The Gibraltar Shooting, Milltown Cemetery Attack and Corporal Killings

Though the IRA attacked places in northern Ireland and the United Kingdom, they sometimes ventured further and their plan to bomb the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar is one such example. What happened in Gibraltar, and the chain of killings that followed in Northern Ireland, is one of the most shocking examples of the tit for tat violence that encapsulated the darkest days of the troubles in Northern Ireland.Sources and Further Reading:Documentary about Mairead Farrell (Irish language with English Subtitles)https://ifiplayer.ie/mairead_farrell/Death on the Rock Full Documentaryhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cE_0M_pzzUIRTE article about Haughey’s reluctance to allow the bodies of the three to be flown into Dublin Airporthttps://www.rte.ie/news/2017/0825/899858-haughey-archive-papers/Article about the inquest into the killing of the Gibraltar threehttps://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/oct/01/ira-killings-gibraltar-sas-1988Yellow Card Rules for the British Army during conflicthttps://alphahistory.com/northernireland/british-army-instructions-opening-fire-1973/Guide on Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rightshttps://www.echr.coe.int/Documents/Guide_Art_2_ENG.pdfFootage minutes before the Corporeal killingshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV3z9H6OyXoAnother Documentary about the three events:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8m8WCAHpD_IArticle about the Corporeal Killings (Warning, graphic images)https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/fr-alec-reid-death-it-was-a-photo-that-shocked-the-world-but-from-that-dark-day-a-sliver-of-light-appeared-on-the-horizon-29777931.html See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Hi folks this is the 10th episode of the podcast and I feel it’s a good time to take a minute and just thank you all for your continuing Support over the past few months the podcast has received an excellent reception and I’ve got plenty of great compliments as well as useful

Feedback on how to continue improving the series if you want to help the podcast you can always donate the price of a coffee or pint at patreon.com thet troubles podcast alternatively please make sure to leave a review wherever you listen to your podcasts before I get

Into the episode I also want to mention two other podcasts that you might find interesting if you want a podcast to learn more about Irish history which is significantly more light-hearted then please check out shite talk an Irish History Podcast it’s an entertaining informative podcast with some excellent

Stories to tell the hosts comedians Jason and Kevin are a lot of fun and have a great Dynamic together if you are a fan of True Crime then I’d also recommend checking out which murderer it’s a true crime podcast and Holly and Gemma are excellent hosts who discuss some fascinating murders

Which have occurred around the world the format is a bit different as each episode they pick a theme instead of a specific murder so small town murders or deathbed murder confessions and many more definitely want to check out now back to the show though the IRA attacked places in

Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom they sometimes ventured further and their plan to bomb the British overseas territory of jalter is one such example what happened in jalter and the chain of killings that followed in Northern Ireland is one of the most shocking examples of the tit fortat violence that

Encapsulated the darkest days of the troubles in Northern Ireland this is the troubles podcast a podcast which explores the violence and bloodshed that occurred in Northern Ireland the Republic of Ireland and Great Britain as multiple sides and organizations waged a conflict over the status of Northern Ireland jalter is a British overseas

Territory located at the tip of the Iberian Peninsula it’s an incredibly small piece of land having an area of 6.2 squ km though it is Tiny it is in a very important geographical location separating both Europe from Africa on the Mediterranean Sea from the Atlantic Ocean it also shares a border with Spain

In 173 after the Treaty of utre control of jalter was seeded to Britain and the area has been of strategic importance to Britain ever since especially during the Napoleonic Wars on World War II during World War II civilians were evacuated from jalter and the entire Peninsula was used as a military

Base nowadays jalter has a population of about 30,000 people and there have been two different referendums on the issue of sovereignty and whether Spain should govern part of jalter and both times the locals have overwhelmingly voted no wanting to remain a British overseas territory it was 1987 in Northern

Ireland and the provisional Ira had already expanded their campaign into different countries just 3 years earlier they had come close to killing British prime minister Margaret Thatcher in the Brighton Hotel bombing it was important for the IRA to take their attacks out of Northern Ireland as they hoped to make

