British troops take to the streets of Northern Ireland
Witness History
BBC
4.5 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 8 August 2019
⏱️ 10 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In August 1969 the British Army was first deployed in Northern Ireland. Their job was to keep the peace on the streets of Londonderry where sectarian violence had broken out. To begin with the soldiers were welcomed by residents, but attitudes soon changed and what became known as 'The Troubles' got underway.
Picture: Armed British soldiers on the streets of Northern Ireland, 15th August 1969 (Credit: Press Association)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Choosing what to watch night after night the flicking through the endless |
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| 0:16.0 | Load to games, loads of fun, loads of screaming. |
| 0:19.0 | Lovely. Off the telly with me Joanna Paige. |
| 0:21.0 | And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less |
| 0:24.9 | searching and a lot more auction listen on BBC sounds. Hello and welcome to the Witness History podcast here on the BBC World Service. |
| 0:41.0 | I'm Louis Adalgo and today I'm taking you back to August |
| 0:44.4 | 1969 when the British Army was deployed on the streets of Northern Ireland for |
| 0:49.0 | the first time. The Army would remain in Northern Ireland for 38 years, becoming a player in one of the longest sectarian |
| 0:56.4 | conflicts of the 20th century. |
| 0:58.9 | I've been talking to one of those first British soldiers and to an Irish reporter who saw them arrive. |
| 1:04.5 | This is the Civil Rights March now in the streets of London Dairy and as we walk along the |
| 1:09.8 | streets where they get cheers from people supporting the marches or on the other hand stones. |
| 1:15.0 | Inspired by the civil rights movement in the United States in the late 60s the |
| 1:20.0 | Catholics of Northern Ireland took to the streets to try to overturn what they saw as decades |
| 1:24.8 | of discrimination by Northern Ireland's Protestants. |
| 1:31.1 | By August 1969, |
| 1:32.8 | tension had erupted into riots. |
| 1:35.2 | On August the other side of the street. |
| 1:37.7 | On August the 12th, Protestant marches held their annual parade near the walls of Northern Ireland's second city, Londonerry. |
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