Four “Bloody Sundays” in 20th century Irish History Dublin 1913 .On August 31, the Dublin Metropolitan Police and RIC baton-charged a crowd on O’Connell Street, Dublin, who were gathered to hear a speech by the radical trade union leader Jim The during the Lockout, when the great industrial dispute of 1913 was escalating. Most of those injured were not in fact trade unionists, they were at a rally elsewhere in the city, and many bystanders were injured demonstrating how indiscriminate the police action was. Several hundred people were injured and ferocious rioting took place all over working class districts of Dublin that night and over the following days between trade unionists and the police. In the irish labour tradition, this is their Bloody Sunday. James Nolan and James Byrne, beaten to death by the police over that weekend. Dublin 1920 21st November 1920. 31 people died, An IRA ‘Squad’ from the IRA Dublin Brigade, visited over a dozen private addresses in the south of the city. By the time Dublin’s citizens awoken, 14 people were dead, eight of them British agents, two Auxiliaries the rest either bystanders or civilians informers. Later that day a mixed force of RIC and Auxiliaries raided a Gaelic football match at Croke Park Once inside the grounds, as a reprisal, they opened fire indiscriminately and killed some 14 people – one of them a player. Three republican prisoners, Peadar Clancy, Dick McKee and Conor Clune, were also murdered in Dublin Castle that night, supposedly, “while trying to escape Belfast 1921 Belfast’s Bloody Sunday took place on July 10th 1921, a day before the Truce between the IRA and the British was put into effect. The IRA in the city was alerted by the banging of nationalist dustbin lids on the ground which warned of raid and the IRA mounted a successful ambush of an RIC armoured car on Raglan Street on July 9. The following day, Sunday July 10, central and west Belfast became a war zone as loyalists, incensed by the ambush and worried that the treaty negotiations would result in “sellout” and they attacked the Catholic enclaves. Loyalist groups, supported by the the police fought with the IRA and they battled each other with rifles, machine guns and even grenades, from rooftops, windows and street corners with rifles, machine guns and even grenades. Catholic and Protestant mobs rioted exchanging stones and petrol bombs. By the time the day was out, 16 civilians were dead and 161 houses destroyed. The sectarian body count was heavily in the Protestants’ favour – 11 Catholics for 5 Protestants and 150 Catholic houses destroyed for 11 Protestant’s. Eoin O’Duffy, ordered the IRA to adhere to the Truce. The British, announced a strict curfew so that the Twelfth, just two days after “Bloody Sunday”, would pass off peaceably”. Derry 1972 On January 30, 1972, the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association called a protest in Derry against the internment of nationalists suspects. The march was banned on the recommendation of the British Army, although the RUC Chief Superintendent Frank Lagan said it should go ahead. Initially the march mostly passed off peacefully after Army barricades prevented the 15,000 marchers from leaving the nationalist Bogside and passing into Derry’s city centre. The 1st Parachute Regiment, opened fire on the marchers, firing 100 shots from their SLR rifles in and around the flat complexes of Rossville Street, Glenfada Park and Abbey Park, killing 13 people and injuring a number of people. These incidents have a number of commonalities They took place on Sunday, considered a day of rest. It was the only day of the week when most people did not have to work and it was for this reason that events like the rallies took place In 1913, 1920, 1921 and 1972, were, in whole or in part, acts of violence committed by British state military or police forces on Irish civilians. The Irish nationalist community was in each case attacked, a suffered the greatest losses and further repercussions from these attacks Belfast 1921 Dublin 1920 Dublin 1913 Derry 1972
Posted on: Sun, 23 Nov 2014 10:50:29 +0000
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