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DERRY (CONT.), IRELAND General Info Dublin Hill of Tara Newgrange Limerick Doolin Cliffs of Moher The Burren Galway Belfast Belfast Murals Derry Derry Murals More Photos. We headed next to the Bogside. The Bogside is a nationalist neighborhood outside the city walls of Derry. The area has been a focus point for many of the events of the troubles, from the Battle of the Bogside and Bloody Sunday in the 1960's and 1970's to today. We finally came to the Free Derry Wall! Yeah! I have always wanted to visit this site! Situated at the junction of Fahan Street and Rossville Street, the wall marks a symbolic entry to the Bogside. It was originally painted in 1969 by local man the late John ‘Caker’ Casey with the words ‘You are now entering Free Derry’ during rioting after the Burntollet attack on a civil rights march. The idea for this mural came from a 1969 mural in California: "You are now entering Free Berkeley," in protest against the Vietnam War and racism (YEAH! My home town!). There have been a number of attempts to demolish the wall. British soldiers drove an armoured vehicle into the wall in an effort to topple it and planners have also tried to have it demolished or moved. But the locals have resisted these efforts. Here's a cool 360° photo of the Free Derry corner. We walked over to the Hunger Strike Memorial (Rossville Street) near the wall. The memorial is dedicated to the ten republican prisoners who died on hunger strike for political status in 1981. It was officially unveiled on May 5, 2001, the 20th anniversary of the death of Bobby Sands. The memorial is in the shape of an ‘H’, to represent the H-Blocks in which the prisoners were held, broken in the middle to symbolise their perceived victory over the prison regime. The symbol of the dove and the barbed wire is taken from one of Sands’s prison poems. Next, we walked to the Bloody Sunday Memorial on Rossville Street. A Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA) march was organized to protest against the continuation of Internment without trial in Northern Ireland. On Sunday, January 30, 1972, between 10-20 thousand protesters took part in the march. The march was prevented from entering the city center by the British Army. The main body of the march then moved to the 'Free Derry' corner to attend a rally but some young men began throwing stones at soldiers on William Street. Soldiers of the Parachute Regiment, an elite regiment of the British Army, moved into the Bogside in an arrest operation. During the next 30 minutes, these soldiers shot dead 13 men and shot and injured 13 others - mainly by single shots to the head and trunk. The soldiers responsible for the deaths and injuries insisted that they had come under sustained gun and bomb attack by members of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and only fired at people in possession of weapons. Those involved in the march, and those who witnessed the events, provided evidence that ran contrary to the evidence given by the soldiers. The British-government-appointed Widgery Tribunal found soldiers were not guilty. The events of 'Bloody Sunday' caused a lot of shock and revulsion at an international level. Within Ireland the killings resulted in a dramatic increase in support for Republicanism in general and the IRA in particular. Continued >

Video: News report on the 30th anniversary of Bloody Sunday Photos taken after paratroopers opened fire on the protest A Chronology of Key Bloody Sunday Events Those Killed on Bloody Sunday (and ages): • Patrick 'Paddy' Doherty (31) • Gerald Donaghy (17) • John ('Jackie') Duddy (17) • Hugh Gilmour (17) • Michael Kelly (17) • Michael McDaid (20) • Kevin McElhinney (17) • Bernard 'Barney' McGuigan (41) • Gerald McKinney (35) • William 'Willie' McKinney (26) • William Nash (19) • James ('Jim') Wray (22) • John Young (17) • John Johnston (59) - died later as result of injuries Those Injured on Bloody Sunday (and ages): • Michael Bradley (22) • Michael Bridge (25) • Alana Burke (18) (injured when run down by a British Army armoured carrier) • Patrick Campbell (53) • Margaret ('Peggy') Deery (37) (the only woman shot on 'Bloody Sunday') • Damien Donaghy (15) • Joseph ('Joe') Friel (20) • Daniel Gillespie (31) • Joseph Mahon (16) • Patrick McDaid (24) • Daniel McGowan (37) • Alexander ('Alex') Nash (52) • Patrick ('Paddy') O'Donnell (41) • Michael Quinn (17)

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