Widowed mother ‘pleaded for life with Bloody Sunday soldier’

A soldier who shot and injured a widowed mother-of-14 on Bloody Sunday cocked his rifle again afterwards - but walked away when she pleaded with him, the Saville Tribunal heard today.

Widowed mother ‘pleaded for life with Bloody Sunday soldier’

A soldier who shot and injured a widowed mother-of-14 on Bloody Sunday cocked his rifle again afterwards - but walked away when she pleaded with him, the Saville Tribunal heard today.

The claim was made by a Helen Deery, daughter of Peggy Deery, who also said her wounded mother was helped indoors for treatment by 17-year-old John Kelly, one of the 13 men and youths shot dead the same day.

Mrs Deery was one of the first people to be shot when Paratroopers opened fire in Derry’s Bogside on January 30, 1972 and was the only woman to suffer a bullet wound that day. She survived her injuries but has since died.

Giving evidence Ms Deery, then 13, said her mother had been widowed only three months earlier, her youngest child was aged just 10 months when she took part in the civil rights demonstration which ended with the killings - her first time on a march.

Ms Deery told the inquiry, in the Guildhall in the city, she became separated from her mother as the crowd ran in panic from troops coming into the Bogside and ran to her Grandmother’s house, encountering the body of one of the dead and a prolonged period of shooting on the way.

Her mother talked frequently about Bloody Sunday afterwards, saying she would never forget the face of the soldier who shot her in the leg at close range, the witness added.

‘‘After he had shot her he had cocked his gun and she had said she was a widow with 14 wee ones. He then put his head down and walked away,’’ Ms Deer said.

‘‘My mother told me that when she was lying on the ground she heard someone shout ‘there’s a girl lying on the ground’. A youth approached and said ‘Jesus, Peggy, it’s you’.

‘‘My mother told me that the youth was Michael Kelly who was shot dead a little while later and that he helped carry her to a house in Chamberlain Street.

‘‘Michael Kelly was always at our house and all our family knew him. My mother often asked how anyone could mistake her as a gunman.’’

Ms Deery said she became responsible for her brothers and sisters in the three or four months her mother was in hospital afterwards.

She said: ‘‘They had wanted to split the family up but we wouldn’t let them.’’

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