Nick Maxwell

1971 Nikita Khrushchev (77), Soviet leader (1953–64) who provoked the Cuban Missile Crisis, died. 1969 During clashes between the RUC and a c. 3,000-strong loyalist mob protesting against the Hunt report on the Shankill Road, Belfast, Constable Victor Arbuckle (29) was shot dead by the UVF. He was the first RUC officer to die in … Read more

1969 The Hunt report on policing in Northern Ireland recommended that the RUC be disarmed and the ‘B’ Specials disbanded and replaced by a new part-time force—later named the Ulster Defence Regiment. 1957 Fire broke out at the Windscale (now Sellafield) facility in Cumbria, the worst nuclear accident in British history. 1922 The Catholic hierarchy … Read more

1921 The Anglo-Irish conference (Treaty talks) opened in London. 1910 Henry McIlhenny, art collector and philanthropist who in 1979 donated his Donegal estate—which opened as Glenveagh National Park in 1984—to the Irish State, was born in Philadelphia. 1843 Daniel O’Connell’s campaign for repeal of the Act of Union was effectively terminated when his ‘monster meeting’ … Read more

1971 Annette McGavigan (14) was shot dead, apparently by a British soldier, during an exchange of fire between troops and the IRA in Derry’s Bogside. She was the 100th victim of Northern Ireland’s violence since 1969. 1970 A new trial of Charles J. Haughey and three others on charges of conspiring to import arms and … Read more

1771 Benjamin Franklin, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, arrived in Ireland on a six-week visit. 1977 Seamus Costello (38), leader of the Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP), was shot dead in Dublin, the first Irish party leader to be assassinated. 1974 The IRA bombed two public houses in Guildford, Surrey, killing five … Read more