the Barricades The pogrom of August 14th and 15th in Belfast resulted in 9 deaths (8 official and at least one other known of); 300 people treated for injury, including 200 people treated for gunshot wounds (plus unknown numbers who dare not go to the hospitals); 162 houses totally destroyed by fire; 362 houses needing major repairs; 1500 families burnt out or expelled by intimidation; 5000 to 6000 people homeless.
The precise details of the fighting are still unclear. However, the 4 major attacks (arrows 1-4) give an idea Attack 1. On Thursday evening paisleyites from the Shankill Road area poured down Dover Street and Percy Street onto Divis Street and backed up by B-Specials terrorised the catholic area around Divis towers Flats (x) where te young nooney boy was killed that night. Here the police used whippets (armoured landrovers) mounted with machine guns. According to people in the flats one of these whippets was stationed behind a derelict building next to the flats, from which it made sorties to fire down the Falls Road. The flats themselves were sprayed with gunfire - but the people inside had no guns and could do nothing more than build barricades on the staircases while the entrances were racked with bullets. Attack 2. Later that night the paisleyite extremists of the Shankill Defence Committee came down Conway and Cupar Streets but were beaten back by catholics before they could reach the Falls Road, The catholics used sticks, petrol bombs and a few IRA guns. Then the kus and b-specias aopeared and clearea a way down these two streets, to be followed by the protestants who burned down Conway Street behind them.
By this time the catholics were fighting for their lives and had started to put up barricades in all the side streets along the south side of the Falls Road to defend the main catholic area. Snipers positioned on the tops of factories to the north fired into the Falls area. Young catholics ran through the field of fire and petrol bombed the factories. At least one sniper was seen to throw down his rifle and perish in the flames. The catholics were very poorly armed, the IRA's promises of guns were mainly empty; meanwhile on the Shankill Road the B-Specials were handing out guns to te protestants Attack 3. As the protestants advanced on the Falls area in the wake of the police others moved up Palmer and Disraeli Streets into the Crumlin Road and attacked the catholics in the Ardoyne area around Hooker Street, Heavy fighting occurred here on Friday as well. The terrified catholics took buses from the local depot to use as barricades, even so the bottom of Hooker Street was completely burnt out and bullet holes clearly mark where the B-Specials and protestants fired machine guns up the streets past the barricades into the Ardoyne. SHANKILL AND FALLS The difference between the protestant Shankill Koad area and the calnone raus koad ared is sunking, and in some ways the geographical differences mirror the sociological and economic differences between the two groups imposed by partition and unionism The protestant area is larger and is centered on the Shankill which is a relatively wealthy shopping street. The protestants have not closed themselves in, their barricades are few and directed against the mythical guns of the tenians. Life continues much as usual and only the odd burnt out shop or pub catches the eye.
In Contra Street, the catholic Falls area, is the maze of side streets which lies to the south of the Falls Road, between it and Grosvenor Road. It is a confined and isolated area, bordered by te aesolanon or burnt out streets and the empty shells of burnt out factories. The Falls Road itself is a no-mans land of demolition, choking dust, and troop patrols, strikingly different from the busy Shankill Road. The catholic areas are. on tie cerensve factories and the men have to go outside the barricades to work.
Catholia nrane maining the hole Road aytend un THERE WERE OVER TWO HUNDRED BARRICADES. THEIR NUMBERS AND POSITIONS CHANGED FROM DAY TO DAY. THIS MAP, DRANN FROM BEGINNING A PERSONAL INVESTIGATION, AND THE OF MOTORWAY THAT WERE ENCLOSED The "peace line" lies parallel to and to the North of the hals kond tencloses ine meers or carnoo settlement that lie between the Falls and the Shankill. At one point in Dover Street, the Army has been forced to build a corridor up to the house of ar isolated catholic family. It was the area which lies behind the line, in a broad sweep from Townsend Street to Cukor Street that suffered the worst blows. The Catholics in these areas were driven out, and forced to flee across the Falls Road as their homes and belongings were looted and burnt.
Areovne ane andersonstowi Other catholic areas include the Ardoyne which is north of Crumlin Road (and extends off the map). The part of this bordering onto Crumlin Road including Hooker Street is old terraced housing but much of the Ardoyne is a new housing estate. Catholic areas off the Springfield Road are mostly new housing estates where the catholics are being moved out to as the old areas of Belfast are demolished. There has been little or no trouble here but the people erected barricades because they feared attack. Some of the now estates off this road are protestant and are GENERAL DIRECTIONS OF PROTESTANT ATTACKS BARRICADED CATHOLIC AREAS ROUGH POSITION OF 'PEACE LINE' DIVIS TOWER (FLATS)
BURNT OUT FACTORIES UNIONIST H.Q CITY HALL IS IN THE CENTRE OF BELFAST.
THE DOCKS ARE NOT FAR TO THE EAST OF IT.
Mackies Mackies is the industrial lynchpin of the Falls Shankill area. With 6,000 men it is the third biggest employer in Belfast and therefore in the Six counties.
Mackies, which makes textile machinery which it exports all over the world is the main employer for the Shankill and less so for the Falls, Its skilled men earn good wages and the factory is Unionised though it has a bad labour record. Its apprentices are treated abominably and quite a few of them are extreme Paisleyites. There is no firm information on the number of catholics employed in Mackies, probably around 25% of the labour force There has been very little trouble inside the works although of course there was a lot of tension.
The protestants, who had to go past the barricades in order to get to work at one point massed during their lunch hour and talked about pulling the barricades down themselves.
The management told them that any trouble mean unemployment and they were restrained. Tina Osborne
----- pull-quotes -----
REPORT IN THE 'UNITED IRISHMAN' SHOWS THE GENERAL AREAS