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 LONDONDERRY On Sunday Jan. 30, 1972 — a clear, crisp winter day — the unrest that divided Northern Ireland escalated into violence as Catholics became convinced that Britain was hostile to their drive for equal rights with the Protestant majority. British soldiers opened fire on civilians taking part in a banned march in Londonderry. Fourteen people were killed. Resentment over the killings swelled the ranks of the outlawed Irish Republican Army (I.R.A.) and helped kick off the worst year of bloodshed in Northern Ireland’s history. In all, 496 people died; a quarter-century would pass before the fighting ceased. Martin McGuinness, a senior Sinn Fein politician and former Education Minister in the now suspended Ulster government, was a 21-year-old I.R.A. commander who was present at the march. British agents claim he triggered the violence by attacking soldiers, an accusation he dismisses as part of a “whitewash” to cover up a deliberate crackdown on protesters. McGuinness is due to testify as part of a second, reopened inquiry into Bloody Sunday. The initial inquiry was set up by Britain immediately after the killings but was widely discredited after clearing the soldiers. The new investigation, which has already cost more than $160 million, is due to conclude next year.
— Chris Thornton |
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Europe Then & Now, a TIME photographic exhibition based on this issue, opens Aug. 18, 2003, in the Olivier Exhibition Foyer of the National Theatre, London. |
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E-mail your letter to the editor
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Londonderry
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Martin McGuinness
Sinn Fein's chief negotiator and former I.R.A. commander
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Posted Sunday, August 10, 2003; 16.11BST
I knew two of the people killed on Bloody Sunday. Michael McDaid was a neighbor. He was about my own age, a total and absolute gentleman. And Jim Wray came from just below where I lived. I didn't know the rest, but I knew some of their families.
I was a member of the I.R.A., but I knew that these people weren't. That had a huge impact on me, to know that civil-rights protesters, people who were not in the I.R.A., could be shot down in this fashion. Quite apart from the politics, there was a sadness knowing in your heart and soul that people labeled as gunmen and bombers were not. I remember seeing people going to play bingo several hours after. And that enraged me. I said to them that it was a disgrace. I was totally wrong.
These people were obviously in shock and didn't really fully understand the importance of this massive historical event. And maybe I was in a state of shock. It was a defining moment. Bloody Sunday changed Ireland, but it dramatically changed the North of Ireland and had a politicizing effect on a whole generation of Catholics.
If you look at the strength of Irish republicanism today, it strengthened as people held the British accountable. Sometimes people talk about the people who were killed as martyrs, and they were. But they were also heroes. They decided they were not going to take second-class citizenship anymore.”
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Time Capsule
The I.R.A. is determined to survive and to win. Says Sean MacStiofáin, chief of staff of the army’s militant Provisional wing: “This is not just another glorious phase in Irish history. We must win ... We will keep the campaign going regardless of the cost to ourselves, regardless of the cost to anyone else.” ... It is already clear that the gunmen have come surprisingly close to winning their political goals. Since its establishment in 1916, the I.R.A. has had but one aim: the creation of a united Ireland wholly free of British control. The army’s tactics of terror have succeeded in reopening the issue of the reunification of North and South. They have made all but untenable the Protestant-dominated
government of Northern Ireland at Stormont ... To many observers, the real issue is not so much whether an Ulster tied to Britain can survive as how long it will last.
— Jan. 10, 1972
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