Rotten Mango - #132: The Sisters of Terror (Case of The Price Sisters)

Episode Date: January 19, 2022

The sisters were arrested - they went with the plan. Stare at a fixed object to the point of looking hypnotized. The police were getting fed up “YOU'RE AN EVIL LITTLE MANIAC TELL US WHERE THE BOMBS ARE.” The sisters remained “hypnotized” till at exactly 3 PM they looked at their wristwatch and let out a big sinister smile. BOOM. The bomb went off in the busy streets of London injuring hundreds. The sisters had 3 more. Book Rec: “Say Nothing” - by Patrick Keefe (one of my favorite authors of all time you won’t be disappointed by any of his books) Full Source Notes: rottenmangopodcast.com To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Rambles. Whether you're doing a dance to your favorite artist in the office parking lot, or being guided into Warrior I in the break room before your shift, whether you're running on your Peloton tread at your mom's house while she watches the baby, or counting your breaths on the subway. Peloton is for all of us, wherever we are, whenever we need it, download the free Peloton app today. Peloton app available through free tier or pay to description starting at $12.99 per month. Butterbeam Butterbeam Welcome to this week's main episode of Rotten Mango. I'm your host Stephanie Sue and let's jump right into London.

The two sisters arrived in London. They hopped into their little reserved cars with fake license plates. It wasn't the nicest car, not the newest model. What did they fake license plate? Like fake ones, not the real ones. You put a fake one on top, like a counterfeit license plate. Oh, okay. Yeah, it's not the nicest car. It's not the newest model.

The seats were a little bit itchy. There was crumbs all over the place. There was a weird stench to the car. But you know, it had its pros. It did have 200 pounds of explosive material attached to the passenger side. And that was good enough for the sisters. They and their accomplices placed four cars in strategic parts of London all set to go off later that day.

But by the time that it detonated, they would already be long gone on a plane. The only issue was, someone had tipped off the police, and the sisters were caught at the airport, taken in to be questioned, and Marion, the younger sister she refused to talk. Instead she followed her sister's teachings, she would stare at a random object in the room, and pretend to look hypnotized. The interrogator was getting pissed, I mean, he knew what she was doing. You're an evil little maniac, yelled. You're not gonna be seeing sunlight for a very long time.

Tell me where the frickin' bombs are. But she continued to stare, almost drooling at this point, and around 3 p.m., she prized her eyes off from the object, looks at her watch, and she smiles. Boom. One of the bombs goes off. Shards of glass everywhere, debris, metal, flying, propelling through the air.

People are knocked to the ground. When they come to, they have blood streaming down their faces. Ambulances are rushing to help the injured, but it was a lot. Nearly 250 people were injured by that bomb. The two sisters would later be known as the Sisters of Terror. But why did they even set those bombs off in the first place? Well, that is a very complicated answer. As always, full source notes are available at RottenMangoPodcast.com, but there is a really good book on this case. That's I'm not saying that. I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying that I'm saying popular everywhere, okay? I'm not like special. It's his newest release. I highly suggest go giving that a read. It's about the dark history of the opioid epidemic. Honestly, it's like the show's succession because it's one family. It's this family that controls all the dark secrets of the pharmaceutical industry and we don't even know their names. Like you think these crazy families are that bad that we know of in the paparazzi and the news

and like the political parties? No. This family is crazy. It's so intense, there's so much drama. The author grew up in Boston. But say nothing is a completely different book. This is a book that I'm talking about today. His family is of Irish heritage

and he dug through mountains and mountains of case files, interviews, did his own field research. He personally interviewed the Maconville children, that's important. In fact, he interviewed over a hundred people in total for his book, but a ton of people actually declined an interview or in the middle of it. They would just stop talking. What? That's why he named the book, say nothing. It was that people's fear that drove them to be silent with so fascinating to him. So that's why it's called Say Nothing.

Go give it a read. It's like the deepest deep dive you'll ever read on this case and the way that he writes is just out of this world. I mean, talk about talent. So let's jump into the case. This is the story of Jean McConville. She was 38 years old when she was kidnapped. She had given birth to 14 children. Four of them had died at infancy and she had 10 kids.

Now before we get to the bombs, I have to give you a quick history lesson. Do you know what the United Kingdom is? I mean, you do, right? But like, what's the difference between England, Great Britain, and the United Kingdom, right? I didn't know. So the United Kingdom is a country of countries, which by the way, the full name for the United Kingdom is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. So it contains England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. So think of it as like two islands right next to each other. England, Scotland, and Wales are on one. Northern Ireland is on the northern tip of the island of Ireland. Ireland is not a country. The Republic of Ireland is anyways. Listen, I just went through an hour-long

explanation of the island of Ireland and my fiance is like, this is confusing. Can you stop saying the island of Ireland? Because my brain is mush now. So I have simplified it. If you want to know the full history there's Google, there's books, there's history books, even say nothing has a whole in depth deep dive on this, okay? But essentially Northern Ireland, half the people were divided. The Protestants is what we're going to call them. They share the same religion as most people in the the UK So they wanted to stay and remain part of the United Kingdom. They said Northern Ireland should be part of the UK Are you kidding me? Whereas the Catholics who were the minority in Northern Ireland they said no We should be a united island. We don't need to go to the UK We need to join forces with the Republic of Ireland. They're right next to us. We share borders with them

That's who we need to join forces with the Republic of Ireland. They're right next to us. We share borders with them. That's who we need to partner up with. So this caused a whole thing. And it wasn't just them fighting. Of course, the British came in because they're like, yeah, no, we want to own y'all so. So they would come in, they would send their troops into Northern Ireland to quote, handle the matter peacefully. But when has that ever happened? So a lot of the times it would result in civilians dying. So the British troops came in and apparently they came in with a homicidal rage because they were just shooting at civilians left and right. Majority of the civilians that were shot and killed were Catholics. So this just made the division even stronger. It's like, look, they're coming in here and they're killing us because we don't like them. So it's clear. They're not trying to make sure

we're all peacemakers. No, they're trying to get rid of us. So every side just got more and more heated. It only made things worse. Some of the most prominent organizations on the side of the nationalist sash Republicans, which the only one that you really need to know for this story is called the Provisional Irish Republican Army, the Ira. Just think of it as like this, Wild Group that will resort to very heavy strong violence in order to make Northern Ireland free from the UK. So let's talk about Jean because Jean Maconneville was born in the midst of all of this. She was born to a Thomas in May in Northern Ireland and she was born very close to Harland and Wolf shipworks.

That's where the Titanic was built. I thought that was kind of interesting. Her dad actually worked for Harland and Wolf, but later the factory gets burned down, so another depression thing, right? So there's just a lot of depressing stuff going on. Now this is back in the day where parents and society as a whole didn't care for the education of a girl. They said, you don't need to be that smart, do you?

Do you need to have thoughts in your head just so that and look pretty? Why clutter that pretty face of yours? With, you know, mathematical equations. So Jean ended up leaving school at just 14 years old, and she was told to go find a job, and she does. One of the only positions that would take her at the time was becoming a servant to a Catholic widow. Now Jean is Protestant, and there's some weird energy going on between the Catholics and the Protestants, right? But she takes a job because she needs the money. And the widow's name was Mary McConaugill, and she lived on Hollywood Row. Now, this widow was a...

She was a sad one. She was like not ecstatic that her husband died, which can't relate. She was just kind of lonely, and the only other person in her life really was her only child, Arthur. Now, Arthur, are they Maconerville? He's 12 years older than Jean. And he was like a military man. And right when Jean started working for the family, he starts telling all the military stories like,

yeah, I fought to the death for my comrades. Like, I got down there on both knees and the trenches. And I, you know, he's talking about all of that. And she fell in love. This is a man's man. This is a hot man, right? And it wasn't just love at first sight. It was gradual.

