Saturday, June 19, 2010

Making memory

I had been wondering why I have no particular personal memory of the events of Bloody Sunday in Northern Ireland – it most certainly it is not, for me, one of those 'where were you' moments.

The answer came when someone mentioned an event which possibly got even more world wide publicity which took place in London two days later on February 1st.

Bernadette Devlin, the young MP for Mid Ulster punched Reginald Maudling – in the House of Commons – as he made his statement on the events in Londonderry.

I was actually in Barbados at the time & I remember two of my male colleagues who were staying in the same hotel calling me to go & look at the television news reporting this unprecedented event (there was no film of the House of Commons proceedings in those days of course). And I never saw any film of the events of Bloody Sunday at that time.

I think we were probably more concerned about the implications of the events surrounding the independence of Bangladesh & the withdrawal of Pakistan form the Commonwealth than with what was perhaps understood as an internal problem for the United Kingdom.

Link