Profile of a Convict: Thomas McElwee

Thomas McElwee, born in November 1957, was the fifth of twelve children in the McElwee family from Bellaghy in County Londonderry. On his father’s side the McElwee clan were newcomers to the area, having emigrated to Bellaghy and taken over a farm in the early 1900s. His mother had lived in Philadelphia in the USA until she was 7 when her family returned to Ireland and moved to Bellaghy. His aunt Margaret on his father’s side was the mother of the IRA terrorist Francis Hughes. The Hughes and McElwee houses were less than half a mile apart and the boys often got involved in the same activities. Like the Hughes’, the McElwee’s large family were provided for by child welfare payments from the British government. Unlike those living in the Irish Republic all the families’ medical, dental and school needs were also paid for by the British government.

As a child Thomas and his younger brother Benedict enjoyed petty vandalism. One of his sisters laughingly recalls that in the winter he would climb on neighbours’ roofs and block their chimneys causing the houses to fill with smoke, a stench that could remain in the houses for weeks.

With the McElwee and Hughes family connections to terrorism it was not surprising that Thomas joined na Fianna Eireann and received terrorist training, when he was 14. Subsequently, with his brother Benedict, he joined the gang his cousin Francis Hughes had started. Together, the boys in this gang would terrorise neighbours who were not sympathetic to Republicans or were thought to have relatives in the police or army.

After leaving school Thomas McElwee attended British taxpayer funded Magherafelt Technical College, but failed a car mechanic’s course. He then attended a training centre in Ballymena and did some off-the-books car maintenance and other general, untaxed, work.

When Francis Hughes’ gang joined Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness’ Sinn Fein IRA, so did Thomas and his brother Benedict and the gang extended its attacks to adjoining counties. They went into Magherafelt, Castle Dawson, and Maghera, destroying property and attacking people as well as in Bellaghy where Thomas continued to live in his parents home and receive British taxpayer’s unemployment benefits.

Thomas and his brothers’ vandalism, terrorist activities and lack of jobs drew the suspicion of the authorities and their home was searched several times between 1974 and 1976. The brothers were questioned by the police on several occasions. Definite proof of any offences was lacking however and they were never charged.

On October 8th 1976 a Roman Catholic priest celebrated Mass in the McElwee home and, after receiving his blessing, Thomas, Benedict and others in their gang set off to place several bombs in Protestant property in the town of Ballymena. One of their bombs exploded as Thomas was fusing it and he suffered severe head injuries. Benedict was only slightly injured but of the others from Bellaghy in the gang, Sean McPeake lost a leg and Colm Scullion, several toes.

Thomas was blinded by the explosion, but the British army rushed him to the Wavery hospital in Ballymena and then to the Royal Victoria in Belfast where, after three weeks of intensive care, at British taxpayer expense, surgeons managed to save the sight in one of his eyes.

After Thomas’ recovery both brothers were charged with murder in the death of Yvonne Dunlop, a 26 year old Protestant , who was killed when one of the bombs they had planted, destroyed her shop the Alley Katz Boutique. On conviction for Yvonne’s murder, the McElwee brothers were sentenced to life but these sentences were later reduced to 20 years.

As they had put the bomb which murdered Yvonne in her shop because she was a Protestant, the McElwee family believed their sons’ crimes to be political, and therefore felt their sons were political prisoners and deserved special treatment in prison. Their demands were that they be allowed additional visits, letters and parcels, that the brothers should be allowed unrestricted access to other Sinn Fein IRA convicts, that they be permitted to wear their own civilian clothing in prison, that other convicts should have to wash and clean their cells, showers and toilets and that they could chose any educational or recreational activities they wished, and these should be provided at British taxpayer expense.

After a series of protests to achieve these demands, including wrapping themselves in blankets instead of wearing prison clothing, and escalating through refusing to wash and shave, to smearing their own faeces in their cells, some of the convicts eventually started refusing to eat until their demands were granted. Thomas participated in this campaign and stopped eating in June 1981. As the demands for special treatment were not granted, Thomas continued to refuse to eat and died of his self-imposed starvation