Priest in famed Bloody Sunday image dies

A priest who became a hero during the Bloody Sunday massacre of 1972 in Derry has died at the age of 82.

A priest who became a hero during the Bloody Sunday massacre of 1972 in Derry has died aged 82. (AAP)

Former Catholic Bishop Edward Daly, who tended victims of Northern Ireland's Bloody Sunday massacre, has died aged 82.

The Catholic Diocese of Derry says Daly died peacefully on Monday.

British paratroopers opened fire on a Catholic protest march in Londonderry on January 30, 1972, killing 13.

The killings helped fuel Northern Ireland's sectarian violence, in which some 3,000 people died.

Edward Daly waving a white handkerchief as he led Jackie Duddy away from danger on Bloody Sunday. Source: Press Association

Daly became a hero by administering last rites to victims on the streets of the Catholic Bogside district.

A photo of the priest waving a blood-stained white handkerchief as he tried to help a fatally wounded victim become one of the event's iconic images.

Daly served as a priest in the city from 1962, and was Bishop of Derry from 1974 to 1994, stepping aside after suffering a stroke.