Nick Maxwell

1972 Eight people, including four members of the IRA and two women, were killed when an IRA bomb exploded prematurely in the Short Strand area of East Belfast. 1970 Former ministers Charles J. Haughey and Neil Blaney, along with Captain Kelly and Albert Luykx, were arrested and charged with conspiring to import arms and ammunition into … Read more

1940 ‘Operation Dynamo’, the evacuation of c. 338,000 Belgian, British and French troops over nine days from the beaches and harbour of Dunkirk, began. 1564 John Calvin (54), influential French theologian during the Protestant Reformation, died. 1911 The first edition of the Irish Worker, organ of the ITGWU and edited by James Larkin, was issued. Averaging 20,000 … Read more

1972 Minister for Justice Desmond O’Malley reintroduced the Special Criminal Court under Part V of the Offences Against the State Act (1939). 1900 Luke Dillon, a leading light in the Fenian dynamite campaign (1881–5), was sentenced to life imprisonment along with two others for attempting to bomb the Welland Canal in Canada, an important shipping … Read more

1921 In an operation involving almost 200 IRA Volunteers, the Custom House in Dublin, the centre of local government, was occupied and burnt. Five Volunteers were killed and over 80 arrested. 1315 The Bruce invasion of Ireland began when Edward, younger brother of Robert Bruce, king of Scotland, landed in Larne, Co. Antrim, with 6,000 battle-hardened … Read more