International headlines and have their cause heard around the world because of jalter’s history and the fact that it is a colony of the British crown a decision was made by the IRA Council to Stage an attack there three individuals were selected to carry out the attack Daniel mccan Shan Savage and mered

Farrell all three were senior members of the IRA Johan Savage was an expert in explosives and Daniel mccan was an expert in intelligence mered Farrell had previously served 10 years in prison after she was caught while planting a bomb in 1976 she was interned in Arma women’s

Prison and took part in the subsequent dirty protest and hunger protests that were happening as the internees demanded to be treated as prisoners of war and not regular prisoners farell was released in 1986 and soon re-engaged in Ira activity then in 1988 she became part of the plan to

Attack jalter the intention was to attack the band and guard of the first ban of the royal Anglican regiment who had a changing of the guards ceremony and parade which would take place every Tuesday Morning outside the residence of the governor of jalter the parade was a huge tourist

Attraction and many people would gather to watch them perform in front of the governor the band would play and the soldiers will March the parade would then end around the corner down a side street it was on this side street that the IRA intended to plant a Car

Bomb the IRA believed that they were operating covertly but they were wrong from late 1987 the British authorities were aware that the IRA were planning an attack in jalter a known Ira member had been cited at The Changing of the Guard ceremony raising suspicions to prove that an attack was

Being planned the governor of jalter canel the ceremony in December that year under the pretex sense that they needed to repaint the guard house whereas secretly they were preparing for a possible attack the ceremony was then resumed on Tuesday February 23rd and a female Ira member was spotted again

Studying the parade in detail she was then spotted the following Tuesday again on March 1st and an imminent attack was suspected authorities in England began working with Spain and jalter who were warned to be on the lookout for members arriving at Spanish airports the only

Way to get to jalter was to fly into Spanish airports and then drive down on the 2nd of March Farrell mccan and Savage began to covertly make their way toward jalter Savage made his way down to Dublin then flew to Brussels and onto Barcelona where he managed to slip into Spain

Undetected even though Spanish authorities were looking out for him he then flew down to Malaga which was only 90 minutes away from their target jalter McAn was stopped by British soldiers at a routine checkpoint on way to Dublin but he was let continue on his journey to Spain then on Friday March

4th Savage rented a red Ford Fiesta which was the first of the team’s three cars that they would rent Spanish police believed that this car drove over a th000 miles to collect the explosives which would be used in the attack which had been smuggled into Spain on Friday

Evening Mancan reached Malaga he had no idea that he’d been under surveillance the entire way from Ireland to Spain and he may have been the one to lead authorities to Savage who had evaded detection up until this point then on Saturday March 5th Spanish police received an Urgent Message from

London alerting them that there was a third individual mered Farrell and that they should be on the lookout for her as well Farrell arrived into Spain undetected and the following day on Sunday March 6th farl rented a white Ford Fiesta under the pseudonym Catherine Smith she drove it into an underground

Car park in Marb and parked it IDE their other rental car and it is believed that the explosives were then transferred into her car 140 lbs of explosives were later found in the car at 12:45 in the afternoon on the same day Shawn Savage made his way undetected into jalter in a

White Renault 5 which he parked on the side street that they intended to bomb before walking around the town McAn and Farrell then entered jalter on foot over 2 hours later they met up with Savage and the trio began to walk through the town at 3:30 they were completely

Unaware that both cars had been tailed by Spanish police each car was tailed by four unmarked police cars that would constantly interchange with each other so as to avoid detection they were also communicating the movement of the cars to British officials in jalter a branch of the British Special

Air Forces or SAS had been dispatched to jalter to intercept the attackers and when they crossed into jalter the Spanish police handed over surveillance to the British authorities Mars punch writes in his book shoot to kill police accountability firearms and fatal force that the British forces had prepared for this

Mission by practicing arrest techniques while the jialan authorities searched for a suitable place to house the three Ira members when the arrests occurred but there will be no arrests on this day there was confusion surrounding the white Renault as it had been allowed into jalter but there was also suspicion that it

