The Ulster Workers' Council Strike - 1974: Recent Episodes
Obscured History Productions
A history of a peaceful national rebellion in the midst of 5 years of sustained terrorist violence which succeeded in toppling one Government and destroying the Northern Ireland policy of two others. In the space of 14 days it changed everything. An almost forgotten piece of history it is a pivotal moment in the creation of the Northern Ireland we know today. It includes what became the strangest military crackdown in history.
The coming of King William, the flight of James. The fates of the main participants in the siege. The penal laws against Catholics, the Test Act and the economic and political oppression of the Presbyterians in the wake of the victory. The babble of the pamphlets regarding Presbyterian involvement in the siege. The repeated mass migrations of the Presbyterians of Ulster to the Americas in reaction to the widespread oppression inflicted by the Protestant Ascendency of Ireland, their experiences informing Article 6 of the United States Constitution.
The siege becomes protracted. To gain time and to protect the abortive surrender, negotiations take place. The siege resumes but news comes at last from the relief fleet. Finally, the boom is broken and the Mountjoy leads the relief of the beleaguered city.
The depravations of the siege are endured and the active defence continues. Count Von Rosen orders the thousands of Protestants, both those under James' protection and those not, to be driven naked beneath the walls of the city in order to force a surrender by employing systematic barbarity.
The relief fleet weighs anchor and leaves. Governor Lundy and his Council of War's resolution to surrender the city are frustrated by Captain (later Colonel) Adam Murray's arrival. King James is fired upon to the cry of "No Surrender" from the walls. Adam Murray once inside the city, now overwhelmed by Presbyterian refugees effects a revolution by leading the voices calling to resist. James' terms are rebuffed and the siege begins.
The fiasco at the Fords. The ignominious retreat of Williamite forces back to Londonderry. The arrival of the relief fleet. Governor Lundy resolves to surrender the city to King James' forces.
Governor Robert Lundy looks to the city's defences. The organisation of regiments of Protestant Anglicans and Presbyterians across eastern Ulster and western Ulster. Tyrconnell sends an army north under Lieutenant General Richard Hamilton. The collapse of defences across eastern Ulster. The flight of refugees as those who have not fled out of Ireland and have the determination to resist, converge through various trials on Londonderry. Governor Lundy resolves to fight.
The prelude to the Siege of Londonderry. The coming of The Earl of Tyrconnell to Ireland, the coming of William to England. The closing of the gates by the Apprentice Boys. The coming of King James to Ireland. The Irish Army is put on a war footing. Ireland erupts into sectarian chaos.
The fate of Sir Edward Carson whose memory is expunged effectively by the British Political Establishment for the phenomenon of the defiance which he represented - yet whose legacy lies in the four nations constituting the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the continuance of the Union Flag in it's present form. Small beer indeed for the King's Counsel who represented Oscar Wilde and was the inspiration for Sir Robert Morton in Terrence Rattigan's play, " The Wilmslow Boy" yet he is today virtually vanished from history.
The truce is declared and Captain James Craig refuses to be drawn into the negotiations which culminate in the Anglo-Irish Treaty. The artifice of the Boundary Commission is intended to dismantle the Northern Irish State. IRA forces are unleashed on the North until the Irish Civil War intervenes. Carson thunders at Conservative betrayal of his Ulster Unionists.
The Easter Rising and the War of Independence. Sectarian conflict convulses Ulster. The rebirth of the State of Northern Ireland. The new Prime Minister of Northern Ireland Captain James Craig clandestinely meets with Eamon De Valera.
The clock count down to Civil War in Ireland and Britain - Imperial Germany watches. The King intervenes but negotiations prove fruitless. The Great War comes as a stroke of luck to Prime Minister Herbert Asquith.
The gun running operation rebalances the argument allowing Sir Edward Carson to face a check mated Winston Churchill in the House of Commons from a position of strength. Civil War seems a certainty.
