Loyalty in Captivity: Researching paramilitary prisoners in the archive, the museum and the conference

The third instalment in our series of posts by BAIS postgraduate bursary winners comes from James Bright (University of Edinburgh). James used his bursary funding for a research trip to Belfast, where he examined material relating to loyalist paramilitaries.

Fieldwork in Belfast is vital to my PhD research into loyalist paramilitary prisoners during Northern Ireland’s Troubles conflict. The help I received from the BAIS bursary allowed me to visit Belfast in June of this year, with two conferences bookending a week of archival research. First I returned to the Linen Hall Library, and its exemplary Northern Ireland Political Collection (NIPC), which has been the focal point of my previous visits to the city. Here I surveyed primary sources from their collection, looking at a number of contemporary loyalist magazines and pamphlets featuring material regarding UVF and UDA prisoners. These contemporary sources give an excellent insight into the internal politics of the paramilitaries, my particular focus being on the expression of political thought by the prisoners themselves. I also accessed creative output by the prisoners, including collections of poetry and songs. These were particularly useful in how they demonstrate the group identities fostered by loyalist prisoners, and how they chose to express them. Looking at the publications of loyalist prisoner welfare organisations based in Scotland allowed me to engage a pan-UK element, fitting with my intention of looking at loyalist imprisonment in broader focus.

I also visited the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI) for the first time, principally to consult the oral evidence collected by the Prisons Memory Archive (PMA) that is housed in PRONI’s digital repository. Described by its director Cahal McLaughlin as a ‘multi-narrative interactive documentary archive’, the PMA recorded over 175 testimonies in 2006 and 2007 from those involved in the prisons of Northern Ireland during the conflict. Underpinned by a ‘life storytelling’ framework, the testimonies take the form of ‘walk and talk’ video recordings with the participant returning to the prison site and relaying their experiences there. Twenty four recordings have been transferred to PRONI to date, and five of these are with loyalist former inmates. The opportunity to access these was highly important to my research, and though transcription was a lengthy process these first-hand accounts from former prisoners will greatly enhance my thesis. 

Alongside using the archive facilities, I also continued my engagement with loyalist community organisations that I have developed in previous visits to Belfast. One such organisation is the Andy Tyrie Interpretive Centre (ATIC), a museum dedicated to the history of the conflict from the UDA perspective. The material culture displayed here, including handicrafts produced by prisoners, offers important insights into prisoner conceptions of collective identity and an as yet uncatalogued collection of political publications helps further elucidate paramilitary political thought.

The first conference I attended was the 1969: The Outbreak of the Troubles in Northern Ireland event held at Queen’s University Belfast. This conference addressed a broad range of themes relevant to the early years of the conflict, and of particular interest to me was Simon Prince’s account of the Shankill in 1969. This provided me with wider contextual information about paramilitary loyalism, and how it emerged as a player in the conflict. The second conference was titled Institutions in Ireland and held at PRONI, conveniently allowing me to continue my work with the Prisons Memory Archive materials upstairs between panels. Dealing with a broad range of topics relating to prisons, asylums and workhouses, most relevant to me were three papers dealing specifically with loyalist prisoners. These addressed themes such as the practice of creative expression among prisoners, the significance of handicraft production and the role played by prisoner’s welfare organisations, all of which are topics that feed into my thesis. These conferences were both very worthwhile to informing the broader picture of my thesis and they provided excellent networking opportunities. I wish to extend my thanks to the BAIS for allowing me this opportunity.

James Bright is a PhD in History at the University of Edinburgh. Provisionally, his thesis is entitled, ‘Loyalty in Captivity: Ideas and Identity among Ulster Loyalist paramilitary prisoners, 1976-1987’. His project aims to explore the role played by the loyalist prison experience in shaping ideological development and identity formation within the UVF and UDA.

*Photo courtesy of the author.