This is the Falls Road in Belfast. And this
is the Shankhill Road. These two areas are just a few streets away from each other, and
yet there is a border running between them. This vast wall stands on the line of the first
peace wall in Northern Ireland. First Built nearly 50 years ago as a temporary barrier
to divide two communities, there is a still a wall standing here today - a physical symbol of
the deep divisions within the Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland was formed in 1921. When Ireland
seceded from the UK, six of Ireland’s 32 counties remained as part of the United Kingdom.
The governance of these counties has been contested ever since, sparking the bloody
30-year conflict known as the Troubles. In this four-part series, we’ll be taking
a look at the history of the Troubles, and why the scars of this conflict remain.
But first of all, let’s take a look back to see what marked out the six counties
of Northern Ireland in the first place. Religious tension in the north of Ireland
dates back hundreds of years, and some of this can be traced back to the plantation of Ulster.
At the end of the 16th century, an Irish alliance rose up to fight against English rule – and a
lot of the unrest took place in the province of Ulster. At the end of the war in 1603, James
VI & I, King of Scotland & England, set out to colonise and subdue the north of Ireland.
He sought to undertake an official plantation of Ulster to ensure its loyalty and to stop uprisings
happening ever again. In this, he planted mainly lowland Scots and some from the north of
England into six of the nine counties of Ulster. Earlier in 1603 that had been private plantation
by Presbyterians Scots in the counties of Down and then Antrim. But the actual official policy
starts in 1609 and it's really there to secure this part of the country in a way that will
make it not be able to rise in rebellion again. Over the next century, Europe was engulfed
in religious wars. James II – the Catholic King of England, Scotland and Ireland -
was overthrown by protestant William of Orange in 1688. A few years later, James’s
supporters – the Jacobites – attempted to restore James to the throne. Supported by
French forces, the Irish Jacobites fought the Williamites in Ireland, backed by the
Grand Alliance. The fighting culminated in two major battles, at the Boyne and Aughrim.
The Battle of the Boyne, although not a decisive battle, was very significant. A year later, in
1691, at the Battle of Aughrim, the Jacobite forces of James are actually destroyed and he
is defeated. Aughrim itself, although the less well known, is by far the most strategically
important of the two battles, but the Boyne has a much larger geopolitical effect. And even today
still William of Orange is a figure that we see, particularly during the loyalist marching
season, which culminates on the 12th of July. Religious conflict, as with much of Europe,
was causing great divisions with Northern Ireland. But another struggle was also continuing to grow:
the fight for independence from British rule. In 1845, a potato famine broke out across Ireland.
The famine reinforced to a lot of Irish people that although they were now part of the UK,
they were not considered equal. As Irish people starved, the British continued to export food for
profit. Over a million people died. The famine sparked rebellion and new calls for independence.
Over the 19th century, there were multiple bills proposed for Home Rule. The first was proposed and
failed in 1886. The third attempt passed in 1914, but was put on hold due to the First World War.
Irish republicans decided to take action. They staged a rebellion over Easter week in 1916.
The Easter Rising is planned as far back as 1914 by Patrick Pierce of the Irish
Republican Brotherhood. There are a number of other groups involved, one of
which will go on to become the IRA in 1919. For a week there is a great deal of violence
and there are a high level of casualties. This is eventually put down by the British
Army. Now, whether or not this would have gone away afterwards changed dramatically in
the way that the British sought to deal with the leaders of the uprising. Many of them
were actually executed by firing squad. And this this hardened attitudes towards Britain.
However, this and things such as the conscription policy that the British
tried to introduce in Ireland, again, hardened Republicanism and eventually Sinn Féin,
a party that was formed back in 1905, which had been a nationalist party not linked with armed
or violent Republicanism becomes a Republican Party. It wins the 1918 general election and
instantly declares an independent Ireland. But support for the union remained strong
in the North, leading to the Irish War for Independence, largely fought between
the IRA and the British government. In 1920, Home Rule was finally granted and Ireland
was partitioned. It was meant to be a temporary solution to end the war, but the government in the
south never formed, and the war continued until a ceasefire in 1921 and the Anglo-Irish Treaty,
which granted Ireland a limited independence. The south became a Free State, but still had
to take an oath to the King. This agreement was not entirely popular, leading to a bloody civil
war between those who were pro-Treaty and those against. In 1923, the pro-Treaty Free State
forces prevailed, cementing the Anglo-Irish Treaty and the two-state solution, with a
region in the North remaining part of Britain. The border had been drawn around six
counties in Ulster. In some places the border was drawn directly through
the middle of towns and villages. Ulster contained nine counties; the three
that were excluded were Donegal, Monaghan and Cavan. This was devised by Unionists, so as
to ensure a protestant majority in the new state. But, although the six counties had
a protestant majority politically, there was a substantial Catholic
population across the region. Voting was manipulated to advantage the unionists.
