'Burntollet' by Bowes Egan and Vincent McCormack

During the night several truckloads of newly-quarried stones were brought to the Claudy area and distributed along the high ridge of a field marking the marchers' route on their final day. Each of the people involved in these preparations has served with the Ulster Special Constabulary. This picture shows some of the stones left behind after the attack.

SMALL, hostile groups gathering spontaneously in public houses round Claudy were not the only indications of trouble to come. Much grander preparations were already under way. Dr. Ian Paisley had announced and advertised his intention of holding a "Prayer Meeting" in the Municipal Guildhall in the centre of Derry. To those who understood the vernacular, there was no doubt what the ecclesiastic intended. Paisley systematically used these religious meetings to whip up the sectarian fury on which he so relies. Even his military advisor, Major Bunting, uses this kind of verbal pretext to disguise the tom-tom functions which render the fanatics more frenzied than before. Thus, for example, when people from around Randalstown gathered, obedient to the "Loyal Citizens" order that the march must be halted, Bunting conducted a crazed and incoherent sermon to convince his listeners, proclaiming that God was on his side.

The rather clandestine nature of this particular meeting was underlined by the vigour with which stewards tried to establish the identity of each who sought to attend this "public" meeting. The Belfast Newsletter of the next morning tells:

"A newspaper reporter, who did manage to get inside the Guildhall, was forcibly removed by stewards, assaulted, and thrown down the stairs into the street."

Through hymns and prayers and recitations Paisley proceeded, inexorably, to the burning question of whether Civil Rights supporters, who were just disguised I.R.A. men, should be allowed to march openly and unmolested into the city. Derry, he reminded them, had been a bastion of support for King William; through the heroism of its apprentice boy defenders it had withstood a sustained Papist seige. Derry holds a particularly emotive position in the loyalist mind. Would the spirit of Protestant Derry capitulate next day he asked? His audience vigorously shared his opinion that such cowardice ought not to be allowed, and sporadic shouts of "hallelujah brothers" from members of the audience identified the more militant spirits.

How should they prevent insurgent entry? Dr. Paisley's secular adviser, Major Ronald Bunting, rose to speak. He felt there might be some among the audience who were prepared to play a manly role. To these he addressed his remarks. Next morning, they should assemble in the Brackfield area, prepared for a long day's activity. He suggested that they bring picnic lunches to sustain them through the day. What else should they bring? Here the gallant gentleman was less than clear, and accounts differ. The virtual absence of press representatives has contributed to the uncertainty.

Mr. Robin Chichester-Clark, brother of the present Prime Minister, has indicated his belief that the Burntollet attack was planned in the Guildhall, though he was not present himself, and relied on secondary accounts. It seems likely that he is wrong in a strict sense. Bunting did not say that the loyal citizens of the area should come armed with sticks and other weapons; he did indicate, that the question of "protective measures" should be left to individual discretion. Some rather lurid accounts of the Guildhall meeting have been circulated. Several witnesses have claimed that official speakers advised in detail, on the kind of armament that might be required. But the balance of evidence rather indicates that this was a standard tom-tom meeting of the Paisleyite sort, whipping up hatred but avoiding direct incitement.

While these deliberations took place, a large crowd of hostile Catholics from Derry had filled the Guildhall Square. These people, outraged at the persistent harassment of the People's Democracy marchers, and activated themselves by the Bunting-Paisley attitude that "intruders" were not welcome, massed in a threatening crowd. The great majority of the population of Derry is Catholic, and they regarded the Paisleyite meeting as deliberate provocation. The crowd grew to more than a thousand. Committee Members of the Derry Citizens' Action Committee, a local group involved in some aspects of the campaign for civil rights, summoned out their corps of stewards to prevent the Catholic crowd from attacking the Guildhall. These stewards are enrolled for use, to restrain the violent and over-enthusiastic at times of public demonstration. Meanwhile, detachments of police also took up positions to protect the prayer meeting from interference.