Already contained the bomb there was also another theory that the explosives were already in jalter and that the car was on route to collect them British foreign secretary Jeffrey how later said of the car their presence and actions near the parked Renault car gave rise to strong

Suspicion that it contained a bomb which appeared to be corroborated by rapid technical examination of the car once the Renault had been left parked a British soldier who specialized in bomb disposal inspected the Renault and concluded that it should be treated as a suspect bomb car even though the car was

Light and not heavily weighed down over the back wheels which was common when there was a heavy bomb in the vehicle as it turned out there was no bomb in this car it is believed that the Ira’s plan was that the three would leave jalter on

Foot and collect the bomb car which was in a car park in Marb just 1 hour away they would then switch out the cars so the white Renault which which was parked at their Target location would then be swapped with the red Ford Fiesta which contained the bomb the car would

Then be left there until 2 days later on Tuesday when it was due to explode it is at this point that the exact nature of what happened is not quite clear Farrell and Mancan were walking about 100 met in front of savage a number of British soldiers had been

Following the three of them as they made their way towards the Spanish border when the order was given to intercept and arrest the three the undercover soldiers then moved in to arrest them at the exact same time the jalter and authorities had been informed and told

To prepare a vehicle to put the arrested people into a police vehicle driving towards the scene was stuck in traffic so decided to activate their siren to try and clear it out the sound of the siren startled maccan and Farrell just as soldier a and Soldier B confronted

Them the soldiers names have never been publicly released so they are referred to with letters at the inquest Soldier a stated that he raised his pistol intending to shout a challenge at them but macan’s hand moved aggressively across the front of his body Soldier a then shot Mancan once in

The back he then looked at Farrell and believed that she was reaching into her handbag suspecting that she had a remote Detonator for the bomb he shot her in the back as well he then shot Mancan a further three times Soldier B also shot Mancan at Farrell a number of times

Soldiers C and D were following Savage who had started to run away from the shooting and Soldier C testified that Savage turned around while reaching towards his jacket pocket suspecting a remote Detonator soldiers C and D opened fire on Savage all three members of the IRA were killed

In a volley of bullets that lasted less than a minute and 27 rounds of ammunition were used immediately after the shooting the forces dawned their Berets and identified themselves and at 4 minutes past 4 they they handed control back to the jalon police force one passer by was

Injured in the shooting after being grazed by a bullet upon inspecting the white Ford Fiesta there was no traces of explosives found keys found on the body of mered Farrell LED authorities to a second car which was an hour away in a car park in Marb

Spain there the police found a car which was loaded with 140 lb of seex explosives rounds of ammunition four detonators and two timers Republicans back in Northern Ireland were outraged that the three had been shot while unarmed two days after the shooting the British foreign secretary made this statement shortly before 1: p.m.

Yesterday afternoon Savage brought a white Renault car into jalter and was seen to park it in the area where the guard mounting ceremony assembles before leaving the car he was seen to spend some time making adjustments in the vehicle an hour and a half later Mancan

And Farrell were seen to enter jalter on foot and shortly before 300 p.m. joined Savage in the town their presence and actions near the parked Rena car gave rise to strong suspicions that it contained a bomb which appeared to be corroborated by a rapid technical examination of the car

Around 3:30 p.m. all three left the scene and started to walk back towards the border on their way to the Border they were challenged by the security forces when challenged they made movements which led the military personnel operating in support of the jalter police to conclude that their own

Lives and the lives of others were under threat in light of this response they the IRA members were shot those killed were subsequently found not to have been carrying arms the parked Renault car was subsequently dealt with by a military bomb disposal team it has now been

Established that it did not contain an explosive device for the most part the British media Vindicated ated the killings saying that the actions of the SAS had prevented a greater loss of life but one documentary would be released which raised some very controversial questions a themes television documentary called Death on

