We met Mr. Michael Gallagher in Omagh, where he took us to the site of the bombing that 26 years ago took the life of his son Aidan. Laying flowers, reading poems, and pronouncing the names of the 29 people, including 21 year old Aidan, killed by a group calling itself the Real IRA in a thankfully failing bid to disrupt the recently signed Belfast or Good Friday Agreement, we heard a small part of the story of a man who finally now is met with an inquiry into what happened and how what he deeply believes was a preventable tragedy might be prevented in the future.
What I remember from the docudrama on the Omagh bombing, whose narrative centered almost entirely on Mr. Gallagher’s perspective, is the quietness of the film, the lack of music to help anticipate or feel a particular way or get a sense of comforting communal spirit, the absence, the shock of the bomb and the deafening silence and then the quiet numbness and then the ordinariness of grief, and all of that quietness a reflection of Mr. Gallagher’s gentleness, manifested in a soft, quiet voice, and the leadership that nonetheless emerged out of an unshowy but profound persistence to achieve justice in truth. I remember, in the film, Mr. Gallagher wanting to get to the bomb site, certain Aidan would be there, because “He’ll be helping.” It was a certainty repeated when he arrived at the hospital, because he might be helping there. And then looking for his name on the lists. A powerful and wrenching watch.
As we gathered at the bottom of the hill, Mr. Gallagher (pronounced Galla-her, the hard G meant for the other side), pointed up the hill to the courthouse, where the bomb was reported to be as the police guided shoppers down the hill, to where we now stood, and people complied, casually, chatting as they walked, used to such threats and small explosions. On the street side of where we stood, a car rigged with explosives; on the shop side, a clothing store where mothers and children were buying clothes for school.
In Enniskillen, Mr. Harkin brought us to a memorial for a 1987 bombing that killed eleven. Why is it so important that we remember, that we come to these places, Mr. Harkin said. Later I will call family members and I’ll tell them that we came, and what we did, and how many of you were hear to witness and honor the memory. We come to these places to comfort and show what happened has not been forgotten, to bear witness to the past, and to show that bad deeds are countered by our good ones. People who drive by us now will wonder what’s going on here and they’ll Google it and the past will be recovered.
All these families and survivors had a choice between revenge and reconciliation, and they chose the latter, because this is what you must know, that there’s more good in the world than bad. This continues to be so We’ll be Irish if that’s what it takes to bring peace. We’ll be British if that’s what it takes to bring peace. And this is where the Good Friday Agreement came from.
Every small good deed, laying our flowers here today and summoning these memories and others, they do matter, they matter. We gather both to take heart from each other and to give heart.
In the rubble, Gordon Wilson had his young daughter’s hand in his own. Are you all right, he asked her. Yes, Dad. But then she screamed. And so he asked her again, Marie, are you okay? Yes, Dad, she said again, still holding his hand. And then she screamed. Are you all right, he asked her again. And she told him she loved him, and fell into a coma and soon died. For Gordon Wilson, the enduring message was her last message, that of love. And that’s how he came to his line, broadcast widely, I bear them no ill will, I bear them no grudge.
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