The more stories he told, the more he talked to her. Just, they were clicking. And a lot of people were really pissed off about this. Not for the quote, normal reasons. And I say quote because none of these reasons are normal anyway. It wasn't because Jean was the house servant and Arthur was the son of the employee. No, it wasn't because Arthur was 12 years older than her. It was because Jean was from a Protestant family and Arthur and his mom were Catholics.

So when they get married, tensions were not as high as they're about to get, but they were pretty damn high. People called them a quote mixed couple. Yeah, people around them reacted rather harshly to it. Jean's uncle dragged her home and punched her in the face. Punched her in the face. Mary, Arthur's mom resented him for his choice, but she had no- nothing to say. So all she could do was accept it, but really really grow to hate Jean.

Hate it her daughter-in-law. So the couple move in with Jean's mom because they're not trying to move in with Mary. Mary freaking hates Jean. And you know, she was potentially the more accepting out of everyone in the family. And they waste no time. They get straight to work. They start popping out babies. I mean, Jean would give birth to 14- 14 kids. So she had to start soon. But she had some issues. The first born and suffered a rare genetic condition and she'd be hospitalized for most of her life. And even without that stress, they were in this tiny little house. Jean's mom's house. There were over a dozen or so people just crammed up in there, like family of the family. So are there decides he's got to do something more lucrative?

He retires from the army, gets a pension, and sets up his own building repair business. And it didn't do well. It shut its doors in like three months. And he was really depressed. So he had this talent. And with that, he lands this amazing opportunity, an engineering job.

This is prestigious. The pay is good. I mean, the the work-life balance is probably great. He gets benefits, but they fire him because they find out that he's Catholic. Yeah, it's that bad, right? So in the 60s, tensions are revving up again. Local Protestants made it a point to march outside the Macon of Hills door during the summertime. I mean, their point was clear. We want Arthur Gond. We want the Catholics Gond. Don't bring a Catholic into our Protestant neighborhood. Now, these neighborhoods are not even sectioned off.

It's not like you have a sign that says, oh, now you're entering Protestant town. It's just like a street. So imagine your neighbors running down your street being like, get the fucking Catholic out of here. It's weird, it's aggressive. And all of this reaches a tipping point with the battle of bogside. Protestants gather together, just regular civilians.

And they started tearing through Catholic neighborhoods mainly, low income ones. They would throw pennies at the houses in bogside, sometimes they would break windows, sometimes they would go as far to torch random homes. Now, the Catholics, they're not gonna sit there and just watch this. These are their livelihoods, these are their homes, these are their families. So they start fighting back.

They start throwing stones. And then eventually, Molotov cocktails. So the escalation was intense. The police show up and a lot of people felt like they were taking their anger out on the Catholics, too. So they weren't even arresting the Protestants. They were just like, yeah! And then helping beat up the Catholics. So then the Catholic neighborhoods felt like

they had to keep these people out. So they started hijacking school buses, tipping them over onto the roads to block these roads into their neighborhoods, and they would have stacks of ginormous rocks on the other side. So if the police showed up, they would just start raining down bull doors onto the police and the Protestants. One time some Catholic kids found a bulldozer from a construction site, they hijacked it, wrote it down West Bell fast to cheers. Everybody's cheering the Catholics are like yeah, they crash into a telephone pole and then they throw a Molotov cocktail inside and it just bursts into flames. Like it was getting bad. I guess the picture I'm trying to paint is one of other chaos.

Just imagine school buses overturned on your neighborhood street, kids driving bulldozers. Like that's not a healthy place to live. Does this mean that all the gas lakes and Protestants were doing this? No, I would say that most people on both sides, they stayed home, and they prayed mainly because they were terrified, they wanted this to be over. But some Catholics didn't even have that luxury. They would have their windows in their house broken into. Gas bombs, thrown inside.

Riders would come in and completely destroy their homes. I'm talking, rip the kitchen off from the walls, rip the sink soft, throw water all over the place, literally hose it down, leaving these people without a home. Sometimes a mob would just ascend to terrorize an entire family, till they left their house. Beat the whole family up until every single one of them marched out of their own home. Or sometimes, this is even creepier. The families would come home to a note, tacked on their door. And all it said was, you have one hour to leave.

And because of this, nearly 2,000 families left their homes in Belfast that summer, and overwhelming majority of them were Catholic. And over the next few years, 10% of Belfast's population will relocate. So it's not long before the mob came to the Maconophiles. They approach Arthur and they tell him, you gotta leave! And he was so scared. He ran from his house, rushed to his mom's place. And at first, Jean was like, well, I'm Protestant.

So I'm gonna stay with the kids like they just wanted Arthur gone. And then when all of this dies down, Arthur's gonna come back home. Because come on, let's be real, we're a family. Nobody wants to break up the family, right? People aren't that evil, right? But it doesn't work. They keep harassing her. They now consider her a traitor. She married a Catholic, so you're just as bad as one of them.

So she has to pack up all their stuff and move into Arthur's mom's place. And with this chaos, she loads all of her things, all of her kids into a taxi, and the taxi driver's like, where you going? That's a really Catholic neighborhood. Yeah, no, I'mma have to just drop you at the end of the road. Sweet drives her halfway. She has to pick up all her things and carry her kids miles to Arthur's mom's house. Because there was no choice, no taxi driver was gonna go into that like technically a war zone. Thankfully, they got there safely, but wow, it was something else.

I mean, it was Jean and Arthur and all their kids and Mary's one bedroom apartment. Mary had aged a lot, she was half blind and she freaking hated Jean, so there's that. After about 10 seconds, like one night, I don't know which one. They were like, yeah, no, this isn't going to work. We got to go. So they joined the rest of the terrified Catholics in the local Catholic school.

So that was kind of converted into like this temporary shelter. And they slept on the floor of a classroom. They waited to be appointed to a house. Now, the city of Belfast, they were building temporary housing for all the people kicked out of their homes. The first two that the couple were given, they had squatters living in there. Like they opened the door and someone's already in there

and they're like, yeah, we're not gonna go when we have these little knives. So we're gonna stab you if you try to get us out. Okay, well, just keep the place, I guess. The third place, are there actually stayed inside while it was being built? The house was still being built and he just slept there on the ground to make sure no squatter snuck in before them. So they finally moved in and the house, um, it wasn't great. It was pretty tight for their family. The toilet was outside. At least it was a place to live, right? Jean was so happy.

The first thing she wanted to do was make her own curtains. Yeah, she's so her own curtains, okay? And then a few months later, they were offered permanent housing at the Divi Falls. And this had been under construction for years. It was a palace compared to their current place. Massive apartment complex. Just concrete maze is what the kids called it, but they would have their own indoor shower, an indoor toilet, and a hot water sink. Are you kidding me? This is frickin' heaven.

But is it? It wasn't really the best planned out building. It's a very bleak place. There was no green spaces, no landscaping, no playgrounds, which I know playgrounds sounds like a luxury, but this is a complex that the government is sticking over 1,000 children people like 1,000 children in So with a lot of kids a lot of families the whole place felt like a raise for rats There was rats everywhere all the hallways the stairwells rams It was just so concrete. It was so cold everything was depressing the walls were paper thin You had so many neighbors and so many people in each unit that you'd literally be eating dinner and listening to marital

problems on one side. And then the other side, your other neighbor is like watching TV or like yelling at the kids and you could hear all of it all at once. But worst of all was probably the black mold that started to grow everywhere. Yeah, the apartment complex, they had like non-porous concrete, so there was just black mold everywhere. Then they get some new neighbors. There was a 20-story building on one end of the Divi complex, and this was the tallest building at Bellfast at that point. That wasn't a church. So when the British Army came, they wanted to place a place to watch people. So this was their little lighthouse.

