John Hume Was Half-Right About Bloody Sunday
Many people today pay little attention to what happened on Bloody Sunday in 1972. That’s hardly surprising — most weren’t alive then, don’t live in Derry or the Bogside, and over five decades have passed. Yet the relatives of those killed remember it vividly.
Their pain surfaced again last week when Soldier F was acquitted on all murder charges. It took fifty-three years for a British soldier to face trial for the massacre, only for the court to declare him not guilty.
John Hume’s Reflection and Its Echo
“Many people down there feel now it’s a united Ireland or nothing. Alienation is pretty total.” — John Hume, speaking to an Irish Times journalist after Bloody Sunday
John Hume’s words still resonate. He was mistaken about imminent Irish reunification — half a century later, the island remains divided — but his insight into alienation proved accurate. The victims’ families expressed only deep disgust when the verdict was announced.
Echoes in Derry
Following the ruling, activists altered the famous Free Derry mural to proclaim:
“There is no British justice.”The statement captured the prevailing outrage in the community.
A Tragic Legacy
The horror of those days is hard to comprehend: after killing eight civilians in Ballymurphy, the same Parachute Regiment entered the Bogside and shot thirteen more, with a fourteenth dying later. The then Home Secretary, Reginald Maudling, falsely claimed that British troops had come under fire.
Author’s Summary
Decades after Bloody Sunday, the verdict and unchanged divisions echo John Hume’s warning about deep alienation that still shapes Northern Ireland’s soul.