1974 London pillar box bombings

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London pillar box bombings
Part of The Troubles
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King's Cross
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Piccadilly Circus
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Victoria
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Chelsea
1974 London pillar box bombings (Greater London)
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Piccadilly Circus
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Victoria
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Chelsea
1974 London pillar box bombings (the United Kingdom)
Location London, United Kingdom
Date25 & 27 November 1974
25 Nov: 5.50pm, 6.00pm, 6:50pm
27 Nov: 8.30pm & 8.50pm (GMT)
Attack type
Time bomb
Weapons Gelignite bomb, "come-on bomb"
Deaths0
Injured40
Perpetrator Provisional IRA

On 25 and 27 November 1974 the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) placed several bombs in pillar boxes and one in a hedge behind a pillar box. This was a new tactic used by the IRA in England, although a similar tactic had been used in Northern Ireland during The Troubles several times previously. 40 people were wounded from five explosions in several districts. [1]

Contents

Background

The IRA began their bombing campaign of England in early 1973 when they bombed the Old Bailey courthouse, the seat of justice in Britain, they used a car bomb to attack it which injured over 200 people, caused extensive damage and one person died from a heart attack. [2]

1974 was to be the IRA's most deadly year in England with close to 50 people being killed and with around 500 being injured. The year started with the M62 coach bombing a military coach which had soldiers and their families on it. Nine soldiers were killed and three civilians with just under 40 being injured, many seriously. [3] [4]

The IRA had been bombing targets in and around the London area since October 1974 including, the Guildford pub bombings on 5 October and the Woolwich pub bombing on 7 November. Seven people were killed from these two bombings alone (5 British military personnel & 2 civilians) and almost 100 people were injured. [2] [5]

On 21 November the Birmingham pub bombings killed 21 and injured close to 200. The Prevention of Terrorism Act 1974 (PTA 1974) was passed through parliament quickly to give the police special powers in dealing with the IRA and similar groups. The powers gave the police powers to hold people in custody for up to seven days without charge. [6] There was a strong desire to respond to what was perceived as "the greatest threat [to the country] since the end of the Second World War." Six men who were wrongly convicted of the bombings was a group known the Birmingham Six who spent 17 years in English jails until their convictions were overturned in 1991. The PTA 1974 was also used to convict other innocent people like Judith Ward of the M62 coach bombing and it was also used to convict the eleven members of the Guildford Four and Maguire Seven of the Guildford bombings. All these convictions were also overturned in the late 1980s/early 1990s. [7] [8]

Bombings

Casualties
Caledonian Road2
Piccadilly Circus16
Victoria Street2
Tite Street (1st)0
Tite Street (2nd)20

The IRA decided to send a message of defiance to the government over the PTA and to show that the IRA was very much still operational in England. They created bombs concealed in packets small enough to fit in a standard-sized pillar post box. [9]

On 25 November 1974 the IRA planted bombs inside pillar boxes in various places around London. They made three small gelignite laden bombs with pocket watch timing devices. The first bomb on Caledonian Road, nearby King's Cross and Pentonville Road, [9] went off at 5:50 pm that injured two people. Ten minutes later a second bomb went off outside Piccadilly Circus at 6:00 pm. This was the worst bomb of the day as it injured 16 people. The last bomb detonated near Metropole Cinema, just outside London Victoria station, and went off at 6:50 pm, injuring another 2 people. This brought the total injured to 20 for the day.

The Metropolitan Police called in the army bomb squad to check all pillar boxes in the W1 and N1 postal areas. In addition, false alarms throughout other places in London caused traffic chaos. The next day, many nervous post workers in central London refused to open boxes in fear that there could be a bomb. [9]

Two days later on 27 November, a twin bomb attack near the National Army Museum on Tite Street in Chelsea occurred – again time bombs inside pillar boxes. The first bomb was small and designed to lure security services to the scene before a much larger bomb went off 21 minutes later in a hedge close by. [10] The second explosion injured 20 people including an explosives officer, six policemen and two ambulancemen. Investigations showed that the second bomb had 3 to 5 lb of gelignite and 200 nails incorporated to make a claymore-type device. [11] The second bomb was aimed to kill those on the scene. [9]

