During 12–16 August 1969, there was an outbreak of political and sectarian violence throughout Northern Ireland, which is often seen as the beginning of the thirty-year conflict known as the Troubles. There had been sporadic violence throughout the year arising out of the Northern Ireland civil rights campaign, which demanded an end to discrimination against Catholics and Irish nationalists. Civil rights marches had been attacked by Protestant loyalists, and protesters often clashed with the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), the overwhelmingly Protestant police force.
On 12 August, the Battle of the Bogside erupted in Derry: three days of fierce clashes between the RUC and thousands of Catholic/nationalist residents of Derry's Bogside district. The besieged residents built barricades and set up first aid posts and workshops for making petrol bombs. Police fired CS gas at rioters for the first time in the history of the UK. In support of the Bogsiders, on 13 August Catholics/nationalists held protests elsewhere in Northern Ireland, some of which led to violence. The bloodiest clashes were in Belfast, where seven people were killed and hundreds wounded, five of them Catholic civilians shot by police. Protesters clashed with both the police and with loyalists, who attacked Catholic districts. Scores of homes and businesses were burnt out, most of them owned by Catholics, and thousands of mostly Catholic families were driven from their homes. In some cases, police helped the loyalists and failed to protect Catholic areas. Both republican and loyalist paramilitaries were involved in the clashes. There were also clashes between protesters and police in Armagh, where a protester was killed by police, as well as in Dungannon and Newry.
The British Army was deployed to restore order on 14 August, beginning the thirty-seven year Operation Banner, and peace lines were built to separate Catholic and Protestant districts. The Republic of Ireland's government set up field hospitals and refugee centres near the Irish border, and called for a United Nations peacekeeping force to be sent to Northern Ireland. The British government held an inquiry into the riots, and the reserve police force was disbanded. The riots led to a split within the IRA and the formation of the Provisional Irish Republican Army and the Official Irish Republican Army. It also led to the growth of loyalist paramilitaries such as the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF).
Background
Northern Ireland was destabilised in 1968 by sporadic rioting arising out of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA) campaign, and the police and loyalist reaction to it. The civil rights campaign demanded an end to discrimination against Catholics in voting rights, housing and employment. NICRA was opposed by loyalists led primarily by Ian Paisley.
During the summer of 1969, the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) published a highly critical report which "criticised the Northern Ireland Government for police brutality, religious discrimination [against Catholics] and gerrymandering in politics". The ICJ secretary general said that laws and conditions in Northern Ireland had been cited by the South African government to justify its apartheid system. The Times reported that the Ulster Special Constabulary (B-Specials), Northern Ireland's reserve police force, was "regarded as the militant arm of the Protestant Orange Order". The Belfast Telegraph reported that the ICJ had added Northern Ireland to the list of states/jurisdictions "where the protection of human rights is inadequately assured".
Events leading up to the August riots
The first major confrontation between Catholic civil rights activists and the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), Northern Ireland's overwhelmingly Protestant police force, occurred in Derry on 5 October 1968, when a NICRA march was baton-charged by the RUC. Disturbed by the prospect of major violence, the prime minister of Northern Ireland, Terence O'Neill, promised reforms in return for a "truce", whereby no further demonstrations would be held.
In spite of these promises, in January 1969 People's Democracy, a left-wing group, staged an anti-government march from Belfast to Derry. Loyalists, including off-duty members of the B-Specials, attacked the marchers, most determinedly at Burntollet Bridge, outside Derry. The RUC failed to adequately protect the marchers. This action, and the RUC's subsequent entry into Derry's predominantly Catholic Bogside district, led to serious rioting in the city.
In March and April 1969, there were six bomb attacks on electricity and water infrastructure, causing blackouts and water shortages. At first the attacks were blamed on the Irish Republican Army (IRA), but it later emerged that the loyalist Ulster Protestant Volunteers (UPV) and Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) had carried out the bombings in an attempt to implicate the IRA, destabilise the Northern Ireland government and halt the reforms promised by O'Neill.
