace process – the Queen’s cousin, Lord Mountbatten, was killed by the IRA in 1979.

But perhaps more powerful than McGuinness’ meeting with the Queen was the moment in 2009 when he branded republican dissidents as “traitors to Ireland” after they killed a police officer. Shaking hands with the Queen was a potent symbol of peace-making; McGuinness’s condemnation of dissident violence had much greater practical effect. His unambiguous, impassioned statement helped protect the lives of all police officers, but particularly Catholics, whom dissidents cynically targeted as a way of undermining the transformation of policing achieved as part of the Good Friday Agreement. He faced numerous death threats afterwards, so it may also have been one of his bravest statements.

His stature was reflected on the large number of dignitaries that attended his funeral, the closest thing to a state funeral including Taoiseach Enda Kenny, former President Bill Clinton, President Michael D Higgins, former Taoisigh Bertie Ahern and Brian Cowen, Northern Secretary James Brokenshire, John Hume and PSNI Chief Constable George Hamilton, as well as Northern Ireland’s former first ministers Arlene Foster and Peter Robinson.

 “After all the breath he expended cursing the British, he worked with two prime ministers and shook hands with the Queen,” said Mr Clinton in his eulogy. Mr Clinton told the 1,500 people packed into Saint Columba’s Church that Mr McGuinness “persevered and he prevailed, he risked the wrath of his comrades and rejection of his adversaries. If you really came here to celebrate his life and honour the contribution of the last chapter of it, you have to finish his work.”

He said he treasured every encounter he had with Mr McGuinness and that his late friend could eulogise far better than him. He said Mr McGuinness would sum up his life quickly by saying “I fought. I made peace. I made politics”.

He continued, “The presence of those political rivals and opponents among you, who have come to pay their respects this afternoon, is the most eloquent testimony to the memory of Martin McGuinness. When you seek his monument, you – by your presence – are his monument.” Read here about the Troubles and some photos. Buy the books here. Buy the books here.

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© Hugh Vaughan 2023