The angry and fractious debates continue in the fallout in the wake of the attempted coercion of Ulster. The progress of the gun running plot.
The Special Committee on Ulster under Jack Seeley and Churchill attempt the coercion of Ulster. Carson returns to direct and organise the response. The Curragh Mutiny.
The negotiations drag on. The concept of the six counties of Northern Ireland gains traction. Carson unveils himself as the leader of the Ulster Unionists to the detriment of the Southern Unionists.
Sir Edward Carson and the Ulster Unionist Leaders form the Ulster Volunteer Force, 90,000 strong. The Ulster Provisional Government is created to take control of Ulster the day that Home Rule is passed. Major Frederick Crawford is commissioned to smuggle in enough guns to arm this rebel army within the United Kingdom. The Suffragette campaign against Carson's political opponents and then against Carson himself.
Sectarian clashes in Ulster including the Castledawson outrage, the shipyard and widespread expulsions of Catholics and the riot at the grounds of Belfast Celtic. Sir Edward Carson and the Ulster Union Leaders' strategy to rein in the sectarianism and channel Ulster Protestant energies into mobilising resistance to Home Rule, culminating in Ulster Day and the signing of the Ulster Solemn League and Covenant.
The backdrop to opposition by Ulster Protestants to the Home Rule Bill. The actors in the Home Rule crisis. Winston Churchill's visit to Belfast as the focus of Ulster Protestant anger at his promotion of an All Ireland Parliament as a leading light in Asquith's Government. His acrimonious exit. The beginning of the Carson Churchill duel. The reasons for the Ulster Protestants' fanatical opposition to a Home Rule All Ireland Parliament including the political, economic as well as religious arguments.
The devastation of Ireland in the wake of the rebellion and the consequences including the Act of Union of Great Britain and Ireland.
The fate of others involved in the rebellion.
The life and death of Mary Anne McCracken in Belfast and Ireland where allegiances shifted into an uglier age.
The fate of the remaining State prisoners after their compact with the Government.
Robert Emmet's rebellion.
The fate of Thomas Russell.
The three French expeditions finally arrive in Ireland.
The fate of General Humbert's force.
The fate of Napper Tandy.
The fate of Wolf Tone.
The ring closes in on Wexford. The Battle of Vinegar Hill
The fate of the leaders of the insurrection in Wexford.
The atrocities continue.
The rising in the North continues. The course of the insurrection in County Down. The fate of Henry Joy McCracken.
With the United Irish leadership beheaded through arrests, the Rebellion breaks out.
The course of the insurrection in Leinster and the Scullabogue atrocity.
United Irish numbers swell despite internment, severe repression and censorship in the wake of the Bantry Bay Expedition.
General Lake's circus of atrocity moves outward from the dragooning of Ulster.
The efforts to preserve Lord Edward at liberty in the countdown to the date set for the rebellion.
Wolf Tone leaves the United States to secure French support for an invasion of Ireland.
The Ascendancy Government answers the calls for reform with repression and a policy of divide and rule. The coming and going of Lord Fitzwilliam. The Jackson conspiracy leading to Wolf Tone's exile from Ireland.
Revolutionary Belfast - The beginnings of the Society of United Irishmen and the radical Presbyterian Catholic Alliance.
The British Government are pressured by the Northern Irish Government to implement its plan to break the strike.
The Prime Minister Harold Wilson angered and frustrated by the strikers, delivers the most ill tempered televised national address in the history of the United Kingdom
The Government's petrol plan is implemented and the UWC strike back. The strike comes to a dramatic conclusion.
This episode also deals with the legacy and lessons of the strike.
The Northern Irish Ministers force the Government's Hand. Protestant Paramilitaries threaten a shooting war and the UWC respond to the Prime Minister's speech.
The British Army carry out the strangest military crackdown in modern history to the fury of the Executive.
An introduction to the events that led to the beginning of the Ulster Workers' Council Strike in Northern Ireland in 1974.