They would go to the top of that 20th floor building and just spy on everyone with binoculars on. So the British army moves into the Divi flats essentially. Now, there's a lot of Catholics in the flats. It's like primarily Catholics. They're the ones that without the homes. And at first all the Catholics were like, yes. The British army, they're going to be so much better than the local police.

The local police, they go by their own laws. They do shady stuff, but the British army, they went through training, they answered to the crown, you know, they don't, they answered to the prime minister which you get it, you know, it's gonna be better. There's more control, quality control of who joins the army, right? They're not gonna be as abusive as the local police

with your uncle in there, no way. But they were the army, right? They're not gonna be as abusive as the local police with your uncle in there No way, but they were the same same sentiment just different uniforms and way more manpower and way more gunpowder That was it So there was they didn't just hate the army for no reason There was this huge incident where the army goes into a predominantly Catholic neighborhood There was this huge incident where the army goes into a predominantly Catholic neighborhood, knock down the doors of 350 people, dragged them from their beds on the mere suspicion that they were part of the resistance. They arrested nearly 350 people, except not a single one of them was an Irish loyalist.

The army was given an outdated list of suspects, most people had nothing to do with anything happening right now. And on top of that, it's Irish tradition to name your sons after your father. So I guess it's like, skips a generation, okay? So if my dad's name is John, I'm gonna have a kid and name it John, right? So the troops who would break down the doors and elderly grandpas and the grandchild would both be taken in because they're like, we don't know which one is the real one on the list, but like you guys are both John, so we're going to take you both. So it's like just a bunch of grandpas in prison.

Eventually, all the suspects' names were cleared and they were released. Now, this was a huge deal because when the suspects name is cleared, it's really cleared. I mean, we have the same issue here. Like, isn't it really cleared? And the Protestants would give these families hell. It did not matter. And since almost everyone that was arrested was Catholic, it really just cemented in every Catholic's mind that the army is also the enemy.

So the Catholics, they started getting creative with it. They started placing their own snipers on the rooftops at night to shoot at people down below. Yeah, no, it was getting really violent, yes. The army would then come in and shoot out all the street lights, to make it hard for the snipers to even shoot anyone, which honestly just added to the terrifying atmosphere of things I don't know if it really helped. I feel like it just made everything more scary.

People were walking around in complete darkness. Why would you break into these apartments? For money, for drugs, whatever was in there? Why aren't you afraid of getting caught at doing this? No, who's going to catch us? What a police! It was the height of the crack era, and instead of locking up drug dealers, some New York City cops had become them. I would suit up in my uniform and we're going to want some drug dealers and I know how

to do it really well. This is the inside story of the biggest police corruption scandal in NYPD history and the investigation that uncovered it all. Did you consider yourself a rat? 100% I saved my soul just like everybody else does. Listen to and follow the set, an Odyssey originals documentary podcast series available now in the Odyssey app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your shows.

I'm not a big guy, man, but I love being that dirty mother s***er. Literally, nobody was safe, not even children. So in the Divis flats, where the Maconnavils were also living, the police just fired shots into the apartment building. Like they didn't even care, they were just like boom, boom, boom, boom. The walls are like I said, paper thin. One of the bullets ended up striking a nine-year-old in the head.

And the parents desperately called for an ambulance and they were told, no, because there's like shootouts happening at the Divis flots right now and it's intermittent gunfire, we're not going to send people in. So this led to the very dramatic gun wrenching moment of three men walking out slowly from the building, frantically waving a white shirt, and two of the men were carrying the boy with his shattered head. His name was Patrick Rooney. They managed to get him in an ambulance, but he died shortly after. Now since the Divis flats was mainly for people who needed permanent housing, after all their

houses were ruined, you know, and destroyed a lot of the more Catholic, a lot of the police made a routine out of just searching units in the building, just random units. A lot of the residents did have guns in their units because they're trying to protect themselves. Now, I don't know, I'm sure some of them were like planning something, and I'm sure most of them were keeping it as a precautionary measure, but they all came up with something called the chain. If you were to see a police knocking on someone's door, which you would see it, which more likely you would hear it because the walls are paper thin like I said a million times. You would then lean out your back window and there would be a chain of people moving the

gun out of that unit to the furthest unit down the hall. Now the police searches, they were horrible. They completely destroyed the units of the families were living it. They disemboweled the sofas like took out all the stuffing. They took out flipped beds over, they peeled the flooring off to see if they were quote hiding something underneath, the just the tiles, they would pry up the floorboards, they would yank out gas and water pipes. Just I guess honestly for giggles.

They even decided everyone at Divi's Falls needed a curfew, they would seal off the entrances and when the residents still continued to throw stones, that them, they were so pissed that they fired 1,600 canisters of gas inside the apartment building. It started to slowly penetrate into people's eyes and throats, and everyone started panicked. I mean, there's over 1,000 children living here. Everyone rushed to the scene to get rags,

they would soak them in vinegar, and would put it all over their face, go back out to throw more stones. So this is the environment where Jean had to raise her kids with Arthur, and Jean was admittedly very protective of her kids. I mean, who's gonna blame her, not me? She would always pull them close to her and say, don't wander away. Stay close to home. The kids didn't even have time to be regular kids. Michael the 8-year-old started to become obsessed with pigeons. He would go outside and dig through the rubble and find these injured pigeons and bring them home to nurse.

When his mom wasn't looking him and the other neighborhood kids they would go explore, they had no fear. Their favorite pastime as 8-year-olds was to crawl around in abandoned homes. There could be squatters, army officials, bombs, but they didn't care. They were not scared. I mean, this is the most fun that they'll ever have. They use the abandoned mattresses as trampolines. But eventually, Michael couldn't even have that type of fun anymore.

Arthur was becoming more sick. He needed to support him and be around him. He started losing so much weight that he couldn't even hold up a cup of tea by himself. He had a lung cancer. He was bed ridden. He couldn't even talk. All he did was moan and pain. And then he finally passed away. Now, meanwhile, in the same town. Let's talk about the price sisters. First, we have Dolores price. She was born into the Price family in a blue collar neighborhood and they had that typical fiery red hair and blue green eyes and that pale skin and she was, she was literally fire, she was fierce. Dolores's parents, they were fierce Republicans, they believed that for hundreds of years the British has

occupied Ireland and it was their moral and ethical duty to get rid of the British. When Dolores was little her dad would say, come here sit on my lap. And he would start telling her all the stories about how he had joined the IRA when he was just an eddy tiny little boy and he went to England to carry out a bomb raid. You know what he put in his shoes? He put cardboard in his shoes. Why? Because his soul's had fallen off and he didn't have money to fix it. So he put cardboard and he wore those shoes.

As she gets older, he starts teaching her other things, like how to build explosives in the house. He would say always use a wooden bowl and wooden utensils, never metal, because a single spark in your gun. He also complained to how his friends were hanged by the British Army. Delores grew up thinking that's completely normal, like who the hell doesn't have parents whose friends were all hanged to death by the British Army. So she just thought that's how every other kid in Northern Ireland was living.

Everyone in the Price family, more or less, had been to prison. Even grandma Dolan, they call her granny Dolan, she went to prison. She tried to steal a police officer's weapon during a protest. They said, I'm not picking sides here, I'm not trying to say whose side is right or wrong. I know nothing, right? But this family was in dangerously deep. To give you some perspective, Dolores had an aunt named Aunt Birdie. And everyone in the family was an aunt of her. They loved her, they respected her, they showed her all this care and attention because when Aunt Birdie was 27 years old,

she was balls deep in the revolution, she was carrying explosives when it suddenly detonated. The blast shredded through both of her hands, all the way to the respawn her hands were gone. I mean, they were literally ground meat. There was no putting it back together. It disfigured her face. She was blinded permanently, but against all odds, she survived.

