The Birmingham pub bombings were carried out on 21 November 1974, killing 21 people and injuring 182 others. Six Irishmen were arrested within hours of the blasts, and in 1975 sentenced to life imprisonment for the bombings. Their convictions were declared unsafe and unsatisfactory, and quashed by the Court of Appeal in 1991. In 2017, one of the alleged perpetrators, Michael Hayes, also claimed that the intention of the bombings had not been to harm civilians. The Provisional Irish Republican Army never officially admitted responsibility for the bombing, although a former senior officer of the organisation confessed to their involvement in 2014.
About Birmingham pub bombings in brief
The Birmingham pub bombings were carried out on 21 November 1974, killing 21 people and injuring 182 others. Six Irishmen were arrested within hours of the blasts, and in 1975 sentenced to life imprisonment for the bombings. After 16 years in prison, and a lengthy campaign, their convictions were declared unsafe and unsatisfactory, and quashed by the Court of Appeal in 1991. In 2017, one of the alleged perpetrators, Michael Hayes, also claimed that the intention of the bombings had not been to harm civilians. The Provisional Irish Republican Army never officially admitted responsibility for the bombing, although a former senior officer of the organisation confessed to their involvement in 2014. The bombings were the deadliest act of terrorism to occur in England between the Second World War and the 2005 London bombings. In 1973, the Provisional IRA extended its campaign to mainland Britain, attacking military and symbolically important targets to both increase pressure on the British government, via popular British opinion, to withdraw from Northern Ireland. By 1974, mainland Britain saw an average of one attack—successful or otherwise—every three days. It is unknown precisely when these bombs were planted; if official IRA protocol of preceding attacks upon non-military installations with a 30-minute advance warning to security services was followed, and subsequent eyewitness accounts are accurate, the bombs would have been planted at these locations after 19: 30 and before 19: 47. The bomb planted inside the Mulberry Bush was concealed inside either a duffel bag or briefcase, whereas the bomb inside the Tavern Town was concealed in a briefcase or duffal bag and Christmas cracker.
If two bombs had been planted in each public house, they would likely have been placed in the same location. At 20:11, an unknown man with a distinct Irish accent telephoned the Birmingham Post and said he had a bomb in the town. The phone box had been vandalised, forcing the caller to find an alternative phone box and thus shortening the amount of time of time police had to clear the location of the bombs. The explosion at each location indicates that if two bombs were placed at each public House, they likely would be placed at the same place. The bombs were detonated in the early evening hours of 21 November, at least three bombs connected to timing devices were planted inside two separate public houses and outside a bank located in and around central Birmingham. The IRA had planned to bury James McDade in Birmingham, with a paramilitary guard of honour. These plans were altered after the British Home Secretary vowed that such a funeral, and any associated sympathy marches, would be prevented. All police leave was cancelled on this date, with an extra 1,300 officers drafted into Birmingham to quell any unrest as the hearse carrying McDade’s coffin was driven to the airport. McDade was buried in Milltown Cemetery in Belfast on 23 November. According to a senior IRA figure, tensions within the Birmingham IRA unit were \”running high\” over the disrupted funeral arrangements for McDade. The body had been scheduled to be flown to Belfast Airport, but upon learning that staff at the airport had refused to handle the coffin, his body was instead flown to Dublin.
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This page is based on the article Birmingham pub bombings published in Wikipedia (as of Dec. 02, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