The Rock was released in April of 1988 just two months after the shootings which raised some points that were seen as very controversial at the time in the United Kingdom the documentary reconstructed events leading up to the shootings and spoke to a number of new Witnesses at the

Scene the four Witnesses said that the soldiers opened fire without warning none of them saw the bombers make any threatening movements one witness said that farell and Mancan had their hands in the air when they were shot another witness said that the soldier who shot Savage did not

Issue a warning or identify himself before opening fire there was also an account from a witness of the soldier who shot Savage quote the man on the ground was lying on his back the man standing over this man had his foot on the man’s chest I could

See that he also had a gun in his hand I then saw the gunman Point his gun deliberately at the man who was lying on the floor and fired two or three times into him at Point Blank Range I was horrified by what I saw in Northern Ireland the British army operated what

Was known as yellow card rules when it came to using lethal Force the rules state that a soldier may only fire at a person who is likely to endanger life and there is no other way to prevent the danger death on the Rock questioned whether extreme force was necessary in this

Case the viability of the remote detonators was also questioned because the three were over a mile away from the car at the time of the shooting and there would be too much interference to remotely detonate a bomb an inquest was held on the 6th of September 1988 the three parties involved were the

British government a representative for the SAS team and a representative for the families of McAn Savage and Farrell the inquest heard from 79 Witnesses some of which had appeared on the documentary death on the Rock during this inquest some witnesses retracted statements made on the documentary or were unsure of the

Recollection of the events the inquest concluded on the 30th of September and the jury returned a verdict by vote of 9 to2 that the killing was lawful and that there was no sign of a conspiracy seed to murder Ira operatives in 1995 families of the three killed took the case to the European

High court of human rights on the basis that Article 2 of the European convention on human rights had been breached Article 2 States that everyone’s right to life shall be protected by law the court concluded that Article 2 had been breached for three reasons for one the three were not arrested

Immediately at the border checkpoint from Spain into jalter though they had been identified secondly authorities did not consider the correctness of the intelligence that they had the soldiers who shot the three were told that there was definitely a bomb in the car thirdly the use of SAS soldiers was questioned

Who were a combat team trained to shoot to kill the court rejected the family’s claim for damages because the three suspects had been killed while preparing for an act of terrorism that’s the end of the legal site of the case but it’s not the end of the

Story the chain of events and killings that kicked off as a result of the shootings in jalter really depicted the turmoil Terror and pandemonium of the troubles the bodies of Macan Savage and Farrell were flown back to Dublin on the 14th of March 8 days after the shootings it has been revealed that

Irish t- shuk at the time Charles Hai requested that the bodies be flown directly to Belfast avoiding the Republic of Ireland completely but this request was was refused 2,000 supporters met the coffins in Dublin Airport which were then driven up to Northern Ireland at the border the procession was met

With a large number of police and army vehicles there was a palpable tension in the air as MERS jled with police and army the bodies were then brought to Repose in their individual homes 2 days later on the 16th of March the funeral of the three took place they

Were to be buried in the miltown graveyard which is a graveyard that has been synonymous with Irish republicanism out of respect for the dead the r agreed to maintain a minimal presence on the Proviso that there would be no Salute by masked gunmen this information about the minimal presence was leaked to a

Self-described freelance loyalist paramilitary Michael stone stone was a member of different loyalist groups including the UDA and the redand Commandos he committed his first murder of a Catholic civilian Patrick Brady in 1984 he then killed another civilian Kevin mcpolin in 1985 Stone wanted to attack the high

Level command of the IRA Jerry Adams and Martin mcginness who were both present at the funeral he walked into the graveyard pretending to be a mner the first two coffins were lowered into the ground and as the third coffin was lowered Stone threw two grenades towards the

Crowd the moment of the explosion was caught on Camera the ensuing explosion caused absolute Terror MERS ran in all directions and a number of people ran directly towards Stone in effort to confront him Stone threw another grenade and then took out a pistol and began shooting at the people pursuing him he eventually ran out of ammunition and

