Provisional Irish Republican Army 1982, reflecting the sequence in which the old leadership of the republican movement were being sidelined. IRA prisoners convicted after March 1976 did not have Special Category Status applied in prison. In response, more than 500 prisoners refused to wear prison clothes. This activity culminated in the 1981 Irish hunger strike, when seven IRA and three Irish National Liberation Army members starved themselves to death in pursuit of political status. The hunger strike leader Bobby Sands and Anti H-Block activist Owen Carron were elected to the British Parliament, and two other protesting prisoners were elected to the Dáil. In addition,
Libby Prison Escape Cavada commented, "Really, when our distracted little Commandant now comes into our rooms, he keeps his knees well together, it is necessary to be very cautious, some of us might slip out between his legs!" A melodramatic Broadway play about the escape entitled "A Fair Rebel", by Harry P. Mawson, premiered in New York City in August 1891. In 1914 a 3-reel silent film version was released starring Linda Arvidson, Charles Perley and Dorothy Gish and directed by Frank Powell. Libby Prison Escape The Libby Prison Escape at Richmond, Virginia in February 1864 saw over 100 Union prisoners-of-war escape from