She would never heal though. She would need round the clock care though, but her dedication to the family was admirable. Nobody thought to themselves, wait, this just happened. Maybe we shouldn't have our kids go through the same cycle. No, they said, you were supposed to look up to Aunt Birdie. She gave the ultimate sacrifice and that's what you need to do. The parents would force the kids to go talk to each other and Aunt Birdie, so Dolores and

Marion, her little sister, would be rushed upstairs and Dolores as a kid would ask questions that might seem malicious, but she was a child. She would say things like, Aunt Birdie, don't you just wish you could have died? And then she would just see this single little tear creeped down Aunt Birdie's cheek. And you know, Aunt Birdie always wore those really dark, dark sunglasses. Can she talk? Yeah, and Dolores would think to herself, how can you cry if you have no eyes?

But by the time that Dolores is 18 years old, she would never believe that if anyone told her she was indoctrinated. She thought that her beliefs and her thoughts were her own. She was like, yeah, I mean, I have the same beliefs as my family, but that's not because they've been brainwashing me since I was born. It's because these are the right beliefs to have, duh, but as she gets older, she starts to kind of like question some things. She starts believing, yeah, the revolution is great, great I still believe that but is violence really that good? I feel like peaceful protest and

politics is the way to go don't you think? She would even yell at her dad and say look at the IRA! You guys tried that and look at your where you guys are now. You guys are practically dormant. You don't see members all over the place right now. You failed. But we are the new generation and there's a new way. So she was interested in a different political idea, socialism. She starts attending these meetings with a political group called the People's Democracy. Now the ideology behind socialism was that it not just gives Catholics, but it also gives Protestants a slice of the pie.

I mean that's something everyone can get behind, Catholics and Protestants, they all want a slice of the pie. Something to benefit both groups, I mean who could's something everyone can get behind. Catholics and Protestants, they all want a slice of the pie. Something to benefit both groups. I mean, who could say no to that? So at one of these peaceful marches with our local college, she runs into a guy and this guy's handsome. He's articulate. He's like, yeah, demonizing Protestants

is not productive. We got to join forces. And it just seemed like this really happy moment of the young generation escaping the violence and they're gonna make a difference. But then of course the peaceful protest turns into a violent climax. A guy named Ronald Bunting was leading a group of civilians to the top of a hill and they were all wearing these like white arm bands around their like upper arm

and they would watch the protesters pass near the base of the hill, and they gathered protection for themselves in the form of rocks. Not pebbles. Hefty rocks. And on the count of three, they just started chucking these rocks at the protesters. A lot of people were screaming. It was causing a crowd surge. People were trapped.

There was no way to run to. They were getting injured. And when the group on top ran out of rocks to throw, they just started running down the hill to beat up people physically with their own bare fists. Some of them brought crowbars, lead pipes, and bats. A few of them brought wooded planks, studded with nails. So people are literally being knocked unconscious, and they're just trying to protect themselves by throwing their coats over their heads. But it just led them to being shoved around

and beaten in the dark. And in the middle of all of it, there was major bunting, swinging his arms around like he's some sort of classical musical conductor. With the coats of his sleeve just completely covered, soaked in blood. And the students had agreed in advance, a pledge, a pledge of nonviolence. So they try to run, all of them had gashes on their face, blood streaming down their bodies

and face, but they did not fight back. Dolores managed to escape, and her grew brand to the local bridge, but they were stopped by man with white arm bands. And they were grabbing each protester and throwing them into the river below, the ice cold river. Dolores splashed into the water and she said for the rest of her life, she will remember this moment. The man who pushed her off the bridge, his eyes were completely glazed with hate. There was nothing. Nothing behind those eyes. Thankfully Dolores didn't lose her eyes, but she went home badly beaten and bruised and

something just switched in her. She realized that peaceful protest, non-violence does nothing. Nothing would ever get done peacefully if the other side is already so violent. So she approaches the local IRA commander and says she wants to join. And they initiate her right in her living room. She was sworn in and she said, I, Dolores Price, promise that I will promote the objectives of the IRA to the best of my knowledge and ability. I will obey any and all orders issued by a superior officer.

She was immediately placed into the female auxiliary wing of the IRA. Now, the members of this group had very serious tasks that needed to be completed. They would take care of the injured men, they would take a gun and steal it back to safety. Like, they would just steal guns, you know, like, because you can't get caught with a gun. So you don't want to lose the gun and get it confiscated because the IRA is not just made of money, you know. So they'd have to steal the gun back to safety, but Dolores was pissed. What is with all this female wing? I want to fight! I want to make tea.

I don't want to roll up bandages and gauze people up. I can do as much as any man and I want to be a fighting soldier. So her and her sister, Maryann, were taken into the Irish Republic to do some training. Typically, it takes place in like a farmhouse and it's run by a housewife or a priest. A very low-key, covert things.

Sometimes you're there for days, sometimes weeks. You start learning how to shoot with revolvers, rifles, explosives. They even learned how to march information like the army. Their teachings surrounded around being clean, disciplined, organized, ideological, and ruthless. They were called volunteers, not soldiers. And they were told since you're volunteering, you have to be ready to sacrifice everything, even your own life. This is the service to the cause. After the training, both the price sisters were couriers. They would have to move weapons and money around.

They would also have to smuggle explosives across the border. So a lot of the explosives were being made in the Republic of Ireland because there was way less police just You know control of that area. They weren't being as crazily surveillance Then they would bring it across the border into Northern Ireland to be detonated. I mean, this is a dangerous job The border is not just like an easy thing to breeze on by so the two girls they were good an easy thing to breeze on by. So the two girls, they were good. They never, not even once, race suspicion with border control. The two girls were taught that you have to have sexuality, because sexuality is a weapon. They were taught you have to be honey traps. This literally reminds me of like those spy movies, but they were taught you have to be honey traps. You have to lure unsuspecting

British soldiers out from the bars and into a violent ambush. The girls would approach Scottish soldiers and invite them to parties. Later the soldiers' bodies would be found, shot in the head, execution style, in a ditch nearby. Dolores personally didn't like being a honey trap. I mean, she did it, but she hated it. She said it was cheap. She wanted to look a soldier in the eye and soldiers should always die in their uniform. Not ambushed by a potential date. Or a quick, you know, one-night stand. But somehow, everyone found out about the price sisters. Nobody knew what they looked like, but their name got leaked and everyone in the British troops

they almost had this legend. There was almost in for me. These stories were shared. They're like female killers, assassins. They hide their assault rifles in their pants. And once you get into bed, you get shot. Marianne, the little sister, she's an expert sniper. They call her the widow maker. Because she's gonna make your wife a widow. Meanwhile Dolores is considered one of the most dangerous women in Northern Ireland, and they would whisper about this in their little camps at night.

Honestly, I think the soldiers talked more about it because it played into that hot assassin trope, and it was just a story time to share rather than actual caution, because I mean, it just fits that sexy forbidden hot rebel, right? None of them really knew what they looked like. None of them knew if these rumors were true, but as the days went, the rumors got bigger and bigger and bigger. But one thing is clear, the two sisters were badasses. Everyone who knew them called them the crazy prices. I guess they get it from their parents, I assume.

Because one day, the police barge into the price home and they scream, Delores price! You're under arrest for the suspected involvement of an illegal organization. Dolores' mom calmly walks over to the police and says, excuse me. But she's not going anywhere until she's finished her breakfast and she slams the door shut.

