The Military Reaction Force ——————————————— The views and opinions expressed in this documentary and page are soley intended to educate and provide background information to those interested in the…
Source: Military Reaction Force – Counter Insurgency Unit
1. Titanic was built in Belfast
2. Tourism brings £123 million to Belfast every year
3. Belfast Zoo is home to the only group of purple-faced langurs in Europe
4. John Wood Dunlop invented the pneumatic tyre in Belfast
5. Liam Neeson first trod the boards at Belfast’s Lyric Theatre
6. Napoleon’s nose overlooks the city
7. Queen’s University taught both Protestants and Catholics from 1845
8. Poet Seamus Heaney, David Trimble and Irish President Mary MacAleese are all alumni of Queen’s University
9. James Murray invented Milk of Magnesia in Belfast
10. Belfast’s famous cranes are called Samson and Goliath. Some women think they should be called Samson and Delilah Cranes
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11. One third of the population of Northern Ireland lives in Belfast
12. Women could hold any office at Queen’s University in…
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Dorothy Counts
High School Segregation
Photographer: Douglas Martin
Year: 1957 World Press Winner
Dorothy Counts (born 1942) was one of the first black students admitted to the Harry Harding High School, in Charlotte, North Carolina. After four days of harassment that threatened her safety, her parents forced her to withdraw from the school.
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A Walk of Faith
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In 1956, forty black students applied for transfers at a white school.[1] This was after the passing of the Pearsall Plan in North Carolina. At 15 years of age, on 4 September 1957, Dorothy Counts was one of the four black students enrolled at various all-white schools in the district; She was at Harry Harding High School, Charlotte, North Carolina.[2]
Three students were enrolled at other schools, including Central High School. The harassment started when the wife of John Z. Warlick, the leader of the
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Shell-shocked American soldier
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BBC Imagine 2013 McCullin
Full movie
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Donald McCullin, CBEHon FRPS (9 October 1935) is an internationally known Britishphotojournalist, particularly recognized for his war photography and images of urban strife. His career, which began in 1959, has specialised in examining the underside of society, and his photographs have depicted the unemployed, downtrodden and the impoverished.
McCullin grew up in Finsbury Park, North London, but he was evacuated to a farm in Somerset during the Blitz.
He is dyslexic but displayed a talent for drawing at the Secondary Modern School he attended. He won a scholarship to Hammersmith School of Arts and Crafts but, following the death of his father, he left school at the age of 15, without qualifications, for a catering job on the railways.He was then called up…
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PBY Blister Gunner By Horace Bristol
This young crewman of a US Navy “Dumbo” PBY rescue mission has just jumped into the water of Rabaul Harbor to rescue a badly burned Marine pilot who was shot down while bombing the Japanese-held fortress of Rabaul.
Since Japanese coastal defense guns were firing at the plane while it was in the water during take-off, this brave young man, after rescuing the pilot, manned his position as machine gunner without taking time to put on his clothes.
A hero photographed right after he’d completed his heroic act. Naked.
Horace Bristol
Photo taken by Horace Bristol (1908-1997). In 1941, Bristol was recruited to the U.S. Naval Aviation Photographic Unit, as one of six photographers under the command of Captain Edward J. Steichen, documenting World War II in places such as South Africa, and Japan. He ended up…
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Below is a comprehensive list of 60 films about the “Troubles” and Republican/Loyalist paramilitaries . The list includes background information on the movies and where possible I have incl…
Source: 60 Films about the “Troubles “
Billy Giles (3 September 1957, Belfast – 25 September 1998, Belfast) was an Ulster Volunteer Force volunteer who later became active in politics following his release from the Maze Prison in 1997 after serving 14 years of a life sentence for murder.
Disclaimer
The views and opinions expressed in these pages/documentaries are soley intended to educate and provide background information to those interested in the Troubles of Northern Ireland. They in no way reflect my own opinions and I take no responsibility for any inaccuracies or factual errors.
Billy Giles was born William Alexander Ellis Giles in Belfast, Northern Ireland on 3 September 1957, and grew up in Island Street, in loyalist east Belfast. His father Sam, worked as a plater in the nearby Harland and Wolff shipyard, and his mother, Lily was a housewife. Giles was the eldest of six children. The Giles family was very religious, the Protestant church having been the centre of their lives. Giles often attended the rallies of Ian Paisley, and was strongly influenced by his sermons.