Over a period of three hours, speaker after speaker in Guildhall Square exhorted the outside gathering to disperse in quietness and leave the Protestant meeting quite unmolested. Violence, these leaders emphasised, would go far to negate the moral force of the uniformly non-violent student march. One speaker persuasive in the cause of restraint was Ivan Cooper, then chairman of the Citizen's Action Committee:

"You can gain nothing by causing trouble here tonight. You'll put yourselves in exactly the same category as the people who have already attacked the student march. Spare all your efforts for tomorrow when we give welcome to these courageous young people and join with them in peaceful public demonstration to show the disciplined determination of all the deprived people."

ABOVE: One of the spiked sticks picked up after the Burntollet attack.

Ivan Cooper comes of Protestant background and is very well acquainted with sectarian problems in the area. Because he has given support to the Civil Rights movement, he is probably more disliked by extremist Protestant elements than is any other individual. In some instances their view of him is pathological. Witness the account of this same speech given by Major Ronald Bunting to the writers:

"When we heard Cooper was speaking outside the hall, we all sat still and listened. Do you know what he said? 'We have taken too many backward steps in the past and have been too peaceful. Now we have got Paisley and Bunting where we want them, right in the Guildhall. Now is the time, not for one step back, but twelve straight steps forward. Let's go and get them boys. . .' Only the bravery of the police saved our lives from massacre by Cooper's mob."

RIGHT: Some of the hundreds of stones which rained down on the marchers. A foot-rule gives an idea of their size.

Then spoke Eamoan McCann, a vigorous campaigner who had taken part in the last three days of the march, and travelled in to his native Derry for that night. He expressed the philosophy which he has consistently maintained:

"You know I am not a moderate. I want to see a lot of radical changes in our society, and I want them as soon as possible. Tonight I would achieve these if it could be done. But nothing, nothing whatsoever, can be gained by attacking or abusing the people in the Hall. Don't you see, that this kind of action is precisely what the clever and unscrupulous organisers expect and hope will happen? Paisley and Bunting will be delighted if there is uproar and disturbance here tonight. It will give strong support to the idea that the Civil Rights movement is anti-Protestant, set on destroying one section of the population on sectarian grounds.

"But even more important, you must not now, or at any other time, attack the kind of people who are listening to the crazy hate sessions in that hall. They are not your enemies. True, they certainly believe that they are. True, they are taught and told to hate you, and to believe that you hold them in equal detestation. But if the Civil Rights movement is ever to be worth anything at all, it must avoid all minor sectarian aims. It must not even concentrate on the question of local government votes and the right of each adult individual to select his local rulers. Rather it must concentrate on the pressing problems of slum housing, poverty and social deprivation, of the sort you Derry people know so well.

"Paisley draws his vigorous support from just the kind of people I would like to see coming, and would warmly welcome, into the kind of Civil Rights movement we must build. This will be a movement of deprived people, Catholic, Protestant or whatever, campaigning against the system that oppresses them both from Stormont and in the City of Derry where we have suffered more than most at the hands of incompetent, disinterested and self-interested councillors.

"We protest about slum housing, but remember that many of the people in that hall in front of us tonight come straight from houses in the Fountain area, which are precisely the kind of inhuman habitations that we are campaigning to destroy and to replace. At the end of the day, Paisley and Bunting are not relevant. They are whipping up the last remains of the dying fires of outdated bigotry. No doubt these can still burn vigorously for a time. But we defeat this dreadful irrelevant nonsense by fighting on different grounds, by fighting on the real issues, on poverty, on housing, fighting against the corrupt unionist government of this country.

"No, you must not attack these people. They are your proper and natural allies. At the moment they are the dupes of a power-mad clergyman, who will use any trick to arouse a howling mob. Today he woos the working people by shouting against the landed gentry because his enemy, O'Neill, is a member of that group. But, as soon as circumstances changed, you would find this man abandon his concern for the deprived slum tenants and small farmers, and jump into a coalition with landowners or with industrialists, if they would give sufficient support and backing to his movement. So leave him to his pathetic, hate-rousing session. Time is running out for this man. The people will abandon him provided you do not play his game, and treat them as your enemies.

