All of the following posters are from the Dutch International Institute of Social History (IISH) website.
They are related to the international defence campaign to save the Murrays from death penalty in the late 1970s. Noel and Marie Murray, former members of Official Sinn Fein, were sentenced to death in June 1976 for the killing of an off-duty Garda during a bank raid as part of a group called the armed ‘anarchist’ group.
From Cedar Lounge Revolution:
Noel Murray had been a member of Sinn Féin from 1966 and had gone with Official Sinn Féin in 1970. Marie Murray had been active in the Housing Action Committee in Dublin in 1969 from which she had joined OSF the following year. Both had left OSF in 1973 but remained politically active…
On appeal and retrial they were convicted of murder and received the lesser sentence of life imprisonment.
Posters from the Irish campaign:
Posters from the English campaign:
Posters from the mainland European campaign:
The shooting happened in St. Annes Park, Raheny in Sept 75. My school was beside the park. The whole park was cordoned off by Gardai that afternoon (and the morning after). I had to cycle a different route to the usual one.
It is doubtful the Murrays would have been hanged regardless of the campaign. There had been no hangings in the republic since the 1950s. I don’t remember much about the campaign at the time so I am not sure it got much publicity or reached a wide audience. I think the general opinion was that regardless of the political past of the Murrays the bank robbery was just criminal activity and after they killed the off duty garda they needed to portray it as politically motivated to get as much support as they could and not be treated as ordinary criminals.
Seamus Costello of the IRSP was involved in the campaign. It coincided with the campaign against the ‘heavy gang’ in relation to the Sallins train robbery in early 76 and the state arrest and torture of IRSP members. The anti H-Block/Political Status campaign was just getting started at the time as well since political status was abolished early 76.
Miriam Daly who was involved in the anti H-Block/Political Status campaign became involved in the Murray campaign. It was through it she met Costello and joined the IRSP eventually leading the party when he was assassinated. She herself was assassinated in 1980 just before the first hunger strike.
The garda was Michael Reynolds. There’s a plaque dedicated to him in the entrance to the garda station in Clontarf. I was playing football in the park that afternoon. It got very busy very quick after the shooting, we hadn’t heard anything so we didn’t know til we got home what had happened. I don’t remember much support for the Murrays; I think they were living in Killester at the time.
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[…] An off-duty Garda, Michael Reynolds (30), is shot dead in St. Anne’s Park by two Anarchists Noel and Marie Murray, former members of Official Sinn Fein, following an armed robbery at the Bank of Ireland, […]