Severe Rioting in Belfast

Introduction from Chronology

These riots are sparked off by deaths of the USC men in Clones – see Feb-11-22/1. In these riots, up to 39 people were killed.  The most notorious incident was the Weaver St bombing in which six people were killed including four children.

McDermott names 32 people killed on 13th, 14th and 15th – 18 Catholics and 14 Protestants.  Parkinson names 37 people who died in Belfast between the 12th and 15th – it would seem 23 Catholics and 14 Protestants.  (However, two of the people on McDermott’s list are not on Parkinson’s so the death toll could have been as high as 39.) 

More Detail

As news came back from Clones on February12th, shooting broke out in a number of areas of Belfast.  A Protestant teenager, David Boyd, was shot in Hanover St.  The bodies of two Catholics, William Tennyson and James Mathers, are found near Millfield after heavy ‘B’ Special activity in the area. A few hours later, a Catholic barman, Peter McNelis, is shot dead in the Markets.

On the morning of February 13th, gunfire was directed at men going to work – two Catholics, Frances Neary (40) and James Gregg (50) were killed in Kildare St and two Protestants, James (John) Brown (23) and Ben Lundy (21) are killed near North Howard St.  (According to McDermott, the latter was killed by a sniper operating from the Falls Rd.)  At lunchtime, a Catholic publican, Patrick Lambe (53) was shot dead on his premises in York St. by loyalist gunmen.  In the evening, five people were killed (or received fatal wounds) in the north of the city.  Two were Catholics - Anthony Sadlier and Mary Robinson (both teenagers) and two were Protestants – Carter William Law (20) and Johnston Crothers (25).  The fifth was Joseph Brown (50).  Parkinson says that Brown was a Catholic but McDermott says Brown was a Protestant.  

 In the worst incident during these disturbances, a bomb is thrown into Weaver St killing six and wounding nearly 20 others – four of the dead are children.  The names of the dead were: Mary Johnstone (11); Catherine Kennedy (15); Elizabeth O’Hanlon (11); Rose Ann O’Neill (13); Margaret Smith (53) and Mary Owen (40).    Churchill, in a letter to Collins, says that the bombing is the worst thing that has happened in Ireland in the last three years and RC Bishop MacRory sends a telegram to Llyod George pleading for military reinforcements.  Weaver St connects North Derby St and Milewater St and was surrounded by Shore Rd.

 The caretaker of Clifton Street Orange Hall, William Waring (50), is shot dead by a lone gunman on the morning of February 14th.  Also, that morning Frank McCoy (26), barman and IRA officer was found dying in Springfield Av.  A Protestant, George Harper (16), was fatally wounded during disturbances in York St.  Two Protestant workmen, Thomas Samuel Blair (40) and James Lindsay, were fatally wounded on Falls Rd.  (McDermott says Lindsay was only slightly wounded but does say that this was a sectarian reprisal carried out by the IRA.) One of the IRA gang, James Morrison, who carried out these killings was shot by police as he fled the scene.   A Catholic carter, Henry Gallagher (40), was shot dead on Great George’s St and another Catholic, James Rice (19) was killed by a loyalist mob on Ravenscroft St.  Two Protestant workers were separated from their colleagues in Divis St by a 12-strong IRA gang and one of them, John McClelland, later died in hospital as did another Protestant, John Wales, who dies from injuries received earlier. 

On February 15th, 8 people were to lose their lives in Belfast.  A Protestant, William Duffin (24), was shot by an IRA gang in his place of work.  Two Catholics, Peter McCall and Owen Bond, were shot dead by a military patrol at Carrick Hill.  An off-duty ‘B’ Special, Hector Steward (21) was shot by an IRA sniper as he passed the New Lodge Road. A Protestant shopkeeper, Hugh French (39) was hit by a police bullet in his shop on the Old Lodge Rd and later died in hospital.  (In the 2019 edition of his Police Casualties book, Abbott says that French was an off-duty Special Sergeant.  He says that “4-5 men carrying weapons came down Stanhope Street and on reaching the corner of Sherbrook Street they fired a number of shots.  It is believed that a few of these bullets passed through the window of Mr French’s shop wounding him in the head” and he dies later in the Royal Victoria Hospital.  Abbott does not identify who the 4 to 5 armed men were.)  Another Protestant, Thomas Neil, was shot dead by police allegedly while sniping from a rooftop on York St.  Two more Catholics were shot on this day.  Charles John McMullan (29), a Catholic, was shot in his home in the Woodstock Road area by loyalists and 5-year-old John Devlin, a Catholic, was shot by a sniper while playing near his home in Seaforde St.   

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