In many senses, the only people you could vote for sometimes were unionists; Catholics wouldn't vote
for them, or the often be no point in actually putting up a candidate from a nationalist party
because it wouldn't be enough of a vote for them to actually carry any win through.
There were actually other things, such as gerrymandering was used as well, most
starkly in the city of Derry/Londonderry, which was an overwhelmingly nationalist community,
but it continued to retain unionist populations where the boundaries were drawn up.
Not only was gerrymandering an issue, also if you were not the rate payer or the rent
payer on a house, even if you were of voting age, you can vote in local elections which
further discriminated against working people. Access to jobs was another area where the
nationalist community often seemed to be prejudiced against such as the big shipbuilding
works in Belfast would have an overwhelmingly Protestant workforce. But this is actually a
hotly contested issue in the sense that if you didn't have relatives working in one of these
factories, no matter if you were Protestant, you would often be prejudiced against as well.
And then on top of that, women found it very hard to get roles in some of these jobs as well.
It was in this environment, with Catholic residents consistently seen to be disadvantaged, that the civil rights movement grew among nationalist communities.
There was no promotion, if you're a Catholic, you didn't get it, you
just didn't get promotion. The Imperial Civil Service - if you worked in England, then you would
get a promotion. But if you were in the Northern Ireland Civil Service, there were people who
weren't as experienced as you were promoted over you. Housing was another thing. That was the start
of the civil rights movement. A young single girl got a house where a Catholic family didn't get it.
You know, I never met many and never mixed, never had any protestants and friends until I started
nursing really. But it's still there. The hatred. Deep hatred in those communities.
Communities and attitudes became deeply polarized through near 30 years of conflict in
Northern Ireland. Many of the events that took place during this time are hotly contested.
Moreover, they are highly disputed as well. Often starkly and highly diverse versions of
events exist on both sides, and many people will never come to a point of agreement on what
happened on certain days at certain times. Throughout the late sixties, tension was rising.
In 1969, at the annual Apprentice Boys of Derry march, violence erupted. The route of the
march passed through the predominantly Catholic Bogside area of Derry/Londonderry, resulting in
violent clashes between marchers and residents. Several days of rioting ensued and the police
became involved. Weapons were fired, batton-round guns were used. Stones were thrown and bits of
the Bogside were shut off to the police. When the police moved into the Bogside, loyalist groups
moved in behind them. This was probably not the police's intention, but it galvanized opinion
within the nationalist Republican community. At the same time, violence broke out in other
parts of Northern Ireland as well. And people were burned out of homes in both loyalist and
republican communities. And the Troubles at this point really begins in Northern Ireland.
In 1969, the IRA split and a break-away group who called themselves the Provisional
IRA formed. Divisions in the IRA had been growing through the 1960s.
In 1962, the new IRA chief of staff, Cathal Goulding, sought to move the IRA in a
different direction, keen that the movement becomes political in its outlook rather
than one that relies on armed struggle, which to traditional Republicans is seen as
a betrayal of their cause, who see their task as the defence of the nationalist community,
and the expulsion of the British from Ireland. Loyalist paramilitaries such
as the Red Hand Commando, the Ulster Defence Association (UDA), and the Ulster
Volunteer Force (UVF), also grew in numbers. Ian Paisley was a Presbyterian minister who
established himself as an outspoken leader within Unionism, leading marches
throughout the 1960s and 70s. As the rival groups grew, tensions rose. Over
these decades, violent attacks and bombings increased in frequency, and barricades
went up to separate the two communities.
The Provisional IRA escalated their armed
campaign against the British and Northern Irish security forces. Many nationalists saw
the PIRA as defenders of their community, and loyalists saw them as dangerous insurgents.
In reaction to this violence, the British Army were deployed on the streets in Operation
Banner. They were called in to support the RUC, and protect infrastructure
and civilians. But ultimately, their presence served to escalate the situation.
