On this day, 5 October 1968

[Kerrygold]

While it was certainly the beginning of the end of the old order, I dont think there was anything 'inevitable' about the descent into violence. The early days of the Civil Rights movement (right up to Bloody Sunday) were full of optimism that civil disobedience would work as it had in India and the southern USA. Unlike the US or India though, there was no one unifying figure who could hold the thing together and the violent reaction of the state led the more shortsighted and stupid among us to react in the way they did.

There is little evidence to suggest that the Civil Rights movement were full of optimism or that civil disobedience would work. The only time civil disobedience worked was during the so called Ulster workers strike because it had the backing of Loyalist mobs and Ian Paisley who intimidated protestant workers into not going to work. In fact I think it was Bernadette McAliskey who said that the Civil Rights campaign was actually losing it's momentum.

[Inishowen]

While it was certainly the beginning of the end of the old order, I dont think there was anything 'inevitable' about the descent into violence. The early days of the Civil Rights movement (right up to Bloody Sunday) were full of optimism that civil disobedience would work as it had in India and the southern USA. Unlike the US or India though, there was no one unifying figure who could hold the thing together and the violent reaction of the state led the more shortsighted and stupid among us to react in the way they did.

There is little evidence to suggest that the Civil Rights movement were full of optimism or that civil disobedience would work. The only time civil disobedience worked was during the so called Ulster workers strike because it had the backing of Loyalist mobs and Ian Paisley who intimidated protestant workers into not going to work. In fact I think it was Bernadette McAliskey who said that the Civil Rights campaign was actually losing it's momentum.

Go and speak to the people who were there man.

[seanad voter]

roc, I always say the camera didn't get my best side there.

did the RUC man

Actually yes. I was injured by a rock thrown by a peeler. I woke up in some woman's house in the Bog surrounded by these ministering angels of daughters (about 5 of them I think) all fussing : "Get him a cuppa tea. Are ye alright, love ? Where do ye live ? Does yer mammy know where ye are ?" and the like. It was great for a wee while but then it was back to the front.

[freedomlover]

On this day in 1968 in my hometown of Derry the spark that ignited the so-called northern Troubles was provided by the actions of the RUC in brutally attacking a Civil Rights march.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/date ... 286818.stm

But could it all have been avoided ? Was there ANY way the gerrymandered rotten borough of Northern Ireland could have been peacefully reformed into something remotely resembling a decent non-sectarian society fit for all its citizens ?

Or did what tragically happened inevitably HAVE to happen ?

Gosh, is it really 39 years? Makes me feel old. I was there, having travelled from my home near Omagh that morning. It was the final weekend before returning to Belfast for my third year at Queens University. The sort of thing that happened in Derry that day had happened numerous times in Northern Ireland before. On previous occasions it hadn't led to anything more as, up to that point, the Northern Ireland nationalist population was renowned for its apathy and unwillingness to confront unionist domination. What made 5 October 1968 different was that (a) it was immediately before the start of the university year when students had lots of free time and (b) many student activists had been in Paris during the summer of 1968 and saw at first-hand the events there. When I got back to university a few days after 5 October, the students were seething at what had happened in Derry and, emboldened by their experiences in Paris that summer, many student activists (e.g. Michael Farrell, Cyril Toman, John McGuffin, Bernadette Devlin, Nick Ross) were confident enough to believe that student agitation could force the Stormont government into bringing in much-needed reforms. For the next six months, virtually all the agitation in Northern Ireland emanated from Queens University. Virtually none came from the nationalist areas of Northern Ireland. We had protest marches almost every week, including a couple to William Craig's house (the Minister for Home affairs at the time) and sit-ins at Stormont. I was on all of them, as were the vast majority of students from both communities. In fact many of the leaders of the student movement that sprang from 5 October were from the unionist community, like Fred Taggart, Wilf Blackwood. Had the 5 October been 5 April I don't think the level of agitation emanating from the university in the immediate aftermath of the events in Derry would have been nearly as great. I can definitely state that, in the six-month period immediately after 5 October, reform of the Northern Ireland State was the limit of most protestors' ambition, not its destruction. The atmosphere at Queens during that period was one of great hope and expectation and virtually no sectarianism. Nobody there believed for a second that we were on the brink of a 30-year war. Extreme republicanism was considered to be on its death bed and the vast majority of those involved in the protests were happy for Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom. In fact, "British rights for British citizens" was the slogan on the banners the student protestors marched under. Of course, a year later the situation was transformed and it was back to the old unionist v nationalist conflict with a vengeance. As to whether that could have been avoided, I think possibly if a majority of the unionist population had backed O'Neil in the February 1969 Stormont elections, it could have been.

