Des O'Hagan (29 March 1934 – 5 May 2015) was a prominent member of the

Workers' Party Workers' Party is a name used by several political parties throughout the world. The name has been used by both organisations on the left and right of the political spectrum. It is currently used by followers of Marxism, Marxism–Leninism, Maoism ...

and was a founding member of the

Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association The Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA; ) was an organisation that campaigned for civil rights for Irish Catholics in Northern Ireland during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Formed in Belfast on 9 April 1967,''The Lost Revolution: The Story of the Official IRA and the Workers' Party'', Brian Hanley and Scott Millar, p. 222. O'Hagan was born in the Lower Falls area of

Belfast Belfast (, , , ; from ) is the capital city and principal port of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan and connected to the open sea through Belfast Lough and the North Channel (Great Britain and Ireland), North Channel ...

in 1934 and became active in republican revolutionary politics in the city from an early age. His grandfather, Michael McKeown, had been head of the Docker's Union in Belfast, and had participated in the

1907 Belfast Dock strike The Belfast Dock strike or Belfast lockout took place in Belfast, Ireland from 26 April to 28 August 1907. The strike was called by Liverpool-born trade union leader James Larkin who had successfully organised the dock workers to join the Nationa ...

alongside

Jim Larkin James Larkin (28 January 1874 – 30 January 1947), sometimes known as Jim Larkin or Big Jim, was an Irish republican, socialist and trade union leader. He was one of the founders of the Irish Labour Party along with James Connolly and Willia ...

. His mother was a devout Catholic but a firm supporter of the

Second Spanish Republic The Spanish Republic (), commonly known as the Second Spanish Republic (), was the form of democratic government in Spain from 1931 to 1939. The Republic was proclaimed on 14 April 1931 after the deposition of Alfonso XIII, King Alfonso XIII. ...

and a rabid anti-

Francoist Francoist Spain (), also known as the Francoist dictatorship (), or Nationalist Spain () was the period of Spanish history between 1936 and 1975, when Francisco Franco ruled Spain after the Spanish Civil War with the title . After his death i ...

. Her family lived besides

James Connolly James Connolly (; 5 June 1868 – 12 May 1916) was a Scottish people, Scottish-born Irish republicanism, Irish republican, socialist, and trade union leader, executed for his part in the Easter Rising, 1916 Easter Rising against British rule i ...

while he resided in Belfast and her father had been his associate. He attended

St Malachy's College St Malachy's College, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, is the oldest Catholic diocesan college in Ulster. The college's alumni and students are known as Malachians. History The college, founded by William Crolly, Bishop William Crolly, opened on th ...

in North Belfast. In 1947 At age 13 he joined Na Fianna Eireann, the youth wing of the

Irish Republican Army The Irish Republican Army (IRA) is a name used by various Resistance movement, resistance organisations in Ireland throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. Organisations by this name have been dominantly Catholic and dedicated to anti-imperiali ...

(IRA), and by 15 he lied about his age in order to enter into the IRA proper. However, he was later expelled from the IRA after joining the Northern Irish civil service, a job which required swearing an

oath of loyalty An oath of allegiance is an oath whereby a nationality, subject or Citizenship, citizen acknowledges a duty of allegiance and swears loyalty to a monarch or a country. In modern republics, oaths are sworn to the country in general, or to the co ...

to the

British monarchy The monarchy of the United Kingdom, commonly referred to as the British monarchy, is the form of government used by the United Kingdom by which a hereditary monarch reigns as the head of state, with their powers Constitutional monarchy, regula ...

. He subsequently joined

Saor Uladh Saor Uladh (; Irish for "Free Ulster") was a short-lived Irish republican paramilitary organisation in Northern Ireland in the 1950s. Feeney (2002), p. 203. Seen as a splinter group of the Irish Republican Army, it was formed in County Tyrone ...

, an left-wing IRA splinter organisation. He was imprisoned in

Crumlin Road jail HM Prison Belfast, also known as Crumlin Road Gaol, is a former prison situated on the Crumlin Road in north Belfast, Northern Ireland. Since 1996 it is the only remaining Victorian era former prison in Northern Ireland. It is colloquially known ...

in his native Belfast from 1956 to 1960 for attempting to rescue a Republican from police custody while being treated at

Mater Infirmorum Hospital The Mater Infirmorum Hospital, commonly known as The Mater, is an acute hospital in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It provides services to most of North Belfast and South Antrim, reaching as far as Glengormley, Carrickfergus and Newtownabbey It is m ...

. On his release from imprisonment, O'Hagan was enrolled in the

London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...

, where he was influenced by

Marxist Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflic ...

theorist

Ralph Miliband Ralph Miliband (born Adolphe Miliband; 7 January 1924 – 21 May 1994) was a British sociologist. He has been described as "one of the best known academic Marxists of his generation", in this manner being compared with E. P. Thompson, Eric Ho ...

