I was only a working-class boy from a Nationalist ghetto. But it is repression that creates the revolutionary spirit of freedom.
Bobby SandsMy life now centered around sleepless nights and stand-bys, dodging the Brits and calming nerves to go out on operations. But the people stood by us. The people not only opened the doors of their homes to lend us a hand, but they opened their hearts to us. I learned that without the people, we could not survive and I knew that I owed them everything.
Bobby SandsThey have nothing in their whole imperial arsenal that can break the spirit of one Irishman who doesn't want to be broken.
Bobby SandsEveryone, Republican or otherwise has their own particular part to play. No part is too great or too small, no one is too old or too young to do something.
Bobby SandsGuns don't win wars; guns and bombs may kill a man but they cannot make him follow their lead, nor will they ever coerce an unyielding man to yield.
Bobby SandsGenerations will continue to meet the same fate unless the perennial oppressor-Britain-is removed, for she will unashamedly and mercilessly continue to maintain her occupation and economic exploitation of Ireland to judgment day, if she is not halted and ejected.
Bobby SandsAll things must come to pass as one, so hope should never die. There is no height or bloody might that a freeman can’t defy. There is no source or foreign force can break one man who knows that his free will no thing can kill … and from that, freedom grows.
Bobby SandsThey will not criminalise us, rob us of our true identity, steal our individualism, depoliticise us, churn us out as systemised, institutionalised, decent law-abiding robots. Never will they label our liberation struggle as criminal.
Bobby SandsWe refuse to lie here in dishonor! We are not criminals, but Irishmen! This is the crime of which we stand accused.
Bobby SandsI am standing on the threshold of another trembling world. May God have mercy on my soul.
Bobby SandsI'll wear no convicts uniform nor meekly serve my time that Britain might brand Irelands fight 800 years of crime.
Bobby SandsI may die, but the Republic of 1916 will never die. Onward to the Republic and liberation of our people.
Bobby SandsThere can never be peace in Ireland until the foreign oppressive British presence is removed, leaving all the Irish people as a unit to control their own affairs and determine their own destinies as a sovereign people, free in mind and body, separate and distinct physically, culturally and economically.
Bobby Sands