[Kerrygold]

While it was certainly the beginning of the end of the old order, I dont think there was anything 'inevitable' about the descent into violence. The early days of the Civil Rights movement (right up to Bloody Sunday) were full of optimism that civil disobedience would work as it had in India and the southern USA. Unlike the US or India though, there was no one unifying figure who could hold the thing together and the violent reaction of the state led the more shortsighted and stupid among us to react in the way they did.

There is little evidence to suggest that the Civil Rights movement were full of optimism or that civil disobedience would work. The only time civil disobedience worked was during the so called Ulster workers strike because it had the backing of Loyalist mobs and Ian Paisley who intimidated protestant workers into not going to work. In fact I think it was Bernadette McAliskey who said that the Civil Rights campaign was actually losing it's momentum.

Go and speak to the people who were there man.

I have spoken to plenty of them man.

[seanad voter]

For the next six months, virtually all the agitation in Northern Ireland emanated from Queens University. Virtually none came from the nationalist areas of Northern Ireland.

Thank you for your contribution, freedomlover.

However, I think the piece I've quoted above is well wide of the mark. Derry rose up. Workplaces and schools emptied as the nationalist population openly flaunted William Craig's ban on all parades inside Derry's Walls. Factory girls left their benches and taunted the RUC to arrest them when they sat down in Guildhall Square. Our school walked out on a least 2 occasions that I recall. The police simply couldn't cope with the number of marches going around the town every day, in and out of the gates of the Walls. We bamboozled the RUC.

And I trust you're not forgetting the some 15,000 who took to the streets and filled Craigavon Bridge on Saturday 2nd of November 1968, making only a token breach of police lines, in a repetition of the 5th October original march ?

http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/derry/chron.htm

[freedomlover]

For the next six months, virtually all the agitation in Northern Ireland emanated from Queens University. Virtually none came from the nationalist areas of Northern Ireland.

Thank you for your contribution, freedomlover.

However, I think the piece I've quoted above is well wide of the mark. Derry rose up. Workplaces and schools emptied as the nationalist population openly flaunted William Craig's ban on all parades inside Derry's Walls. Factory girls left their benches and taunted the RUC to arrest them when they sat down in Guildhall Square. Our school walked out on a least 2 occasions that I recall. The police simply couldn't cope with the number of marches going around the town every day, in and out of the gates of the Walls. We bamboozled the RUC.

And I trust you're not forgetting the some 15,000 who took to the streets and filled Craigavon Bridge on Saturday 2nd of November 1968, making only a token breach of police lines, in a repetition of the 5th October original march ?

http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/derry/chron.htm

Yes, you're correct. You're bringing back my memories of my youth. I should have excluded Derry itself from the comment I made. But, I think Derry was the exception. I was thinking mainly of Belfast. That's where I was in the months after 5 October, so am more familiar with the situation there. Definitely in Belfast, there was virtually no agitation in the nationalist areas of the city in the six months after 5 October. I think the first outbreak of trouble in Belfast was around April 1969. All the agitation that was going on in Belfast in the six months after 5 October 1968 emanated from Queen's. Its also true that there were big marches in Armagh and Newry on either side of Christmas 1968, but again they were mainly organised from Queen's. I was at both. In fact, I got arrested at the Newry one for occupying (along with 50 others) some building or other (so long ago I can't remember what building it was). We were fined £10 each, not a sum to be sneezed at in 1969. However, I know for certain the local nationalist politicians in both Armagh and Newry tried to discourage the student leaders from Queen's from taking their protest marches to those two towns. There was also the march from Belfast to Derry at New Year 1969, but again that was organised from Queen's rather than from Derry.

[Catalpa]

I remember it well - I too was out on a protest march that day - but in Dublin not Derry.

What was that about - opposition to the Vietnam War.

But trouble was in the air for that Derry march, I recall talking about the potential for violence with my father the night before and we agreed it could turn nasty if Craig gave the go ahead - he did!

[beardyboy]

It could have ended no other way - the civil rights was an open challenge to the state - it had to clamp down.

The function of the state was to provide a "homeland" for Protestants. The marches threatened this premise