Now, there must have been something in the way that she said it because the police waited outside till Dolores finished her breakfast. And then afterwards, her mom threw on her one good coat and told them she's not going anywhere without me. At the police station, Dolores was questioned for hours and she just kept saying I have nothing to say. And this is a good girl with no record, great grades, amazing college attendance.

I mean, they couldn't arrest her. These are just real murs. So they let her go without any charges. But they did take a mug shot for good measure. And Dolores' mom said, wait, take your mug shot. Wow, she looks really good in that one. Can I get a copy? She wanted to frame Dolores' mug shot.

And the police are like, this family is bad. Crazy. Honestly, Dolores was lucky. Some of her friends were not. She knew a guy by the name of friendine, and he was arrested for suspicion. When he was taken to be interrogated, they shoved his head into a sack so that he couldn't see. All he smelled was still dirty laundry.

They rushed him into a helicopter. Nobody's talking to him. He's like, where are we going? Nobody cares. Nobody would listen to him. Like, guy, it's with the hair, right? The next thing he knows, he's being pushed out of the helicopter while it's in the air. And he's like, okay, well, I'm going to die.

So he goes into a fetal position, braces or impacts, but he lands on the ground only a few feet down. So they unload the prisoners, they were taken to a remote area, stripped naked, examined by a doctor, and for days. No food, no water, no sleep. They were made to stand in these stressful positions, like we talked about stress positions, where there's just no way your body or your muscles can relax

and then you start spasming. They had hoods covering their eyes. The police were also subjecting them to audio torture. They would just play the most high-piercing noises non-stop on speakers all day long. You're like, where did they get these amazing ideas? Well, they learned it from the prisoners held by the Nazis. Listen, the only thing you should be learning from the Nazis is what not to do.

Not follow their torture handbook line by line, but that's what they did. Originally, it was taught in the British Army to show them. This might happen to you. So you need to be prepared mentally, physically. Don't let them get to you. But they started getting creative and they started using these tactics themselves. For a full week, Francine was chained up and he started to hallucinate. He could barely spell his own name at this point and he was just bashing his head rhythmically up against the wall until it started bleeding. In the end, he gave up no names of any members

of the IRA. Later that summer, the price sisters robbed a bank. They robbed a lot of banks, because making explosives is not cheap. Also smuggling them is not cheap, you need a lot of cash for that. So the price sisters and another IRA member dressed up as nuns walked into a bank right before closing time. they reached into their outfits, whipped out their assault rifles, and they were successful. Yet again. Then another time, the sisters raided a hospital that was just covered in cops. Why are there so many cops at the hospital, you ask? Well, one, a former member of the IRA. Well, I guess they're

a current member. He was thrown in prison, and then he had a burst appendix in prison. So he had to be transferred to a hospital to be operated on. Now, this is a prisoner and he's a member of the IRA. So please, they're like, no, we can't risk it. The price sister is, I mean, straight out of a movie in the sense that they broke in, overpowered the cops, wheeled this guy out. The former or the current IRA member. That was a prisoner.

Freed him, prison break! That was a prisoner! Freed him! Prison break! It was a miracle that they weren't arrested! Dolores said it was an exciting time. I should be ashamed to admit that there was so much fun in it. And she was only 21 years old. What?

She felt like she was invincible. Not even her parents could blame her, you know? Her own father was part of the resistance. She would travel to Milan, Italy, to talk about the oppression of Catholics in Northern Ireland, the lack of civil rights and violence, and at that time she didn't know that she was very high up on the British most wanted list.

Which by the way, it's not fun and games. It's not cute, it's not a movie. One of her commanders was also very high up on that most wanted list, and one day he was walking down the street. He's ambushed by a bunch of civilians that were indeed police officers and plane clothes. So the guy, his name is Brandon, he starts booking it.

Now, there were houses all over the neighborhood of West Bell Fast that were designed to be checkpoints where people were allowed to go in and find weapons. So he finds a safe house, jumps through the window instead of using the front door because he's in such a rush, and just starts shooting out of it. The police end up retreating, and then that's when he noticed who was bleeding. He injured his wrist on the shattered glass, and he suffered a major artery in his wrist. Now, this is not like a bandaid fix. That's a major artery. So he calls in his best friend Gary, another member,

and they bring in a heart surgeon to stitch him up. No anesthesia and Brandon couldn't scream because the police were still scouring the area. Soon after Gary was caught, they interrogated him for weeks. All they could get him to do was admit his name. He refused to give any more information, so they sent him to a new prison called Longcash. Now, people who have been there say it's more like a concentration camp than anything.

It's all barbed wires and floodlights, and Gary was adamant that he was going to die there. For sure. But one day a guard tells him, pack up your things. You get your family waiting for you. He thought it was a sick prank. When he gets out, he sees Dolores and Marion Price, the Price Sisters, were there to pick him up. Now, once he's released, back to work, they go, okay. Brandon decided they needed to do something big. I mean, there was a lot that went wrong between that time. There was briefly a ceasefire agreement that lasted two weeks and that's why Gary got out. So the members of the IRA were like, yeah, we're not going to kill any more people if you like Gary out. And so for two weeks, it was peaceful. But then the other side broke it, not the IRA, the other side. And now Brandon, he wanted revenge. So he had his people plant 24 bombs all over the place.

I'm talking bus stations, railway stations, shopping areas. He called and told everyone that the bombs were coming. He told the cops to press everyone. He wanted the economy to crash, but he didn't want civilians to die. He says, you guys need to vacate because it's gonna happen. But nobody vacated. The police didn't alert people. Nobody alerted anyone.

And around 2 p.m. the city was super busy. Nobody vacated. The police didn't alert people. Nobody alerted anyone. And around 2 p.m., the city was super busy. The devices started to detonate. There was a new bomb going off every few minutes. People were screaming, terrified. But they would leave one area where a bomb just exploded straight into the area where the next bomb would explode. Busses were ripped apart.

Nine people were killed. 130 people were wounded. The youngest victim was a nine-year-old. The police had to go through the crime scenes and they had these giant plastic bags with them. And they would just move around the rubble, find a detached arm, and just place it in the back. There were detached limbs all over the city. Brandon later said, I only wanted to damage property and the economy. There were detached limbs all over the city. Brandon later said, I only wanted to damage property and the economy. I never knew that the bombs would be that big. I told everybody to get out and I didn't know the police would do nothing. Now anyway, back to Jean because it's all going to come full circle. So after I hear

their dies, you know, his oldest son at the time would become the man of the house, but he was suspected of being an IRA member, so he was taken into long cash, and it was just a whole ordeal. Honestly, Jean was just depressed. Her husband was no longer there. She spent most of her day smoking cigarettes, taking sedatives. The kids said all she did was cry herself to sleep every single night. But she wasn't alone. There was actually a term for it called Belfast Syndrome. And it kind of affected everyone in Belfast. They were dealing with a lot of mental health problems and they felt overwhelmed, anxious and PTSD. Oddly, the men that were fighting in the streets didn't really have Belfast Syndrome.

It was typically women and children waiting around at home for their loved ones to come home and all they heard through that thin walls was gunfire smoke bombs and screaming. So yeah, it's terrifying. Jean spent a lot of her time pondering if not attempting to take her own life. Eventually she was checked into a local psychiatric hospital. And one night they were in their apartment and it was violent outside. And the kids heard a voice right outside their door. A stranger, a man.

Help me. Help me, please, please God. I don't want to die. They door. A stranger, a man. Help me. Help me, please, please God, I don't want to die. They peek outside, it's a British soldier. She sees the man, jeans sees the man, and she gets her pillow, brings it outside, gingerly places his head on the pillow, cradles his face, and murmurs a prayer.

