Unit 3: 1966 “The Beginnings:  The Easter Commemorations, Ian Paisley, and the Ulster Volunteer Force”

 

1966 was one of the pivotal years in the history of Northern Ireland.  It was the 50th anniversary of the Battle of the Somme and also 50th Anniversary of the Easter Rising; two events mutually exclusive to each community.  The Somme had and has the same emotional hold on Unionists/Loyalists as the Easter Rising does for Republicans/Nationalists.  Both commemorations brought the past alive leading to the battles fought in the early part of the 20th Century to be fought out again.  It was the year that a young firebrand Free Presbyterian Minister named Ian Paisley gave voice or, as some would argue created the voice, of Protestant discontent and fears. He held, as you will read, a rally attacking the Easter Commemorations and arguing that any reform or conciliation, including Ecumenism would weaken the Union and put Ulster on the slippery slope to a United Ireland.  He also organized the Ulster Protestant Volunteers, a quasi-paramilitary organization to “defend Ulster.” This was also the year in which the first sectarian killings of the modern era took place when the reconstituted UVF, men influenced by Ian Paisley an the example of the UVF in the Great War, shot 4 men, killing one, coming out of a bar in Belfast in the mistaken belief that they were IRA men.

 

Read:

  1. Edwards and McGrattan pp 12-15 on the IRA's 1956-1962 Border Campaign. This will make it easier for you to understand why Paisley's rhetoric would strike a cord among Protestants in the 1960s when unemployment increased and the 50th Anniversary of the Easter approached. 
  2. Go to Courseweb - Audio and listen to the Interview with Gusty Spence as he describes the attempted coup within Ulster Unionism in 1966 and the fear generated in 1965-66 by Unionism. Listen from minutes 10:40 through 15:00 minute mark.
  3. Chapter 2 in Provos
  4. Chapter 2 in Making Sense of the Troubles  
  5. Chapter 2 and 3 in Loyalists

 

Study Questions:

  1. What was Ian Paisley’s role in raising the tensions in Northern Ireland?
  2. Why did ordinary Protestants, such as Gusty Spence, feel the need to take up the gun to “defend Ulster?”
  3. Why is 1966 considered the “Crossing of the Rubicon, for both Loyalists and Republicans?
  4. How did ordinary Catholics view this period?
  5. What would make many young people want to join the IRA (the Irish Republican Army) in this period

Watch: 

  1. Go to Courseweb, click on Videos and then "Joining the Struggle" and then "Meehan and Spence."
  2. Go to Courseweb, click on Videos and then "Divis." This deals with the affect of urban planning on the Falls.
  3. This is a retrospective video dealing with how urban planning caused so much disruption on the Shankill and, as many now argue, played a role in the conflict.

The Rape and Plunder of the Shankill Revisited from Northern Visions/NvTv on Vimeo.