His father, a former soldier in the British Army, was a member of the Orange Order, The Royal Black Preceptory, and The Apprentice Boys of Derry. His brothers also served in the army.
At the age of 14, he witnessed first-hand the events of Bloody Friday on 21 July 1972 when the Provisional IRA exploded 26 bombs across Belfast, killing nine people, and injuring 103. As the years passed, he found himself attending many funerals of friends he had lost and people he had known. In 1975, he joined the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and was trained in the use of weapons and explosives by former military personnel; he had just turned 18 years old.
At the outbreak of the republican hunger strike in 1981, Giles had gradually become disassociated from the UVF. Following the deaths of the ten republican prisoners, however, Giles believed that, in the wake of the hunger strike, “there was going to be an uprising and they [Protestants] were all going to be slaughtered” by the IRA.
Giles mentally prepared himself to go to war against the IRA and therefore returned as an active member of the UVF.
On 19 November 1982 in Newtownards, Billy Giles abducted a Roman Catholic married man, Michael Fay, and shot him in the back of the head, killing him instantly. He then stuffed the body in the car’s boot. Fay had been Giles’ friend and workmate. The killing was in retaliation for the fatal shooting of Karen McKeown, a young Protestant Sunday school teacher by the Irish National Liberation Army two months previously. Giles was arrested by the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) and brought to the Castlereagh interrogation centre, where he confessed to the killing. He was found guilty of the murder and sentenced to life in the Maze Prison
Giles was housed in the prison’s H-Blocks. He spent his time studying and took several GCSEs; he eventually obtained an Open University degree in Social Sciences. He also wrote a play about his childhood in Island Street called Boy Girl. It was later performed before a Belfast audience; his parents were present at the performance. Few people present at the performance were aware that it was the work of a UVF prisoner.
It took Giles seven years before he adjusted to life inside The Maze. He gave many interviews to British journalist, Peter Taylor, to whom he confessed his deep remorse at the killing of Michael Fay, saying that he had “never felt like a whole person again” since the fatal shooting.
On two separate occasions, Giles claimed he had saved the lives of prison officers inside the Maze: the first time when he stopped an inmate from cutting an officer’s throat and the second time during a prison riot in March 1995 when he persuaded his inmates to stop the wrecking and to allow free passage to the block staff.
He was released on 4 July 1997 after serving 14 years of his life sentence. He immediately commenced work with the Progressive Unionist Party also known as PUP, and concentrated on helping released Loyalist prisoners to resettle into the community. At the signing of the Good Friday Agreement on 10 April 1998 at Stormont, Giles was part of PUP’s negotiating team. He told Peter Taylor that he felt optimistic about the future of Northern Ireland and his own.
Despite his degree, he was unable to obtain a proper job that paid a decent salary. On the night of 24–25 September after composing a four-page letter of explanation and naming himself a “victim of the Troubles“, Billy Giles hanged himself in his living room.
He was 41 years old. Peter Taylor visited Giles’ family in east Belfast on the eve of the funeral. He described Giles as lying in the coffin wearing his best suit, and his UVF badge with the inscribed words “For God and Ulster” was pinned to his lapel.
One of his last lines in his letter read,
“Please let the next generation live normal lives”.
This line was quoted during a speech given by Colm Cavanagh, Vice-President of The Alliance Party of Northern Ireland on 3 March 2006 to The Department of Education. His friend and former UVF colleague Billy Mitchell, who was strongly critical of trauma counselling and a psychological approach to former paramilitaries, suggested that Giles’ suicide had been prompted by a “trauma workshop” Giles had attended in South Africa. This was in contrast to Taylor, who believed that Giles took his own life because of the remorse he felt about his involvement in UVF violence.
Giles is commemorated, along with other prominent Loyalist paramilitaries, in the controversial UVF song Battalion of the Dead.