And she rushes, she scurries back into her apartment. The kids tell her, mom, you're only asking for trouble. But that's somebody's son. It doesn't matter. The Maconville's never saw that soldier again, but the next morning they woke up, and there was writing on their door, Brit lover. This was bad news. If you were found flirting with British soldiers as a woman as a single woman event, it was really bad. You might be subjected to tarring and feathering. Yeah, the old medieval humiliation and torture tactic. The mob would come, force the woman outside, shave her head in public while holding her down, cover her in warm, sticky black tar, and then shower a pillow case full of dirty pigeon feathers on top of her. And then sticky black tar, and then shower a pillowcase full

of dirty pigeon feathers on top of her. And then afterwards, they will chain her to a lamp post by the neck so that everyone would yell at her, soldier lover, soldier doll, soldier whore. So the mcconifils, they were in a really strange situation. They were always either too Protestant or too Catholic for either side. And now, she was just seen helping a British soldier. Jean also refused to take part in the gun chain out the window because she was terrified of guns.

And she didn't want her kids to go to prison if they found a gun in her apartment, so people started turning on her. At one point, their family dogs, their two family dogs, were thrown down the garbage shoot and killed. One of the kids arms was beat up so badly his arm was broken. And then another night, Jean was playing bingo, which is her only escape from life when people ran in. Oh my god, Jean, your son was just hit by a car. You have to go to the hospital. Let's go. So she rushes outside and she's frantically looking like, what car do I get in? Where do I get to the hospital? Instead,

they shover into a car with a hood over her head. She's taken into an abandoned building, tied to a chair, beaten, and interrogated. They let her go and the kids are like, Mom, what happened? Who did this to you? What do they want? Nothing. Just stuff I know nothing about. Helen, do you mind grabbing some dinner downstairs? The stove isn't working.

Here, let me give you some money. Go buy us some fish and chips from the store, do you mind grabbing some dinner downstairs? The stove isn't working. Here, let me give you some money. Go buy us some fish and chips from the store, will you? So Helen was grabbing dinner around 6.30 and Jean decided, today's a special day, she just got interrogated and beat up by the IRA, so she wants a minute to herself. She never gets leaves moments, she's got 10 kids. She barely had time for herself. She had so many thoughts, so she draws a bath, gets in and leaves the bath around seven, it's about 30 minutes. And the kids here are knock on the door and

they assume a tell-in, so they open it, but it was a gang of 8-10 people. They were all wearing masks, some men, some women, some had like real masks like the bala, bala clavas is what you call it. Others had nylon stockings over their head, which just made them look more terrifying, honestly. They were armed, and one of them told Jean, put on your coat. What's happening? They all start tugging on her to try to get her outside.

And that's when the kids understandably lost it. They're like holding onto their mom, like, no, you can't go! Calm down, kids! We just want to talk to your mother, and we will bring her back in a few hours then can I come with sure Archie you're the oldest one you can come with the younger kids were put into one of the bedrooms and oddly they noticed that the intruders knew all their names and addressed them as such they were like come on Billy get into the room come on Jim hurry it up they're like wait a minute and the kids realize that these math

strangers we're not strangers, but they were the neighbors. Jean and Archie are taken down a flight of stairs. I mean, this isn't the happiest place on Earth, but even considering that, today the hallways were eerily quiet. It's almost as if someone put out a notice. Don't be in the hallways tonight. There was no one there for them.

There was no one that could see where they were going, No one that he could cry out to and when they get outside There was an even larger group of masked people waiting for them about 20 people A lot of them had guns one of them pressed a gun to Archie's face and said F*** off and Archie has a tated. He wanted to protect his mom, but at the same time He doesn't want to die and his mom just gave him the go ahead Watch the children till I come back. And he turned around and headed back up the stairs. Helen got home and the kids huddled around together

and waited for their mom. A day passed and then another. And another, and she never came. A week passed, and the kids still didn't comprehend that their mother wasn't coming back. They held at hope. A guy came knocking on their door. It was a stranger. And he gave the kids three rings that their mom had been wearing when she left. Her engagement ring, her wedding ring, and an attorney-d ring that Arthur had given her.

Where's our mom? I don't know anything about your mom. I was just told to give you these. Around that time, an elite squad within the IRA called the Unknowns was assembled. The head was Commander Pat McClure, Brandon saw them as headhunters. They did secretive, dangerous, and a lot of the times really grew some dark sh**t, okay? The answer directly to Gary Adams went up Brandon's closest friends, but the price sisters they were one of the first to join after the team was put together. And right away, the unknowns got to planning. At first they wanted to plan a bombing campaign, right in the heart of England.

Honestly, this was Delores' great idea. So England had really no idea the truth of what was going on in Northern Ireland. They were kind of kept in the dark. I'm sure if they knew what was happening to these families and to these people, they would have flipped out. Something would have happened, right? But they were just kind of in the dark. Maybe there was some news coverage, but not a lot everyone went about their days. So if they bombed England, no one could ignore them anymore. And that's where the problem in their eyes all started with the British. So Gary assembled the unknowns and any other members of the IRA that he felt like could be up for it.

And he was honest with them. He said, this is a very dangerous job. Any volunteers are going to be away from home for a while. This could be a death wish. If anyone doesn't want to go, get up and leave now. A ton of people started to get up and Dolores thought they were all cowards. She mocked them, whoa, whoa, whoa, don't knock me down in your rush. And she stayed. In the end, only about 11 volunteers remained. And they headed out with their plan. The two sisters were involved. Now, all the volunteers were super young. The oldest was 29. And Dolores became the de facto leader. In her own words, she was the OC of the whole Shabang. That's what she called it.

She would have two lieutenants, Hugh Feney and Marion Price. Now, about a month before the bombing, Marion went to England to scout targets for the bombs. It was presented to leadership and approved. On March 5th, after all that was done, the unknowns would split into two teams. One team would drive across Dublin into the liver of Poole Ferry. The next day, the remaining team, led by Marion, would drive across the ferry. The cars had bombs planted in the backseat of the car.

There would be four cars in total. Each one, with close to 200 pounds, of just explosive material. Dolores did not take the ferry. She flew from Dublin under the name Una, and by March 7th, the whole gang would be in London, all checked into different hotels. The plan was simple. Early the next morning, the team would drive the four cars into different locations in the city. 1. The British Army Recruiting Center in Whitehall

2. The British Forces Broadcasting Service 3. New Scotland Yard. 4. Old Bailey. Then to minimize civilian deaths, the team would call the police for a warning, one hour before the bombs were scheduled to go off. At that point, the whole gang would already be on a flight back home using fake passports,

of course. So, the next day, it goes as planned. They leave the cars and the unknowns had different flights back to Northern Ireland. The only problem was, someone in the higher ranks of the IRA was a British informant, and had given the police a heads up. So the police race to find these cars, they have no idea what it looks like, and to make things worse, the London has often been described as a giant parking lot. It's just a lot of cars, but they finally found some of them,

three of them, and an expert was able to diffuse the bombs in time. They found 200 pounds of explosive material in each car. It would have been devastating. The police started to stop anyone at the airport that had a flight to Northern Ireland, and 10 of the unknowns were arrested, because none of them had thought to come up

with a good convincing reason to be in London, so it was pretty clear who they were. Marion was taken in, and she and the rest of the unknowns had a game plan. If they were ever arrested, just stare at a fixed object the entire time as if you're hypnotized. Say nothing, don't even make eye contact, just stare and drool. She refused to talk. They would scream at her, you're an evil little maniac! We're the fork of the bombs! You're not going to be seeing sunlight for an eternity! Tell us where the last bomb is! And around 3 p.m. she looks away,

looks at her watch, and the interrogator knew. It's a bomb going off. And she just smiled. They could not get to the one at old Bailey in time. It went off at 3 p.m. sending shards of glass debris and metal flying. People were knocked to the ground and when they came to they had blood everywhere. Nearly 250 people were injured. What's really emotional is that that day there was a medical worker strike. Nobody was in the hospital. Nobody was working the ambulances

But when the workers heard about the bombing all of them rushed to work They stopped their strike. Thankfully nobody died a 50-year-old man did die, but he actually started having a heart attack right before the bomb went off So his death was not attributed to the bomb Now the 10 captured unknowns were sent to prison. They were stripped naked, tested for explosive residue. Now Dolores, I don't know why, but they took her mug shot while she was naked. I don't know.

