Peter Graham | |
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Born | 1946 Dublin, Ireland |
Died | near
St Stephen's Green, Dublin, Ireland |
Cause of death | Gunshot |
Employer | CIÉ |
Organization(s) | Connolly Youth Movement, Irish Workers' Group, People's Democracy (Ireland), Saor Éire (1967–1975) |
Known for | Irish republicanism |
Part of a series on |
Irish republicanism |
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Peter Graham (born 1946) was an Irish republican and Marxist who worked as an electrician.
Graham was a member of various left-wing movements, a founder of the Young Socialists, and some sources identify him as a leader in the militant Saor Éire organisation.
He was murdered in his flat in Dublin in unclear circumstances in 1971.
Graham was born in 1946 [1] with father Joseph Graham and raised in The Coombe, Dublin. [2]
Graham was born into a Catholic family, but relinquished religion later in life. [2]
Graham worked as an electrician for the CIÉ and was a trade union activist in Ireland and London, England. [2]
Briefly a Labour Party member, Graham left in disillusionment and became a Trotskyite joining the Connolly Youth Movement and the Trotskyist Irish Workers Group (IWG) in 1967. [2] After growing dissatisfied with the ideological stance of the IWG, Graham left and started the League for a Worker's Republic. [2] [3] He was also the chair of the Young Socialists [3]and a member of the International Marxist Group. [4]
After IWG collapsed, some members started the People's Democracy organisation, with some of them starting the Saor Éire organisation. [2] While sources identify Graham as a member of Saor Éire, [4] This Week magazine rejects that. [2] He organised a meeting bringing Saor Éire and others together in 1968. [2] He was friends with D.R. O’Connor Lysaght, who both broke away from the International Marxist Group. [5]
On October 25, 1971 [6] he was murdered in his own flat on St Stephen's Green, Dublin [5] by rivals in Saor Éire, who accused him of being a police informant. [4] Graham was tortured with a hammer and shot in the neck. [7] He was aged 26 at the time of his death. [5]
While magazine This Week reported that Graham's friends attribute his death to a false accusation of being a police informant and also suggested his death was possibly linked to a gun smuggling operation. [8]
Journalist Charlie Bird spoke at his funeral. [3] Both Charlie Bird and Tariq Ali raised a clenched fist at the cemetery. [2]
The Provisional Irish Republican Army issued a statement thanking him for his support. [2]