There was some movement on reform in the first half of 1969. On 23 April Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) members of the Northern Ireland parliament voted by 28 to 22 to introduce universal adult suffrage in local government elections in Northern Ireland. The call for "one man, one vote" had been one of the key demands of the civil rights movement. Five days later, O'Neill resigned as UUP leader and prime minister and was replaced in both roles by James Chichester-Clark. Chichester-Clark, despite having resigned in protest over the introduction of universal suffrage in local government, announced that he would continue the reforms begun by O'Neill.
Street violence, however, continued to escalate. On 19 April there was serious rioting in the Bogside following clashes between NICRA marchers and the RUC. A Catholic, Samuel Devenny, was severely beaten by the RUC and later died of his injuries. On 12 July, during the Orange Order's Twelfth of July marches, there was serious rioting in Derry, Belfast and Dungiven, causing many families in Belfast to flee from their homes. Another Catholic civilian, Francis McCloskey (67), died after being hit on the head with batons by RUC officers during rioting in Dungiven.
Battle of the Bogside
This unrest culminated in a pitched battle in Derry from 12 to 14 August, known as the Battle of the Bogside. As the yearly march by the Protestant loyalist Apprentice Boys of Derry skirted the edge of the Catholic Bogside, stone-throwing broke out. The RUC—on foot and in armoured vehicles—drove back the Catholic crowd and attempted to force its way into the Bogside, followed by loyalists who smashed the windows of Catholic homes. Thousands of Bogside residents mobilised to defend the area, and beat back the RUC with a hail of stones and petrol bombs. Barricades were built, petrol bomb workshops and first aid posts were set up, and a radio transmitter ("Radio Free Derry") broadcast messages and called on "every able-bodied man in Ireland who believes in freedom" to defend the Bogside.
The overstretched police resorted to throwing stones back at the Bogsiders, and were helped by loyalists. They fired CS gas into the Bogside – the first time it had been used by police in the UK. The Bogsiders feared that the B-Specials, the wholly-Protestant police reserves, would be sent in and would massacre the Catholic residents. On 13 August, NICRA called for protests across Northern Ireland in support of the Bogside to draw police away from the fighting there. That night it issued a statement:
A war of genocide is about to flare across the North. The CRA demands that all Irishmen recognise their common interdependence and calls upon the Government and people of the Twenty-six Counties to act now to prevent a great national disaster. We urgently request that the Government take immediate action to have a United Nations peace-keeping force sent to Derry.
Violence in Belfast
Belfast has a long history of riots between Catholics and Protestants. British rule in Ireland was cemented by official British support for Protestant settlement since the 17th Century. Beginning in 1835 there have been at least 15 major riots in Belfast, the most violent ones taking place in 1864, 1886 and 1921. See 1886 Belfast riots, Bloody Sunday (1921) and The Troubles in Ulster (1920–1922). Belfast saw the most intense violence of the August 1969 riots. Unlike Derry, Catholics were a minority in Belfast and mostly lived in enclaves surrounded by Protestant districts. For this reason, whereas in Derry the fighting was largely between nationalists and the RUC, in Belfast it also involved fighting between Catholics and Protestants, including exchanges of gunfire and widespread burning of homes and businesses.
On the night of 12 August, bands of Apprentice Boys arrived back in Belfast after taking part in the Derry march. They were met by Protestant pipe bands and a large crowd of supporters. They then marched to Shankill Road waving Union Flags and singing "The Sash My Father Wore", a popular loyalist ballad.
According to journalists Patrick Bishop and Eamonn Mallie, "Both communities were in the grip of a mounting paranoia about the other's intentions. Catholics were convinced that they were about to become victims of a Protestant pogrom; Protestants that they were on the eve of an IRA insurrection".
