Armagh Prison no-wash protest Armagh Prison no-wash protest The 1980–1981 Armagh Prison Dirty Protest occurred at the all-women Armagh Prison in Northern Ireland, where prisoners refused to bathe, use the lavatory, empty chamber pots, or clean their cells. This resulted in unsanitary conditions and increased abuse at the hands of the prison guards. The protest borrowed tactics previously used by male Irish republican prisoners in Long Kesh Prison (informally known as the Maze Prison), that had started in 1978. Since a hunger strike of 40 IRA prisoners in 1972, prisoners convicted as members of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) had been given Special Category
Maze Prison escape when rope ladders were thrown over the wall. Two prisoners were recaptured, but the remaining seven managed to cross the border into the Republic of Ireland and appeared at a press conference in Dublin. On 17 January 1972, seven internees escaped from the prison ship HMS "Maidstone" by swimming to freedom, resulting in them being dubbed the "Magnificent Seven". On 31 October 1973, three leading IRA members, including former Chief of Staff Seamus Twomey, escaped from Mountjoy Prison in Dublin when a hijacked helicopter landed in the exercise yard of the prison. Irish band The Wolfe Tones wrote a song