Beats me. Very weird. The ten of them also refused to wear prison clothes. They said that they were captured soldiers, not criminals. So they shouldn't be in this prison with the rest of the criminals. Yeah, the guards didn't care, so a lot of them just stood naked in their selves for like days. They were all charged with conspiring to cause an explosion of a nature likely to endanger life. Why can't we just say planting bombs? They would remain in prison till trial, with no great escape this time.

Dolores and Marion were obviously the focus of the press because everyone called them the sisters of terror. Daily mirror said the legend has it that women are passive peace loving creatures who only want to hide them. No way. Who only want to stay at home and look after children. But that has exploded in a thunder of bombs and bullets. I guess I wonder if it's a male or female who wrote this. I wonder really hard I think my brain exploded at that like you think we wanted that you weirdo Anyway, the sisters they didn't make it any better for themselves in the courtroom They were sassy carefree almost upbeat and there were a ton of supporters at the trial for the sisters Dolores with wave and smile at them

But it didn't work because the verdict came in and just one of the girls was acquitted, but both the pricestors were not, so just one of the unknowns who happened to be a girl was acquitted. Everybody else was found guilty. The judge gave them the maximum penalty of 20 years. Dolores and Marion announced that they would go on a hunger strike and their demands were to be deemed political prisoners returned to Northern Ireland to serve their sentences. They did not want to be in British prison. I mean they hated the British, so I really don't think that they wanted to be in their prison system.

But they didn't care. The two sisters were instead taken to an all-male prison because police thought they were too dangerous for an all-female prison. Yeah, I don't know. They immediately go on a hunger strike and Dolores remained in high spirits. She wrote to her mom all the time, Mom, don't worry, I'm going to be home by new year, one way or another, even if it means I'm in a coffin. She said, volunteers died on the streets of Belfast for our cause, and our deaths will

be no different from theirs. We will be the very first woman, I think, and I am very proud to be so. Finally, after two and a half weeks of no food, doctors rushed into Dolores's cell, took her into a room, tied her up to a stretcher, and forced a feeding tube down her throat. She gagged, nearly suffocated, and they forcefed her. And right afterwards, she vomited everything up. It was a blend of raw eggs, orange juice, milk, minerals, and vitamins and liquid protein, disgusting, honestly. Two days later, they started force feeding Maryanne and Dolores, every single morning at 10 a.m. It was gruesome. She would write

her mom, we're learning to breathe a bit more easily with the tube down, but it's hard not to vomit, and then it feels like you're choking to death on your own vomit Dolores fought the tube so hard. She started to bite at it her teeth started to loosen and decay Her hair started to turn gray and both their skin was turning pale and waxy. They're in their 20s But in Northern Ireland a lot of people thought these girls were martyrs They were considered Irish martyrs, two beautiful young sisters, starving for Irish freedom. In their case, in their trial, became a PR fiasco. Many civilians in England said,

yeah, what the girls did were wrong, but being forced fed with a feeding tube feels like torture. And then a year later, something really starting happened. A 17th century painting by Vermeer was stolen out of a museum. This painting was of a young girl playing the guitar and it was stolen straight from the walls of a high security museum. A little while later an anonymous letter arrives to the Times of London demanding that they let out Dolores and Marion Price if they don't want the painting to be burned. They even sent a piece of parchment from the painting to prove that they had stolen it. What's even weirder is that just two years ago before Dolores was

in prison, she had gone to that museum and stopped to stare at that painting. She was an art student. She loved art. So she heard of the news, requested the anonymous person return the painting unharmed for the sake of art, and it was returned unharmed only because Dolores requested it. We still don't know who did it. Crazy. Yeah. What a story. But the feeding tube also stopped.

I mean, it was clear as having drastic negative impacts on the girls. Doctors were straight up refusing to do it, even though they were ordered to do it. And just like that, the girls were back to losing one pound a day. Dolores became so weak she couldn't even walk across her cell, but she loved it though. She said, I have control over something. I am my own tool, I am the craftsman wielding the tool and carving away at myself. But she hated watching her sister waste away. And before one of them died, the British relented, and they told the girls, end the strike and

you can return to Northern Ireland. I mean, they would still be in prison, don't get me wrong, but they would be celebrities in prison. Everyone in Northern Ireland, you know, they relatively like them. Most of the prisons were filled with Catholics anyway, so it would be perfect. And after Dolores got back to Northern Ireland, outrage was still taking place in England, and a new law was passed, that British prisoners would not be subjected to force feeding if they were on a hunger strike. Ten prisoners would soon commit suicide by starving to death. And Dolores would always wonder if she was responsible for those lives. Back to prison in Northern Ireland.

The price sisters were like celebrities. They had a cell with a kitchenette and a TV room. Dolores spent her time writing letters and painting and doing DIY projects that were shipped out of prison and sold to raise money for the Irish cause. She even was talking to a man, a British man that was supportive of the sisters during trial like a stranger, and she made him a leather wallet and before she sent it, she wrote to it, What? I guess she has jokes or whatever?

Meanwhile, Dolores was pulling back from the IRA. She had read on the news that they bombed a hotel that killed 12 people and severely burned another 12. And she kept asking, am I here because I wanted to burn people to death? Am I here because I wanted to burn people to death? Am I here because I wanted to incinerate people? Is that what I really wanted? So both the sisters resigned from the IRA while in prison. And honestly, they were dealing with a lot. So after their hunger strike and their tube feeding which lasted for years, they had massive

mental health issues and eating disorders. I mean, they weren't on a strike, but they both stopped eating regardless. It got so bad that Marion was taken to a hospital and Dolores was in her late 20s and weighed 76 pounds. Margaret Thatcher, the Prime Minister of England at the time, sympathized with the two sisters, and with some British support, she ordered Dolores and Marion be released on medical grounds. Of course, people were pissed because back then, Enerrexia was seen as a vain disease,

rather than a mental illness. They were like, you just want to be pretty. So Dolores out now spent time with her family, trying to get healthy again, and she wanted to be a writer. So one and a half years after her release, she wrote a book about Enerrexia, and how it was all about control of mental illness.

And famous people like Princess Diana and Jane Fonda suffered from it. That's what she wrote. She said that anorexia was also associated with people with higher than average IQ, which what? She ends up getting married and to like a guy that is an actor. Yeah, he did like plays, very strange stuff. Dolores was so done with being political that the most

that she ever did was vote. Meanwhile, there was no formal investigation into the disappearance of Jean, but then BBC News decided that they want to cover the story. Meanwhile, there was no formal investigation into the disappearance of Jean. Helen, who was 16, was the primary caretaker for her little siblings, and they were just kind of using their mom's pension. They were really struggling. Everyone looked the other way. Not one single neighbor even offered a hot meal or condolences to the kids. In fact, neighbors actually complained more often than not that the kids were too loud.