We’ve come up to IWM’s conservation studio to have a look at this weapon here which is a baton
round gun which was used by the British army and the Royal Ulster Constantly in riot control
situations. This type of weapon could fire a variety of ammunition from these guns, such
as CS gas canisters, but more usually rubber bullets and more latterly plastic bullets.
The British Army was deployed in Northern Ireland in 1969 at the behest of the then prime
minister, and it changed the relationship with Northern Ireland and the rest of United
Kingdom, where now the British government itself took a more active role because the
army were very much within their control. Initially, in some areas they were seen
as being protective and helpful of the nationalist Catholic community. But as the
situation developed in Northern Ireland and the army's role became more intense, they
were no longer seen as a neutral actor. Although seen as an effective form of crowd
control if used incorrectly, the bullets could in themselves be fatal. There were a number of
fatalities caused by rubber and more latterly the replacement for the use of plastic bullets,
which were at the time thought to be less lethal, but turned out to be no less so.
This was often seen as a fairly heavy-handed approach, and nationalist communities
often saw that they were the ones more targeted by British soldiers with these particular
weapons than those in loyalist communities. In 1970, the Ulster Defence Regiment was formed
– the largest regiment in the British Army. They consisted of people, men and women, who
came from Northern Ireland. They didn't go home. They didn't have tours of duty. They came
from the community from which they defended. Although there was a drive to include Catholics in
the recruitment and some did join, it largely was unsuccessful because of pressure in nationalist
and Republican communities to join them, and also because the force was seen, as with
the Royal Constabulary, the police force, to be overwhelming Protestant and was viewed
from a nationalist Republican standpoint as being a tool of the oppressor, if you will.
The UDR did draw controversy. There were accusations from Republicans of collusion with
loyalist paramilitaries, some of which may have been true, others may have been overstated.
Even within the loyalist community, many of them didn't see them as friends either.
For others, others saw them as neutral. So the position was difficult and it was dangerous
and it certainly was controversial at times. I think that was the hardest
thing any of us had to deal with - the fact this was a United Kingdom
city. And yet you were there, as though you were in the middle of a war zone. It was a war zone.
It was a war zone. There was a lot of violence and a lot of anger. You had all that debris from the
first riots, all the burnt-out streets and things. And what were the people like? The ones
that were friendly were very friendly. But the ones that weren’t were the exact
opposite. You got stoned, and bottled, and petrol bombed and all the rest of it in a
Protestant area just as much as you did in the Catholic one. You really were piggy in the middle.
The British Army arriving in NI faced a difficult challenge. In their efforts to supress the IRA,
hostility from the Catholic community grew towards the British Army. This was severely aggravated by
the introduction of the Falls Curfew in July 1970. What started off as a search for weapons
in a Catholic, nationalist area, resulted in clashes between local residents throwing
petrol bombs, and British soldiers firing CS gas. In response to this clash, the entire area
was sealed off and a curfew was imposed. Large amounts of weapons were seized by the British
troops, but in the process of the operation, four civilians were killed and dozens others
injured. The same month, in the House of Commons, UK Home Secretary Reginald Maudling
declared, "We are now at war with the IRA." The following year, the policy of
internment sparked further anger.
Operation Demetrius involved the imprisonment without trial of suspected IRA members. The
British Army conducted sweeps and arrested more than 340 people from Catholic and nationalist
backgrounds – due to faulty intelligence, many of these people in fact had no connection
to armed Republicanism. The treatment of some of those arrested was later categorised as torture.
We're standing in front of a cabinet here in the galleries, and then here we have a poster
which is a protest against the Northern Irish government's policy of internment in
1971. These initial sweeps caused four days of rioting in which over 20 people died. Posters like these would have appeared on walls, on lampposts, etc. in Northern
Ireland at the time as a protest against what was felt to be an unjust policy targeted
against the nationalist community. Indeed, loyalists would not be subject to the
same internment without trial until 1973. The backlash to internment was strong. It
sparked a lot of violence, a recruitment boost for the IRA, and a deepening of divisions
between the loyalists and nationalists. 1972 was the worst year of violence in Northern
Ireland. But from the couple of years before that, the violence had been escalating. Northern
Ireland was starting to appear on the news regular at night and civilians bore the brunt
of it as far as casualties were concerned. There seemed to be at this point no resolution
in sight, but the worst was still to come. The presence of the British Army and the growth
of the paramilitaries all ramped up the violence of the Troubles. The IRA had already split but
their strategy was about to entirely change. As the violence increased and spread beyond NI
borders, the road to peace would not be easy.