Birmingham Six survivor who forgave his tormentors – The Irish Times

Born March 24th, 1930

Died May 27th, 2023

Sally Mulready, whose family were great supporters and friends of Hugh Callaghan, one of the Birmingham Six who has died aged 93, said part of his philosophy was to “sing his worries away”.

“He would sing anywhere,” she said. On the last day of his life, he was still singing, to the nurses in Homerton Hospital in London, with his beloved partner, Adeline Masterson, by his side.

Sally’s daughter Molly remembers travelling in a coach in central London with Hugh Callaghan for the St Patrick’s Day celebrations last year. “He was with a whole bunch of older people from the Irish Pensioners Choir, who were going to perform at Trafalgar Square. There was some problem with the traffic so there had to be a police escort to get us there. I said to Hugh, ‘Look out the window’. And he said, ‘I would be a lot less relaxed if that happened years ago’.”

Callaghan was a cheerful, optimistic man but there was one nightmare that did recur, and that was of the police-controlled Alsatian dogs terrorising him in his cell where he was held in connection with the IRA Birmingham pub bombings of November 21st 1974. “He managed not to dwell on the past but it was so horrific he was never completely free of it,” said Molly.

Twenty-one people died and more than 180 people were maimed and injured in the attack on the two city centre pubs – the Mulberry Bush and the Tavern in the Town. Callaghan was arrested along with five others – Paddy Hill, Gerard Hunter, Richard McIlkenny, William Power and John Walker – hence the name the Birmingham Six. All five, apart from Callaghan, had left Birmingham that evening shortly before the explosions. They were travelling to Belfast to attend the funeral of an IRA man, James McDade, whom they all knew as a friend rather than as a republican paramilitary. McDade was killed earlier that month when a bomb he was planting at the telephone exchange in Coventry prematurely exploded.

Callaghan had gone to McIlkenny’s house to pay him back £1 that he owed him and had seen the men off at the train station in Birmingham. The five were arrested at Heysham in Lancashire when they got off the train, while Callaghan was arrested the following day.

[ Hugh Callaghan: ‘The night terrors have become less frequent’ ]

After beatings, long interrogations, deprivation of food and sleep and a mock execution, false confessions were extracted by West Midlands Police. They all received life sentences in 1975.

But doubt was cast on the nature of the confessions and also on the scientific evidence. A number of people took up their cause, such as Sr Sarah Clarke, Fr Denis Faul, the solicitor Gareth Peirce, who represented the men, and journalist, and later a Labour MP, Chris Mullin, along with the Mulreadys and many others.

Mullin worked on the case for Granada TV’s World in Action series and also wrote a book, Error of Judgment: The Truth About the Birmingham Pub Bombings, where he reported how he had interviewed some of the people who were actually responsible for the explosions.

Gareth Peirce said of Callaghan: “He was the one who was in a vulnerable situation, perhaps the most vulnerable. The fact that he survived and came out and had a life was a heroic achievement of stamina.”

Later in his sentence, Callaghan was offered parole but insisted he would fight his case until the innocence of the six was formally established. Following a number of failed appeals the campaign finally succeeded, and in 1991 the convictions were declared unsafe and unsatisfactory and Callaghan and the other five were released after serving more than 16 years. It took another 10 years before the men received compensation of £840,000-£1.2 million.

On his release Callaghan found that he could not settle back in Birmingham. He moved to London while his wife, Eileen, and daughter, Geraldine, remained in Birmingham. Eileen died in 2014.

With Sally Mulready he wrote his autobiography, Cruel Fate. He was raised in poverty in a large family in Ardoyne in north Belfast, moving to Birmingham in 1947 for labouring work when he was 17. His father, Patrick, a former British army sergeant whom he described as an “overbearing brute and bully” mistreated his wife, Rose; and children, and ultimately deserted the family.

[ Birmingham Six member Hugh Callaghan dies aged 93 ]

He had some good memories from prison. One was of joining the prison choir and singing Danny Boy for the prison governor, which brought her to tears.

Soon after his release he met Jack Charlton and members of the Irish squad, including Aston Villa player Paul McGrath at a training session in Wembley. Charlton said, “You’ve had a rough time”. Callaghan responded: “It’s all over now.”

The trauma of those falsely convicted for outrages such as the IRA 1974 Birmingham and Guildford bombings led some of them, on release, to have difficult and tortured lives but Callaghan settled into a contented pattern of life, particularly after he met his partner, Adeline, a Belfast woman of similar age.

He was a remarkable, gentle soul. There was not a hint of bitterness in him. I don’t know how he did it, but he managed to forgive them

According to Molly Mulready, they lived independently in a lovely house in Hackney in London. They regularly attended evening tea dances and every Sunday joined parishioners for Mass at the local Catholic church. “She really loved him and he really loved her. You could really see the affection between them.”

He was a member of the Irish Pensioners Choir, who are releasing an album shortly. “It is such a shame he won’t hear his final tracks,” Molly said.

She believed the secret of his latterly happy life was that he was able to forgive those who had mistreated him. “He was a remarkable, gentle soul. There was not a hint of bitterness in him. I don’t know how he did it, but he managed to forgive them. It transformed his life. And that meant he could love and he could laugh and he could enjoy his life … He had really made his peace.”

Hugh Callaghan is the second of the Birmingham Six to die, after Richard McIlkenny died in 2006. He is survived by his partner, Adeline; daughter, Geraldine; two grandchildren and sister Patsy in Belfast.

All are welcome to his funeral which takes place at 12.30pm on Monday June 12th at The Immaculate Heart of Mary and St Dominic’s church, Hackney, London E9 5SS