The Troubles, also known as the Northern Ireland conflict, was a violent conflict over the issue whether Northern Ireland should be part of Ireland or the United Kingdom. The term is used for a series of violent acts from the 1960s to the 1990s with around 3,500 deaths in total and tens of thousand injured. The conflict has roots in the 17th century, and while the Good Friday Agreement of 1998 has established a peace process, some issues are yet to be resolved as of the 2020s.
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Understand
[edit]Writing the history of the Troubles has been part of the conflict itself; the term the Troubles is preferred to avoid bias for any of the sides.
The background of the conflict was in the early 17th century, as Protestant Scottish and English settlers were given land in the Plantation of Ulster, today's northern Island. The Protestants won the subsequent Irish Confederate Wars (1641–1653) and the Williamite war (1689–1691) establishing Protestant domination of land ownership in the region. Up to the 19th century, the British Empire expanded its power over the whole island.
In 1920, Ireland was divided between Southern Ireland, which was uniformly Catholic, and Northern Ireland, where Protestants and Catholics were segregated by neighborhoods. Southern Ireland became the sovereign republic of Ireland in 1922. In contrast to most other countries which became independent from the former British Empire, Ireland is not part of the British monarchy or the Commonwealth.
By the late 1960s, a wave of civil rights protests swept the world, and inspired Catholics in Northern Ireland to protest against disenfranchisement, poverty, and British oppression, suggesting unification with Ireland; the republican or Irish nationalist movement, with the Irish Republican Army (IRA) as the militant branch. Protestants tended to be unionists or loyalists to preserve the Protestant and British identity, and the allegiance to the United Kingdom. British soldiers were deployed to contain the violence, but their methods became oppressive against the Republican side, culminating in the 1972 Bloody Sunday in the Bogside district of Derry, shooting 14 people to death, injuring several others.
The peace process has been complex, requiring mutual disarmament of republican and loyalist paramilitaries. Following the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, the Real IRA (an Irish Nationalist splinter group that defied the agreement) carried out Omagh Bombing on the 15 August the same year, killing 29 people and injured more than 200 people. Since then, violent incidents have been few.
Destinations
[edit]
Visible remnants of the conflict include "peace walls" between Protestant and Catholic communities, and wall art with propaganda for the different sides.
Belfast
[edit]- Ring of Steel. From 1972 to 1998, the centre of Belfast was protected by a metal perimeter.
- 1 Irish Republican History Museum (Eileen Hickey Museum), Conway Mill, 5 Conway Place BT13 2DA (Belfast). The collections of Eileen Hickey, a Provisional IRA organiser within Armagh prison. This museum describes the Republican side of the conflict.
- 2 Museum of Orange Heritage, Schomberg House, 368 Cregagh Rd BT6 9EY. The Protestant and Unionist side of the story from the 17th century, when William Prince of Orange ousted the Catholic king of the British Isles and began Protestant rule.
- 3 Shankill Road. A main road through a Loyalist district, famous for its murals.
- 4 Peace Wall (Cupar Way). From the 1960s, walls were built to contain civil unrest, and kept growing after the 1998 Good Friday Agreement.
- 5 Divis Tower. The only remaining part of the Divis Flats Complex, a housing projects home to 10,000 Catholics. In the Troubles, the complex was a Republican stronghold with shootouts between the British Army and the IRA. The British Army used the two top floors of the tower as an observation post from 1972 to 2005. At the height of the Troubles, they could only reach the post by helicopter.
- 6 The Harp Bar. A punk rock club, and one of few establishments where Protestant and Catholic youths would fraternise.
Omagh
[edit]- 7 Omagh Bomb Memorial (Omagh). A glass obelisk marking the 1998 blast on Market Street.
- 8 Memorial Garden of Light (Omagh). A set of mirrors each bearing the name of a victim.
Derry
[edit]- 9 Museum of Free Derry, 55 Glenfada Park BT48 9DR (Derry). Museum of the Northern Ireland conflict, the march of civil rights, Bloody Sunday and its long aftermath from the republican side.
- 10 Free Derry Corner. The junction of Rossville Road and Lecky St with Creggan Road, where a monument marks the bounds of "Free Derry", the fiercely nationalist quarter of town during the height of the Troubles. Building gable-ends around are painted with the "Bogside Murals" of political art, and another monument commemorates the Bloody Sunday massacre.