, graduating in 1964. He subsequently returned to Belfast and was appointed to the post of Senior Lecturer in

Sociology Sociology is the scientific study of human society that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. The term sociol ...

in Stranmillis College of Teacher Education, now known as

Stranmillis University College Stranmillis University College is a university college of Queen's University Belfast. The institution is located on the Stranmillis Road in Belfast. It had students in . The school offers the BEd, PGCE and TESOL, as well as other courses. ...

. Between his time in London and the growing influence of left-wing members of the IRA/Sinn Féin such as

Cathal Goulding Cathal Goulding (; 2 January 1923 – 26 December 1998) was Chief of Staff of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and the Official IRA. Early life and career One of seven children born on East Arran Street in north Dublin to an Irish republican f ...

Tomás Mac Giolla Tomás Mac Giolla (; born Thomas Gill; 25 January 1924 – 4 February 2010) was an Irish Workers' Party politician who served as Lord Mayor of Dublin from 1993 to 1994, Leader of the Workers' Party from 1962 to 1988 and President of Sinn Féin ...

and

Seán Garland Seán Garland (7 March 1934 – 13 December 2018) was the General Secretary of the Workers' Party in Ireland from 1977 to 1991, and President from 1998 to 2008. Early life Born at Belvedere Place, off Mountjoy Square in Dublin, Garland joined ...

, O'Hagan became a committed

Communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

. In 1967 O'Hagan was one of the founding members of the

Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association The Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA; ) was an organisation that campaigned for civil rights for Irish Catholics in Northern Ireland during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Formed in Belfast on 9 April 1967,political concessions. Des O'Hagan was one of a large number of Republicans who were arrested and interned without trial in August 1971. He quickly began documenting the ill-treatment of prisoners by the British authorities and had these articles smuggled out of the Long Kesh internment camp. They were soon serialised by the ''

Irish Times ''The Irish Times'' is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper and online digital publication. It was launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Ruadhán Mac Cormaic. It is published every day except Sundays. ''The Irish Times'' is Ireland's leading n ...

'' newspaper as ''Letters from Long Kesh''. His articles played a significant role in exposing the torture and ill-treatment of prisoners at the camp and drawing international attention to them. The "Letters from Long Kesh" were finally published in book form, by Citizen Press, in September 2012 to mark the 40th anniversary of their serialisation. On his release from internment, O'Hagan resigned from his post in the overwhelmingly Protestant Stranmillis and once again became involved in the official republican movement and played an important role of its development into the

. He was for a time editor of ''The Irish People'' and served on the party's Central Executive Committee for many years during which he was chairman of the party's education committee. He also contested a number of elections on behalf of the Workers' Party in the South Down constituency. By the 1970s he had adopted the nickname "The Red Divil" (a Northern Irish pronunciation of "The Red Devil") after he was denounced at the pulpit by Canon Murray of St Peter's Cathedral for his Communist outlook and his known opposition to the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, left-wing parties and movements across the West rapidly shifted away from hardliner positions. Splits were common and the Worker's Party was not unaffected, seeing a major split occur when a major faction of the party left to form Democratic Left, a

Democratic socialist Democratic socialism is a left-wing economic and political philosophy that supports political democracy and some form of a socially owned economy, with a particular emphasis on economic democracy, workplace democracy, and workers' self-mana ...

party as opposed to the Marxist-Leninist stance of the Worker's Party. O'Hagan remained a hardliner and viewed the split as a "Betrayal", and desperately tried to hold the fragments of the Worker's Party together as it dwindled. He lashed out the emergence of

New Labour New Labour is the political philosophy that dominated the history of the British Labour Party from the mid-late 1990s to 2010 under the leadership of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. The term originated in a conference slogan first used by the ...

in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

, which saw the Labour Party move away from Socialist policies towards a version of

Social Democracy Social democracy is a Social philosophy, social, Economic ideology, economic, and political philosophy within socialism that supports Democracy, political and economic democracy and a gradualist, reformist, and democratic approach toward achi ...

. Des O'Hagan died on 5 May 2015, aged 81 in

Downpatrick Downpatrick () is a town in County Down, Northern Ireland. It is on the Lecale peninsula, about south of Belfast. In the Middle Ages, it was the capital of the Dál Fiatach, the main ruling dynasty of Ulaid. Down Cathedral, Its cathedral is sai ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ohagan, Des 1934 births 2015 deaths Alumni of the London School of Economics Communists from Northern Ireland Irish Marxists Irish Republican Army (1922–1969) members Irish republicans interned without trial Official Irish Republican Army members Politicians from Belfast Republicans imprisoned during the Northern Ireland conflict Workers' Party (Ireland) politicians