Are you freaking kidding? A social worker came to check on the kids and she would later just non-challantly report, Helen's capable. it seems like she's managing well. I mean, finally, they realized the state realized this is not a good setup for the kids. Like we need to put them in state care. Do you guys want to go to foster care? And all of them refused. They said no, our mom's going to be home any day now.

We have to wait here for her. So they just let them be. The kids were struggling so much that Michael would shop live food. He was caught stealing chocolate biscuits from a shop in town and he begged the owners to go easy on him because him and his siblings had an eaten in days. They were just starving. To make things worse, Michael was kidnapped by a group of young boys from the IRA. They dragged him into a room where they tied him up and stabbed him in the leg with a pen knife. They got up in his face and said, don't talk to anyone about what happened with your

mom, okay? Eventually, the state had to intervene and the kids were taken into custody. The orphanage that they were taken into was bad, bad. Like it was known for just having legendary, sadistic nuns. Beatings and harsh punishments were routine. It was almost like a sport for the people running the orphanage. Straight up, kids were beaten with sticks, belts, sometimes fists, and to make things worse, an ugly rumor started spreading that Jean was not kidnapped. She abandoned her kids to start a new, much easier life.

And then, the agreement of 1998 came to be. It was agreed upon that Northern Ireland would remain part of the UK, but with its own assembly and close links to the Republic of Ireland. So basically Northern Ireland would be part of the UK, but more independent in terms of government now. So it wasn't perfect, and not everybody was satisfied. In fact, I think like nobody was satisfied, because of all the lives lost, but it stopped people from killing one another.

And with that, an organization was put together to look for those that went missing or were murdered during the troubles. So Helen made a speech up lead to the organization and she said, for women and eight men came into our home and took away my mother. We never saw her again. And now I say to those women in particular, how can they look at their own children and not feel guilty about what they did to my mother. Throughout the adult lives of these kids, they even ran into their mom's kidnappers, neighbors, and if they tried to approach them, the neighbors would say, get away, leave us alone. Those times are over. Finally, in 1999, the IRA acknowledged that they killed Gene and ate others that disappeared.

So what happened? Let's talk about IRA informants. So for example, let's say you joined the IRA and later you captured by the British and you end up deciding to become a British spy. You're not looking at anything good. I mean, this is like bad, bad news. So the British had informants in the IRA. The IRA had spy hunters. Scab was an infamous spy hunter. His dad owned a local ice cream truck and what he would do for the IRA was kidnaps Aspected informants to the British army tie them to a chair blindfold them for days They would be questioned non-stop while being threatened be littled and sometimes beaten and tortured

He promised to save their lives if they confessed But sure enough when they did he would just record it and their bodies would later be found tortured and discarded somewhere in the country. Scat would even play the confession to the dead person's family and let them know. This is why your son had to die. He was a traitor. He would even go as far to tell them all the torture tactics he used on them. But then it later came out, and here's the kicker, that Scat was a British informant. And when people were mad at the British for that,

and they said, this guy has killed close to 50 people in the IRA that were suspected informant, what do you have to say about that? And the British said, well, he saved over 180 lives with the information he gave. And like, I don't know about you, but it just feel like a mathematical debate, but more of a moral debate and like a legal debate.

But they were like, well, he saved a little bit more lives than he killed so. Then in 2001, Boston College and the United States launched a history project on the troubles, and they called it the Belfast Project. They decided to reach out to Brandon, who was Dolores's prices superior in the IRA, and Dolores price herself for their research. They said, we want to interview you. Trust me, your interviews will never be released to any government, any official, any public member until you're dead. Oh.

And they said, okay. So during Brandon's interview for some strange freaking reason, he claimed Jean died because she was a British informant. What? So the IRA abducted her, took her into questioning, and she allegedly confessed to passing information to the British. So it's abducted her, took her into questioning, and she allegedly confessed to passing information to the British.

So it's kind of weird, right? The kids scoffed when they heard this because they said, my mom was an overworked depressed psychologically fragile mother of 10 who had just lost her husband to cancer. She spent her days hiding in the apartment, smoking cigarettes, and juggling children and doing laundry by hand. What information could this woman possibly have that the British want? I mean, while you guys were torturing her, she probably would have said anything.

Anyway, Brandon said that the squad was ordered to transport Jeanne across the Irish border into the Republic of Ireland for execution. And you guessed it, that squad included, done, done, done, Dolores' price. Dolores' story goes like this. She said, don't get me wrong, you know, I don't regret anything that I did. If anything, I'm not ashamed of what I did, because it was an honor of my beliefs. She almost felt proud of herself. She said, I would like to

think that what I did was to illustrate to the world the ability of any regular human being to push themselves to the limit and beyond physically and mentally because of a deeply felt belief. Anyway, Dolores does this interview with the Belfast Project for Boston College, and this really amps up the police's need to search for Jean or at least her body. They receive a tip that she was buried in Shelling Hill Beach, and for 50 days that summer they dug a hole as large and as deep as an Olympic pool, but they never found her. The kids were devastated, they thought that someone had given in a fake tip just to depress them more. But then almost exactly four years later, her body was found in 2003, on that beach.

The autopsy showed that she was killed by a single gunshot wound to the back of her head, and it was her skeletonized remains. She was identified with her clothing. And that's why the Maconville kids believe that they finally found their mom 31 years later. And nobody was punished. So in 2009, Dolores is arrested for trying to steal a bottle of vodka

from the supermarket, and she claimed to win him in it. I didn't steal the bottle. I just got confused at these automatic checkouts. You know, I'm good at bombs. I'm not good at automated checkout stuff. They have these electric scanners and I just suck at using it. Regardless whether or not she meant to steal it, Dolores was struggling with substance abuse,

she was addicted to alcohol, drugs, and suffering from PTSD. She was even caught stealing pills. So she wanted a way to channel her PTSD and maybe she thought being a writer could do it and her friends kept telling her, don't write about the IRA. Just write about your child or something. Don't write about the IRA. So even to this day, it was all hush hush. Everyone just wanted to forget it, but she didn't listen. And in 2010, she told her reporter she was ready to tell her side. And that intrigued the public and the government to try to get those tapes from the Boston

College. So, the public service of Northern Ireland gets word and they send a formal request to the United States Justice Department to subpoena the Boston College for those tapes. Now this is in 2011 where Brandon was dead but Dolores was alive and she was in a hospital being treated for depression and PTSD. And in that interview Dolores admits to helping make Jean disappear. She said that she was with two other people that she's not going to name. And they didn't want to do it, but they had to because those were their orders.

It was for the cause. So they took her to the beach, dug a grave, and they put one bullet in the chamber and took turns until she was finally killed. She said, I don't know the specifics of what Jean did and what she didn't do, but I have to ask myself, what warrants death? I certainly knew nothing of the nature of the children or the number, I didn't know Jean had kids, I knew none of that. And had it been a situation where I was brought into the discussion of what happened,

I might have advocated for a lesser punishment than death. And at the end, not one person would serve a single day for the murder of Jean McConville. Dolores also died. That is the story of Jean McConville. I mean, it makes you wonder how many people are going missing and dying in war-torn areas. Just areas of conflict because, I mean, how would people know? The press is so busy covering other things up or, you know, pushing an narrative or maybe they're doing this, right? It's just...

Just the people at the bottom that suffer. Yeah, and the lives, like the lost lives, they just go unnoticed. It's like, they never existed. It's just, they never existed. It's just so sad that she's 10 kids and not a single one of them is going to get answers. But I hope you guys enjoyed this week's main episode of Rotten Mingo and I will see you on Sunday for the mini-sode. Bye!