The crowd caught up with him and attacked him he was bundled into a hijacked car and there is no doubt that he would have been driven away to his death but armed ruc officers arrived at the scene and arrested him Stone killed three people in this attack Thomas McAn John Murray and Kevin

Brady a further 60 people were injured by bullets grenade shrapnel and marble and Stone from the gravestones as he was being pat down by the Army he said of his gun the [ __ ] things jammed or else I would have got more of the bastards the UDA and uvf were quick to

Deny any involvement in the attack saying that stone was a rogue loyalist Shin faine claimed that there must have been collusion because very few people knew about the reduced police presence at the funeral Stone was convicted and sentenced to 638 years in prison he ended up serving 12 years in

In Ma’s prison before being released in 2000 as part of the Northern Ireland peace process he was then rearrested in 2006 after trying to enter the parliament buildings in storment Northern Ireland with a knife gun and viable bomb his lawyer argued that he was taking part in performance art imitating a terrorist

Attack this defense didn’t hold up and stone was sentenced to 16 years in prison then in 2013 he was given an additional 18 years in prison for his role in the miltown attacks Stone has since become a loyalist icon and there were murals dedicated to him in loyst areas of

Belfast at this stage we have the death of three Ira members in jalter then at their funeral an additional three people were to die one of those three was Ira member Kevin Brady and at his funeral the cycle of death would continue on the 19 of March the funeral

For Kevin Brady was taking place for many this was their second funeral in less than a week and many felt like they were living in a war zone again the Oru agreed that they would keep minimal distance during the funeral many MERS were still scared that there was another attack coming the MERS

Were following the same route from the church to the graveyard that they had walked 3 days earlier the funeral cortage was making its way along a street when a car approached them at high speed after After ignoring the traffic stewards who were waving and trying to get it to slow

Down the people in the crowd believed that they were under attack again and a group of people surged towards the car trying to get to the men inside one of the men inside drew a pistol and fired a warning shot into the air which caused the crowds to burst

Back before they surged in again the two men were dragged out of the car and taken into the nearby casement park there they were stripped beaten and searched before being put in a black taxi and driven away upon searching the men it was revealed that they were undercover

British soldiers one had an ID that said Herford on it which was a town in Germany where there was a British base the IRA believed that this was a different place Herford in England where the SAS had their headquarters as the spellings are very similar they believed that they had

Captured members of the same unit who had killed the jalter 3 less than two week weeks previous the men were driven to a different location before being shot multiple times by men in baly clavas a haunting picture was captured of priest father Alec Reed giving the last rights

To the body of one of the soldiers the men were identified as David house and Derek Woods who were corporals in the British army an ex Ira member describes the attack I thought it was grotesque if I’m to be honest with myself it wasn’t a proper conducted Ira operation it’s just

Not how the IRA would do it it’s like it was just like a mob British prime minister Margaret Thatcher went on to describe the incident as the single most horrifying event in Northern Ireland during her time as prime minister journalist Mary Holland described seeing one of the men as he

Was dragged by her and the group of journalists she was with quote he didn’t cry out just looked at us with terrified eyes as though we were all enemies in a foreign country who wouldn’t have understood what language he was speaking if he called out for help the entire incident was filmed on

Camera and from a police helicopter and the footage would go on to become some of the most shocking and harrowing footage of the entire troubles it was never fully clear what the two corporals were doing when they drove into the procession they were probably driving from one Army Barracks to another one

But it’s unclear why they drove through a nationalist area area and according to the British army they had ignored general orders to stay away from the area they also should have been warned of the funeral procession before leaving the barracks on one side people believe it

Was simply a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time on the other some have argued that they were working undercover after a lengthy court case eventually two men Alex Murphy and Harry MaGuire were arrested and sentenced for the killing of the corporals both were

Released in 1998 under the terms of the Good Friday agreement 1988 was a very violent year of the troubles in the space of 13 days in March eight lives were lost in three different attacks that were both violent and Savage in their nature there would be many more killed

Before the year was over and it would still be another decade before a tentative peace would be found