A FORMER West Belfast teacher has recalled collapsing and being rushed to hospital following a hunger strike protest over Bloody Sunday in Manchester.
Martin Quinn (72) grew up in Sunnyside Street off the Ormeau Road before moving to Stockman's Drive in West Belfast. After being educated at Holy Rosary Primary School and then St Finian's Primary School on the Falls Road, he went to St Malachy's College on the Antrim Road.
It was then that Martin left Belfast for Manchester to study PE and RE at university.
"After school, my father said to me Liverpool or Manchester for university? And I picked Manchester to study RE and PE. My father sent me over with a few quid and said, son, phone me if there is any trouble," he recalled.
"When I was there, I hit the front page headlines of the Manchester Evening News. Bloody Sunday happened on Sunday, 30th January 1972. Myself and two other Irish fellas – Kieran Burke from Newry and Seanie O'Neill from Derry went on hunger strike in Piccadilly in the centre of Manchester.
"On the Monday night, the day after it was about minus ten degrees. I collapsed and had to get rushed to hospital.
"I remember the mixed support. People in their cars beeping their horns in support but some were shouting at us, Irish b******s and stuff like that.
"I wasn't overly politically minded but Bloody Sunday was such a disgrace that we wanted to show solidarity with the victims."
It was also in Manchester where he received the devastating news that his mother had passed away back at home.
"In 1972 I was still in Manchester in university and got called to the Vice Chancellors office," he said. "My mother was the first women in Ireland to have a plastic valve heart operation in 1967.
"She had to have another operation and the Chancellor told me she came through it but the next few hours were crucial.
"He then told me my mother had passed away. There was a taxi waiting to take me back to the airport. That was a hard journey home which I barely remember."
