1969 in Ireland - Events

Events

  • January 1 - The People's Democracy civil rights march leaves Belfast for Derry.
  • January 4 - Militant loyalists, including off-duty B-Specials, attack the civil rights marchers in County Londonderry.
  • January 10 - Protestors in Northern Ireland defy police orders to abandon a planned march.
  • January 27 - Ian Paisley is jailed for three months for illegal assembly in Northern Ireland.
  • March 4 - The Lichfield Report is issued. It proposes the creation of a "University of Limerick" which will be "orientated towards technological subjects".
  • March 19 - The Republic of Ireland receives its first loan from the World Bank.
  • March 22 - Civil rights demonstrations take place all over Northern Ireland.
  • April 17 - Bernadette Devlin, the 21-year-old student and civil rights campaigner, wins the Mid-Ulster by-election. She is the youngest female MP ever.
  • April 20 - Troops arrive in Northern Ireland as a back-up to the Royal Ulster Constabulary.
  • April 28 - The Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, Terence O'Neill, resigns.
  • May 1 - Major James Chichester-Clark succeeds Terence O'Neill as the Northern Irish Prime Minister.
  • May 7 - The Republic's Minister for Finance Charles Haughey announces tax exemptions for painters, sculptors, writers and composers on earnings gained from works of cultural merit.
  • June 18 - Former French President General Charles de Gaulle and his wife are greeted by President de Valera at Áras an Uachtaráin.
  • July 21 - Neil Armstrong becomes the first person to set foot on the moon. President de Valera sends President Nixon a telegram of congratulations and admiration.
  • July 31 - The halfpenny is withdrawn from circulation as Northern Ireland moves towards decimalisation.
  • August 1 - A huge protest rally over events in Northern Ireland is held outside the GPO. The crowd demands that the Irish Army cross the border.
  • August 3 - Taoiseach Jack Lynch makes a state visit to the Lebanon.
  • August 5 - Belfast experiences the worst sectarian rioting since 1935.
  • August 12 - Rioting breaks out in Derry in the Battle of the Bogside, the first major confrontation of The Troubles.
  • August 13–17 - Sectarian rioting in Northern Ireland.
  • August 13 - As the Battle of the Bogside continues, Taoiseach Jack Lynch makes a speech on Southern television. He says that the Republic's government "can no longer stand by" and demands a United Nations peace-keeping force for Northern Ireland.
  • August 14 - British troops are deployed for the first time in Northern Ireland to restore law and order. Their presence is at first welcomed by many in the Catholic population of Derry.
  • August 15 - A night of shooting and burning takes place in Belfast. In Dublin a Sinn Féin protest meeting calls for the boycott of British goods, Irish government protection of the people of Northern Ireland and United Nations intervention.
  • August 16 - Soldiers are deployed into particularly violent areas of Belfast.
  • August 17 - Members of an Garda Síochána clash with protesters on O'Connell Street, Dublin, as a march against the Northern Ireland situation heads for the British embassy.
  • August 27 - The B-Specials begin to hand in their guns following a call by Lieutenant-General Ian Freeland to disband them. British Home Secretary, James Callaghan, visits Belfast.
  • August 30 - Jack Lynch orders the Irish Army Chief of Staff, General Seán Mac Eoin, to prepare a plan for possible incursions into Northern Ireland in defence of Catholic communities there, Exercise Armageddon.
  • October 10 - The Hunt Committee Report recommends an unarmed civil police force in Northern Ireland and abolition of the Ulster Special Constabulary.
  • December 1 - Fianna Fáil pays tribute to Seán Lemass as his forty-five years of public life come to an end.
  • December - The Irish Republican Army splits into Official and Provisional wings.

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