The life and death of Eamon Collins Eamon Collins (1954 – 27 January 1999) was a Provisional Irish Republican Army member in the late 1970s and early 1980s. He turned his back on the organisation in the late 1980s, and later co-authored a book called Killing Rage detailing his experiences within it. In January 1999 he was waylaid on a…
The brutal & unforgivable murder of Ann Ogilby, also known as the Romper Room murder Forgotten victims of the Troubles The murder of Ann Ogilby, also known as the “Romper Room murder”, took place in Sandy Row, south Belfast, Northern Ireland on 24 July 1974. It was a punishment killing, carried out by members of the Sandy Row women’s Ulster Defence…
Joe McCann – Life & Death Joe McCann (2 November 1947 – 15 April 1972) was an Irish republican volunteer. A member of the Irish Republican Army and later the Official Irish Republican Army, he was active in politics from the early 1960s and participated in the early years of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. He was shot dead, after being confronted by RUC Special…
… Máire Drumm Life & death 22 October 1919 – 28 October 1976 Máire Drumm (22 October 1919 – 28 October 1976) was the vice-president of Sinn Féin and a commander in Cumann na mBan. She was killed by Ulster loyalists while recovering from an eye operation in Belfast’s Mater Hospital. Born in Newry, County Down, to a staunchly Irish republican family. Drumm’s mother had…
Death of Robert Hamill Robert Hamill was an Irish Catholic civilian who was beaten to death by a loyalist mob in Portadown, County Armagh, Northern Ireland. Hamill and his friends were attacked on 27 April 1997 on the town’s main street. It has been claimed that the local Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), parked a short…
John Bingham Life & Death John Dowey Bingham (c. 1953 – 14 September 1986) was a prominent Northern Irish loyalist who led “D Company” (Ballysillan), 1st Battalion, Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF). He was shot dead by the Provisional IRA after they had broken into his home. Bingham was one of a number of prominent UVF members to be assassinated during the 1980s,…
Patrick Rooney Age 9 First Child killed in the Troubles Patrick Rooney 14th August 1969 Patrick was the first child to be killed during the Troubles he died shortly after being struck by a tracer bullet by the RUC as he lay in his bed in his family home in Divis Tower. The shot was…
Dawn of the Troubles – August 1969 Northern Ireland History During 12–16 August 1969, there was an outbreak of political and sectarian violence in 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 civil rights…
Ian Reginald Edward Gow Ian Reginald Edward Gow TD 11 February 1937 – 30 July 1990) was a British Conservative politician and solicitor. While serving as Member of Parliament (MP) for Eastbourne, he was assassinated by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA), who exploded a bomb under his car outside his home in East Sussex. Early life Ian Gow was born at 3 Upper Harley Street, London, the…
Miriam Daly Life & Death Miriam Daly (1928 – 26 June 1980) was an Irish republican activist and university lecturer who was assassinated by the loyalist Ulster Defence Association (UDA). Background and personal life She was born in the Curragh Irish Army camp, County Kildare, Ireland. She grew up in Hatch Street, Dublin, attending Loreto College on St Stephen’s Green and then University College, Dublin, graduating in history. The…
Ronnie Bunting (1947/1948 – 15 October 1980) was a Protestant Irish republican and socialist activist in Ireland. He became a member of the Official IRA in the early 1970s and was a founder-member of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) in 1974. He became leader of the INLA in 1978 and was assassinated in 1980 at age 32. Background Bunting came from an Ulster Protestant family in East Belfast.…
Dolours Price IRA Icon ? Dolours Price (16 December 1950 – 23 January 2013) was a Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) volunteer along with her younger sister Marian. Early life Dolours and her sister, Marian, also an IRA member, were the daughters of Albert Price, a prominent Irish republican and former IRA member from Belfast. Their aunt, Bridie Dolan, was blinded and lost both hands in…
Kevin Fulton aka Peter Keeley – Double Agent ? Kevin Fulton is a British agent from Newry, Northern Ireland, who allegedly spied on the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) for MI5. He is believed to be in London, where he is suing the Crown, claiming his British military handlers cut off their connections and financial aid to him. In 2004 he reportedly sued the Andersonstown News, an Irish…
– Disclaimer –
The views and opinions expressed in these documentary are soley intended to educate and provide background information to those interested in the Troubles of Northern Ireland. They in no way reflect my own opinions and I take no responsibility for any inaccuracies or factual errors.
Michael Stone (born 2 April 1955) is an Ulster loyalist who was a volunteer in the Ulster Defence Association (UDA). Stone was born in England but raised in the Braniel estate in East Belfast, Northern Ireland. Convicted of murdering three people and injuring more than sixty in an attack on mourners at Milltown Cemetery in 1988, he was sentenced to life imprisonment. While in jail, he became one of the leaders of the Ulster Defence Association/Ulster Freedom Fighters (UDA/UFF) prisoners.[1]
In 2000, Stone was released from prison on licence under the Belfast Agreement and subsequently worked as an…
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belfastchildis.com 