Aftermath

The secondary 'come-on' bomb in Chelsea, the first time it was deployed in London, forced the Metropolitan Police to make changes to responses to explosions. It required all police officers attending an explosion to carry out an immediate search around the scene and cordon the area off to ensure there would be no second bomb. [11]

Sources

Related Research Articles

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The 1987 Rheindahlen bombing was a car bomb attack on 23 March 1987 at JHQ Rheindahlen military barracks, the British Army headquarters in West Germany, injuring thirty-one. The large 300 lb (140 kg) car bomb exploded near the visitors officers' mess of the barracks. The Provisional IRA later stated it had carried out the bombing. It was the second bombing in Rheindahlen, the first being in 1973, and the start of the IRA's campaign on mainland Europe from the late 1980s to the early 1990s. Although British soldiers were targeted, most of the injured were actually German officers and their wives.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">1975 Piccadilly bombing</span> Bomb attack near Green Park Underground station, London

On Thursday 9 October 1975, a bomb attack just outside Green Park Underground station in the City of Westminster, London, left one man dead and injured 20 others. The attack was carried out by volunteers from the Provisional IRA's Balcombe Street Gang. The attack occurred during a period of heightened activity by the IRA in England and in particular London and surrounding areas, since the Caterham Arms pub bombing two months earlier in August 1975.

The Balcombe Street Gang was a Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) active service unit (ASU) who carried out a bombing campaign in southern England in the mid-1970s. The majority of their attacks and attempted attacks took place in London and the rest in Surrey, Hampshire and Wiltshire. Between October 1974 and December 1975 they carried out approximately 40 bomb and gun attacks in and around London, sometimes attacking the same targets twice. The unit would sometimes carry out two or more attacks in one day; on 27 January 1975 they placed seven time bombs in London.

The Provisional IRA carried out two separate attacks on the same day on 1 May 1988 against British military personnel in the Netherlands which resulted in the deaths of three RAF members and another three being injured. It was the worst attack suffered by the British security forces during The Troubles from 1969 to 1998 in mainland Europe.

The Rose & Crown Bar bombing was a bomb attack carried out against a Catholic-owned pub in Belfast. The attack was carried out by the loyalist paramilitary group the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) just less than two weeks before the start of the Ulster Workers' Council strike of May 1974 which brought down the Sunningdale power sharing agreement and just 15 days before the UVF carried out the Dublin and Monaghan bombings which killed 34 and injured 300 people, the highest casualty rate in a single day during The Troubles in either Ireland or Britain.

On 17 June 1974 the Provisional IRA bombed the British Houses of Parliament causing extensive damage and injuring eleven people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1992 London Bridge bombing</span> Provisional IRA attack in London

On Friday 28 February 1992, the Provisional IRA (IRA) exploded a bomb inside London Bridge station during the morning rush hour, causing extensive damage and wounding 29 people. It was one of many bombings carried out by one of the IRA's London active service units. It occurred just over a year after a bomb at Victoria station.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bombings of Paddington and Victoria stations</span> 1991 IRA bombings in London

On 18 February 1991 two Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) bombs exploded at London mainline stations, one at Victoria station and the other at Paddington station, killing one person and injuring 38 other people at Victoria station. It was the IRA's second major attack in London in February 1991 after the Downing Street mortar attack eleven days earlier which was an attempt to assassinate the British War cabinet and the British prime minister John Major. It was also the first IRA attack against a civilian target in England since the 1983 Harrods bombing, marking a strategic change in their bombing campaign in England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">New Lodge Six shooting</span> 1973 mass shooting in Belfast

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kesh ambush</span>

On 2 December 1984, a four-man Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) active service unit was ambushed by a British Army Special Air Service team while attempting to bomb a Royal Ulster Constabulary patrol who they had lured to Drumrush Lodge Restaurant. Two IRA volunteers and one SAS soldier were killed during the action.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Central Bar bombing</span> Terrorist attack in Gilford, Northern Ireland

The Central Bar bombing was a bomb attack on a pub in the town of Gilford near Portadown in County Down in Northern Ireland on 31 December 1975. The attack was carried out by members of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) using the covername "People's Republican Army" although contemporary reports also said the "Armagh unit" of the "People's Republican Army" had claimed responsibility. Three Protestant civilians were killed in the bombing.

