with those of us who opposed it. Hunger striking, as a weapon of being released from prison, lost its effectiveness with the cruel death of Terence McSwiney, martyred Lord Mayor of Cork. The prison rules in Winchester were set up for convicts and criminals and, right from the start, efforts to make us comply with those rules met with our determined resistance. We were allowed exercise and received the usual prison food but had no privileges. Winchester was also a penal institution for young offenders, of the type of the Borstal Institutions and this necessitated very strict warders. One of these warders was particularly severe and seemed to regard us as so many "Borstal" types thinking that all he had to do was bully us into submission. His tone and his attitude towards us was most offensive and obnoxious. We put up with that for a while but then decided the time had come to "tame" him; and hence forth we nicknamed him "Bulldog". Due to the youth of a number of the criminal inmates, a schoolmaster was employed by the prison authorities who also acted as the Prison librarian. He must have miscalculated the situation when he decided to interview all of us separately in our cells. Accompanied by a star [23] (good conduct) prisoner he started his interviewing tours. His questions were utterly childish and ridiculous concerning our age, family background, education, etc., etc. and we had previously decided not to tell him anything but to let the British try and find out for themselves. All went well as he got one refusal to divulge information after another, until he encountered Thady Kelly of Limerick. Thady was a born prankster who, having been a political prisoner in British penal institutions before, knew all the rules and had his own plans and methods for breaking them. He was an unsurpassed master on duplicity and on breaking down discipline and all that with a cherubic face and a sweet smile. The schoolmaster thought he had finally hit on a "soft" case but pretty soon Thady really took him in hand and commenced to tell him about the Black and Tans, the tortures, prodding with white hot pokers and so on and so forth. The visitor turned purple in the face and, stammering in rage, uttered some most insulting accusations against the Irish in general , and the Irish way of living in particular. So, that's when Thady decided to really take him apart; grabbing his little stool, Thady chased the schoolmaster around and out of his cell, all the time yelling and screeching how this man had insulted and mortally offended him, and that was the end of the schoolmaster's personalised interviews as far as we were concerned. Not to be outdone, next to appear on the scene was "Bulldog" the warder; he, too, accompanied by a star prisoner who brought along a bucket filled to the brim with water, complete with a scrubbing brush and some rags. The warder's attitude was so insulting, yelling orders at us how, what, and why we should scrub and clean that, as soon as he appeared in my cell, I kicked bucket, brush and all right out on to the landing and then slammed the door shut for good measure. Not a sound from outside,... but, next morning, I found myself lined up for punishment, being taken before the prison Governor, together with Thady Kelly and Mick Sheehan, another one of our lads. Mick, too had resorted to chasing "Bulldog" out of his cell. Sitting behind his massive desk, the Governor was surrounded by about six of the warders. Upon entering the room, the Chief Warder barked at us to "stand at attention" for the Governor, an order we totally ignored and, instead, stood at ease. Not enough with that Mick Sheehan, a very cool and calculating man, put his arms right on the [24] Governor's desk, resting his chin on his hands. There came the immediate, outraged yell of the Chief Warder, "Take your hands of the Governor's desk this minute', followed by an amused admonition from Thady, “Putting your elbows yet on the Governor's desk, God what next?" “SHUT UP" was the Chief Warder's hysterically furious shout. This, however, didn't faze our Thady one bit and, leaning across me and towards Sheehan, he admonished Mick in mocked severity, "Sure , 'tis a wonder you didn't put your feet on the man's desk!" Again a "SHUT UP" screech from the Chief Warder's mouth which only brought still another remark from Thady, this time directed at the Warder complete with an angelic, and apologetic sweet smile, "You don't know that fellow like we do; he is ALWAYS GETTING US INTO TROUBLE!! A third yell to "SHUT UP" was hurled at Thady and, simultaneously, an old hat which Thady wore (having removed the hatband, just as Thady had also removed all the buttons from his
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