The partition of Ireland held severe consequences for the people in the Northern half of Ireland. The majority of people living in the North were protestant although a small minority was Catholics. By the 1960’s many Catholics felt they were being treated unfairly in comparison to the Protestants. They were given the short straw in everything, they had the worst housing as they had only 22 out of 765 council houses, some could not vote in the local elections, Protestants would not usually employ them, it was difficult for them to get promotions and the councils were controlled by Protestants. Only households could vote in elections and people with 2 houses/businesses could vote twice, Catholics were much poorer than Protestants so this was unfair as it meant they couldn’t have as many votes. Catholics decided to follow the footsteps of the USA civil rights movement and in 1967 Catholics set up The Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA). This group was supported by both Catholics and Protestants originally from colleges and universities. Their main aim was to gain equal rights for everybody, no matter what religion. The NICRA used peaceful methods of protest to campaign for change. On November 22nd 1968 after many protests and violence had broken out reforms were made by Prime Minister O’Neil which were set to put an end to the dispute, but this brought only 5 short weeks of peace. On New Year’s Day 1969 around 40 young Catholics, mainly students of the people’s democracy set to walk across Northern Ireland in a marching protest, when they reached Burntollet Bridge near Londenderry they were barricaded by a mob of Protestants and hit by bricks, bottles and stones. Protestant loyalists attacked them with iron bars yet the police did nothing. It was later found out that some of the mobs were actually off-duty police and special constables. This caused the Catholics to lose all faith in the Police force as they thought they would protect them. Later that same night Londonderry was swept by rioting and violence as loyalist mobs RUC officers and B specialists invaded the Catholic Bogside area, smashing shops, breaking windows, and singing protestant songs. This angered the Catholics and made the situation even worse. At that point O’Neil resigned and the New Prime Minister became James Chichester Clark. Catholics did not give up and on 12th August 1969 they began another march to Bogside. The march itself was quite peaceful, until after it ended. Protestants and Catholics threw missiles at each other after loyalists threw pennies at Catholics. Soon there was a riot and as the RUC tried to take down a barricade on Rosville Street the riot turned into a battle. Police faced a storm of missiles and petrol bombs from the BOGSIDE RESIDENTS, Rioting continued for 2days. This is known as the Battle of the Bogside. Police were unable to enter the area. The long term consequence of the battle of the Bogside was that Jack Lynch sent British troops into Ireland to restore order. Even today Protestants march through the streets of Ireland and celebrate their victory over the Catholics years ago.
British troops had been sent into Ireland in 1969 to help restore order after the Easter Rising. In July 1970 the Stormont government sent 3000 troops into fall road area of Belfast to search for weapons and the IRA. The army fired over 1500 rounds of ammunition in gun battles with the IRA, 4 people were killed, tear gas was used, the area was put under a curfew for 35 hours sand homes were wrecked as they were searched. The British army was controlled by the Protestants and therefore under the circumstances of the Catholics and Protestants being constantly in battle with one another there began to be conflict. Catholics felt that the Army had betrayed them. In 1971 the provisional’s responded to the British Army in the form of violence. They began a bombing campaign targeting Protestants businesses and shops and the army it’s self. By the end of 1970 this had resulted in 46 soldiers been killed. Following this in March 1971 3 soldiers were lured to a party and then shot in the head, the again in August a soldier was shot dead and another 6 injured. The good relationship between the British army and the Nationalist community had now ended. By 1972 the situation has escalated until the point where they had killed over 100 soldiers, left 500 more wounded and carried out 1300 explosions. This was a vicious circle that needed and end, so in August 1971 the Prime Minister Brian Faulkner introduced ‘internment’ this meant that anyone the security forces suspected of terrorism could be arrested and charged or put on trial. Internment was biased against Catholics and republicans. This is indicated by the figure showing that between 1971 and 1975 1874 catholic/republicans were detained in comparison to a minute amount of 107 protestant/loyalists. Many of those arrested were not actually terrorists and most of the information that the army and police used was poor and out of date. By introducing internment had introduced yet another reason for the Catholics to turn against the Army. Many internees were mistreated. They were the victims of ‘hooding’ this meant that their heads were covered with an opaque cloth bag with no ventilation, the prisoners would often be stripped naked to make this experience even worse. ‘Wall standing’ which was a procedure of forcing prisoners to stand balanced against a cell wall in the search position for hours on end enduring painful muscle cramps. Many prisoners were subjected to the punishment for over 20 hours. Prisoners were subjected to noise which consisted in being placed a very minute distance away from machinery and the whining they made for periods up to 7 days. They were deprived of food and water and given a strict regime of bread and water. Also they had to endure sleep deprivation this enabled them to sleep for up to a week at times. These torturing methods angered Catholics and led consequently to more people in Northern Ireland joining the IRA and joining marches to protest against internment. On Sunday 30th January 1500 people defied a ban on marches and gathered in the centre of Londonderry city. There was a huge march against ‘internment’ organized by the civil rights movement. Many details of the day's events are in dispute but it is known that a riot broke out when troops of the parachute regiment sealed off the area and began to be hit by a hail of stones thrown by youths, this riot then escalated. At this point, a water cannon, tear gas and rubber bullets were used to disperse the rioters. This event has now gone down in history as the ‘bloody Sunday’ and resulted in 13 marches that were all unarmed being killed. There were many inquiries on the events to find out what actually happened as there was much confusion and it was the British army’s word against the Catholics and nationalists. The soldiers insisted that they were fired at first and then returned fire, but evidence questions this being truthful as all of the 13 dead marchers were unarmed and many seemed to be in the surrendering position with their arms raised. The events of this day ‘bloody Sunday’ caused outrage to the people and many thought the British were in the wrong. The short term impact of this was an increase in violence against the British army and Government as people wanted their revenge. In the medium term Bloody Sunday led to an increase in support for the IRA and many more Catholics began to see the only solution to the problem in the form of violence. The betrayal of the British army who had now taken sides with the Protestants resulted in the impact of many people in America starting to support the PIRA and sending money to them. This money helped to buy guns and weapons used to kill people. Since the day of ‘bloody Sunday’ this violence has carried on and since 1972 over 3500 people have been killed in the ‘troubles’. This is the long term impact of Bloody Sunday as the Catholics and Protestants are still quarrelling to this day and if bloody Sunday had not taken place then the rivalry between the two religions may have ended a long time ago. Bloody Sunday would never have taken place if the British troops had not been sent into Ireland and the events of this day proved that sending the British troops into Ireland did not achieve its aim to stop fighting and help regain peace it instead made the situation worse and brought much more fighting.
In conclusion to my study of the three main events which took place in Ireland I have decided that the Easter rising was certainly the event with the biggest impact on the history of conflict in Ireland. There are many reasons that led me to this decision, firstly because the Easter rising led to the partition of Ireland into North and South which escalated into the majority of Protestants in the South mistreating the minority of Catholics in the North. This then resulted in the Catholics setting up the civil rights movement as they were angered and wanted to be treated fairly and equally to the Protestants. This was the beginning of much never-ending conflict to come between the Catholics and Protestants. When the police became helpless to stopping the violence they called British Troops to be sent into Northern Ireland for help. This was meant to be a short term solution but British soldiers remained in Ireland for over 35 years. The Easter Rising resulted in the short term effect of 13 people being executed but it had huge long term effects on Ireland as without British troops being present in Ireland many of the events which were to follow the Easter rising would not have taken place and to this day Ireland is still parted into North and South. The British troops then introduced ‘internment’ which angered the Catholics furthermore and caused them to fight for equal rights even more. In the short term the following event of bloody Sunday resulted in the deaths of 13 Catholics being executed by the British soldiers, this led to the British government and Army becoming targets for the IRA in the medium term but its main long term consequence was that it worsened the already terrible situation by causing even more hatred and therefore fighting between Catholics and protestants and the two religions are still in conflict with each other to this day. The Easter Rising had a domino effect as it set off all these other events but even without it violence and conflict was prone to happen as the Catholics and Protestants had very different opinions as Catholics wanted to be independent whereas Protestants wanted to remain a part of the UK. However in reference to the question the Easter Rising was the most important and had the biggest impact on the history of Ireland.
