During late August 1969, shortly after the violence that had shaken Belfast and elsewhere, Irish army intelligence gave their assessment of the situation to the Dublin government: ‘. . . some element of [the] IRA was certainly in action in Belfast during [the] night of 14th August . . . as in [the] Bogside, [the] … Read more
In mid-1969 the Department of Justice presented the Irish government with its view of the threat posed by the IRA, which it suggested had perhaps 1,200 members in the Republic. IRA members were said to be centrally involved in housing protests and land agitation, having decided that ‘social unrest would be exploited’ in order to … Read more
Augustus (Gusty) Spence, a shipyard worker and former regular soldier in the Royal Ulster Rifles as well as an active Orangeman, has recalled accepting a lift early in 1965 to a farm near Pomeroy, Co. Tyrone. Once there, he and three others were led into a building lit by hurricane lamps. In the presence of … Read more
In April 1966 the Revd Ian Paisley, who had already earned his first token conviction for a public order offence, addressed the inaugural meeting in Belfast’s Ulster Hall of what became the Ulster Constitutional Defence Committee. In the course of a fiery speech he told his audience that in anticipation of republican subversion to accompany … Read more
Towards the end of 1968 Northern Ireland seemed to have pulled back from the brink. In response to pressure from the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA) and from the Labour government in Westminster, and in spite of opposition from within his own cabinet, Prime Minister Terence O’Neill announced a reform package. Buoyed up by … Read more