Wednesday 13 August
The first disturbances in Belfast took place on the night of 13 August. Derry activists Eamonn McCann and Seán Keenan contacted Frank Gogarty of NICRA to organise demonstrations in Belfast to draw off police from Derry. Independently, Belfast IRA leader Billy McMillen ordered republicans to organise demonstrations "in support of Derry".
In protest at the RUC's actions in Derry, a group of 500 nationalists held a demonstration outside Springfield Road police station, where they handed in a petition. After handing in the petition, the crowd of now 1,000–2,000 people, including IRA members such as Joe McCann, began a protest march along Falls Road and Divis Street to the Hastings Street police station. When they arrived, about fifty youths broke away from the march and attacked the police station with stones and petrol bombs. The RUC responded by deploying riot police and by driving Shorland armoured cars at the crowd. Protesters pushed burning cars onto the road to stop the RUC from entering the nationalist area.
At Leeson Street, roughly halfway between the two police stations, an RUC Humber armoured car was attacked with a hand grenade and rifle fire. At the time, it was not known who had launched the attack, but it has since emerged that it was IRA members, acting under the orders of Belfast commander Billy McMillen. He also authorised members of the Fianna Éireann (IRA youth wing) to attack the Springfield Road police station with petrol bombs. The station also came under fire, and police fired "warning shots" in response, wounding two young men.
In addition to the attacks on the RUC, the car dealership of Protestant Isaac Agnew, on the Falls Road, was destroyed. The nationalist crowd also burnt a Catholic-owned pub and betting shop. At this stage, loyalist crowds gathered on Shankill Road but did not join in the clashes.
Thursday 14 August and early Friday 15 August
On 14 August, many Catholics and Protestants living near sectarian flashpoints fled their homes for safety.
Loyalists viewed the nationalist attacks of Wednesday night as an organised attempt by the IRA "to undermine the constitutional position of Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom". McMillen called up all available IRA members for "defensive duties" and sent parties out to Cupar Street, Divis Street and St Comgall's School on Dover Street. They amounted to thirty IRA volunteers, twelve women, forty youths from the Fianna and 15–20 girls. Their arms consisted of one Thompson submachine gun, one Sten submachine gun, one Lee–Enfield rifle and six handguns. A "wee factory" was also set up in Leeson Street to make petrol bombs. Their orders at the outset were to "disperse people trying to burn houses, but under no circumstances to take life".
Falls–Shankill interface at Divis Street
At around 7 pm, a nationalist crowd the Falls gathered outside Hastings Street police station and began to attack it with stones and petrol bombs for a second night. Riot police and armoured vehicles scattered the nationalists and moved into the Falls district. From the rooftop of the Whitehall flats, part of the Divis complex, a group of nationalists would spend the rest of the night raining missiles on the police below. A chain of people were passing stones and petrol bombs from the ground to the roof.
Loyalist crowds armed with petrol bombs, bricks, stones, sharpened poles and protective dustbin lids gathered at Dover and Percy Streets. On Dover Street, the loyalist crowd was led by Ulster Unionist MP John McQuade. They included a rowdy gang of loyalist football supporters who had returned from a match. The loyalists began moving down these streets into the Catholic district, attacking Catholic homes and businesses. They were confronted by nationalists, who had hastily blocked their streets with barricades. Fighting broke out between the rival factions at about 11 pm. Catholics claimed that B-Specials had been seen giving guns to the loyalists, while journalists reported seeing pike-wielding loyalists standing among RUC officers. On Percy Street, a loyalist opened fire with a shotgun, and B-Specials helped the loyalists to push back the nationalists.
At about 12:30 am, an IRA unit opened fire on RUC officers and loyalists gathered at the intersection of Dover and Divis Street, at the edge of the Catholic district. Protestant Herbert Roy (26) was killed and three officers were wounded. Police responded with bursts from Sterling submachine guns. At this point, the RUC, believing they were facing an organised IRA uprising, deployed Shorland armoured cars mounted with Browning machine guns, whose .30 calibre bullets "tore through walls as if they were cardboard".