This month marks fifty years since Frank Stagg, a native of Hollymount in
South Mayo, died on hunger strike in an English Jail.
On 12 February 1976, aged 34, Frank died in Wakefield Prison after 62 days
without food.
On Saturday, 14 February, at 2pm, a 50thanniversary commemoration will take
place at Leigue Cemetery, Ballina.
Half a century on, Frank Stagg\u2019s life and death are being remembered in
Ballina on Saturday week, as people locally, nationally and internationally
gather to mark the anniversary of his death.
From the outset of his imprisonment, Frank Stagg insisted on being treated as
a political prisoner. In March 1974, he joined a hunger strike alongside
fellow Mayo man Michael Gaughan and other Irish prisoners, demanding
transfer to a prison in Ireland.
In a final message written shortly before his death, he expressed the hope
that his sacrifice might contribute to \u201cpeace with justice\u201d.
The controversy surrounding his burial ensured that his story would remain
prominent in Irish public life. He had requested to be buried in the
Republican Plot in Ballina beside Michael Gaughan. However, the Fine
Gael-Labour government intervened, diverting the plane carrying his remains
and arranging a burial under heavy security in a separate grave. Concrete
was poured over the coffin to prevent its removal, and most of his family
boycotted the funeral in protest.
In November 1977, his remains were removed and reinterred beside Michael
Gaughan, in accordance with his wishes.
On Saturday 14thFebruary at 2pm, a 50thanniversary commemoration will take
place at Leigue Cemetery, Ballina. The main speaker will be Gerry Kelly MLA,
who was imprisoned in England during the same period. This will be followed
by a social gathering at 7pm at the Great National Hotel Ballina. All are
welcome to attend.
On 12th February, George Stagg will be a guest on the Tommy Marren Show to talk about the life and death of his brother Frank.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This month marks fifty years since Frank Stagg, a native of Hollymount inSouth Mayo, died on hunger strike…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":287441,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":{"0":"post-287440","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=287440"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287440\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/287441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=287440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=287440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=287440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}