Today in 1921-Belfasts Bloody Sunday On 8 July, the RIC attempted to enter the mainly Catholic and republican area around Union Street and Stanhope Street. However, they were confronted by about 15 IRA volunteers in a firefight that lasted over three hours. On 9 July a truce to suspend the war was agreed in Dublin between Sinn Féin and the British administration, to come into effect at noon on 11 July. Also on 9 July, the IRA ambushed an armoured police truck on Raglan Street, killing one RIC man, injuring two more and destroying their armoured car. Around 14 IRA men took part in the operation. They had been alerted to the police presence by local residents banging dustbin lids to warn the IRA of the RIC patrol. This sparked an outbreak of ferocious fighting between Catholics and Protestants in west Belfast on the following day, Sunday 10 July, in which 16 civilians (11 Catholics and 5 Protestants) lost their lives and 161 houses were destroyed.Of the houses destroyed, 150 were Catholic. Gun battles raged all day along the sectarian boundary between the Falls and Shankill Roads and rival gunmen used rifles, machine guns and hand grenades in the clashes. Gunmen were seen firing from windows, rooftops and street corners. A loyalist mob, several thousand strong attempted to storm the Catholic Falls Road, carrying petrol and other flammable materials. The New York Times characterised the fighting as a three-fold fight between Sinn Féin and Unionist snipers and Crown forces. It added, In the extent of material damage to property, Sundays rioting can be compared to the Dublin Rising in 1916 Another four people died over the following two days.The violence occurred only one day before the truce between the IRA and British forces formally ended the war – though in the north the official truce did not end the fighting. IRA members later recalled, The Truce was not observed by either side in the north. The leader of the Belfast IRAs Active Service Unit, Roger McCorley, stated that the truce in Belfast lasted six hours only
Posted on: Thu, 10 Jul 2014 08:59:43 +0000
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