The Official IRA's Belfast Brigade was founded in December 1969 after the Official IRA itself emerged in December 1969, shortly after the beginning of the Troubles, when the Irish Republican Army split into two factions. The other was the Provisional IRA. The "Officials" were Marxist-Leninists and worked to form a united front with other Irish communist groups, named the Irish National Liberation Front (NLF). The Brigade like the pre-split IRA brigade before the split had three battalions, one in West Belfast, one in North Belfast and the third in East Belfast. The Belfast Brigade was involved in most of the biggest early confrontations of the conflict like the Falls Curfew in 1970, the battles that followed after the introduction of Internment without trial in 1971 and Volunteers joined forces with the Provisional brigade to fight the British Army and UVF during the Battle at Springmartin in 1972. The first Commanding Officer (CO) of the brigade was veteran Billy McMillen who fought during the IRA Border Campaign. Shortly after the death of Official IRA Belfast "Staff Captain" Joe McCann in April 1972, the battalion structure of the brigade was done away with and command centralized under McMillen.

Roy Walsh is a former Provisional IRA volunteer. He was convicted for his part in the IRA's 1973 Old Bailey bombing which injured over 200 people and one person died from a heart attack due to the bombing.

The following is a timeline of actions during The Troubles which took place in the Republic of Ireland between 1969 and 1998. It includes Ulster Volunteer Force bombings such as the Dublin and Monaghan bombings in May 1974, and other Loyalist bombings carried out in the 1970s, 80s & 90s, the last of which was in 1997. These attacks killed dozens of people and injured hundreds more. Also actions carried out by Irish Republicans including bombings, prison escapes, kidnappings, and gun battles between the Gardaí (police) and the Irish Defence Forces against Republican gunmen from the Irish National Liberation Army, the Provisional Irish Republican Army, and a socialist-revolutionary group, Saor Éire. These attacks killed a number of civilians, police, soldiers, and Republican paramilitaries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chelsea Barracks bombing</span> 1981 IRA attack in London, England

The Chelsea Barracks bombing was an attack carried out by a London-based Active Service Unit (ASU) of the Provisional IRA on 10 October 1981, using a remote-controlled nail bomb. The bomb targeted a bus carrying British Army soldiers just outside Chelsea Barracks. The blast killed two civilians and injured 40 people, among them 23 soldiers.

This is a timeline of the events and actions during the Troubles that were carried out in Great Britain, the vast majority of which were carried out by Irish Republican paramilitaries mainly the Provisional IRA were by far the most active but both the Official IRA and the Irish National Liberation Army, also carried out a number of attacks, which included bombings and shootings. Ulster Loyalist paramilitary groups also carried out a small number of violent actions.

References

  1. Melaugh, Dr Martin. "CAIN: Chronology of the Conflict 1974". cain.ulst.ac.uk. Retrieved 31 May 2018.
  2. 1 2 Sutton, Malcolm. "CAIN: Sutton Index of Deaths". cain.ulst.ac.uk. Retrieved 31 May 2018.
  3. Sutton, Malcolm. "CAIN: Sutton Index of Deaths". cain.ulst.ac.uk. Retrieved 31 May 2018.
  4. Melaugh, Dr Martin. "CAIN: Chronology of the Conflict 1974". cain.ulst.ac.uk. Retrieved 31 May 2018.
  5. Sutton, Malcolm. "CAIN: Sutton Index of Deaths". cain.ulst.ac.uk. Retrieved 31 May 2018.
  6. Melaugh, Dr Martin. "CAIN: Chronology of the Conflict 1974". cain.ulst.ac.uk. Retrieved 31 May 2018.
  7. "Justice – Miscarriages of justice". sixthformlaw.info. Archived from the original on 7 March 2017. Retrieved 31 May 2018.
  8. Melaugh, Dr Martin. "CAIN: HMSO: Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act 1974". cain.ulst.ac.uk. Retrieved 31 May 2018.
  9. 1 2 3 4 Moysey, Steve (19 November 2013). The Road to Balcombe Street: The IRA Reign of Terror in London. Routledge. ISBN   9781317856078.
  10. https://books.google.com/books?id=oR8_DwAcAQBAJ&q=november+1974+bomb+london+piccadilly+circus&pg=PT111%5B%5D
  11. 1 2 Jones, Ian (31 October 2016). London: Bombed Blitzed and Blown Up: The British Capital Under Attack Since 1867. Frontline Books. ISBN   9781473879010.