While the prayer meeting continued, a fire was started behind the hall. A group had managed to identify Major Bunting's car which was burnt out. About the same time some of the more maniac groups in the square managed to involve themselves in the electric wires connecting ornamental lighting on the giant Christmas tree and on the ninth night of Christmas this symbol of seasonable goodwill came tumbling down with a number of young men tangled in the debris. The Belfast Newsletter of January 6th published this outline of events:

"Repeatedly on Friday night leaders of the Citizens' Action Committee-the chairman, Mr. Ivan Cooper, the chief steward, Mr. Paul Grace, and committee members such as Mr. Finbar O'Doherty and Mr. Eamonn McCann, who had travelled into the city at the end of the Maghera-Claudy stage of the People's Democracy march-all pleaded with the crowds in the area of the Guildhall to go home peacefully. The leaders pointed out that the people attending the meeting in the Guildhall were entitled to enjoy Civil Rights, but still the crowd refused to move-the first time that the leaders had not received spontaneous reaction.

"It was thought the reason why the advice of the leaders was not accepted was because of attacks made on the People's Democracy march. The Civil Rights supporters in the city were anxious to give a warm welcome to the marchers on Saturday afternoon and they wanted to demonstrate against Mr. Paisley and Major Bunting whom they blamed for harassing the marchers.

"The crowd remained at the Guildhall besieging the 1,000 or so people attending the Paisley meeting. Eventually about 100 young men at the meeting suddenly swarmed through the front door of the hall armed with pieces of broken furniture and chased the Civil Rights crowds who were still in Guildhall Square and the surrounding streets. And as they chased the crowd, the police chased them to prevent people being injured.

"But, unfortunately, this police action was misinterpreted and some accused the police of charging with the Paisley supporters. That atmosphere was still very much in the air on Saturday morning. . . "

"I kept the camera as hidden as best I could because I know how much they fear identification. But a group caught me in the centre of the road and I was beaten down with sticks. I turned to police for protection but could get no help. I was at last brought to the safety of the hotel by Civil Rights stewards."

Just after midnight, a bus, empty save for driver and conductor, pulled up at the roadside some miles outside Claudy, and engaged in the curious exercise of unloading several crates loaded with empty bottles into a field where, coincidentally, a group was waiting to receive these and other missiles. And rather later on, over a period of hours, several truck-loads of newly-quarried stones packed in eight-stone sacks were brought to the same area and distributed along the edge of a high field marching the road along which the marchers would pass. The quantity of stone, and the time taken for distribution, are described in a later chapter. But the identities of those involved in making the arrangements is well known in the locality. Each one has a record of service with the Ulster Special Constabulary.

Claudy is a small village, meriting only a purely automatic telephone exchange. People living in houses close to this building tell a near-incredible story. During the night a number of G.P.O. vans arrived and workmen embarked on some activities at a time long past normal working hours. The local official in charge of this area refuses to confirm, deny, or comment on this story. But, true or not, the emergency telephone services suffered an almost unprecedented lapse. On the morning of January 4th, 1969, as the Burntollet attack commenced, all direct emergency contact with police and ambulance services in Claudy became impossible. Numerous people who dialled the 999 emergency number at various times over a period of several hours, got neither a response, nor the engaged tone. There seemed to be no connection whatever. And developments, in and around Claudy, put considerable pressure on members of the police force. Thus, in answer to a parliamentary question, the Minister of Home Affairs exemplified Constable Ronald Crawford, who performed orderly duty for a continuous period of fourteen hours on January 3rd and 4th. Later we explain how this did not conclude his obligations in respect of the march. He was called out again next morning, on an informal basis, to perform more special police duties.

All through the night, the marchers were disturbed by mobs calling threats from the darkness, repeated information that explosives had been planted, and that detachments of the Ulster Volunteer Force, a clandestine military organisation closely associated with the Orange Order and the police force, were preparing to march on the hall. But nothing more serious happened than the discharge of a number of airgun slugs through the windows of the hall. The marksman was a young man from Irwin Crescent, Claudy. It is likely that the accuracy of his shooting owed something at least to the probationary time he spent in the Royal Ulster Constabulary Training Depot in Enniskillen.