Did 'THE TROUBLES' effect your family in the North West ?..

Paddy20

Now that the trouble's in Northern Ireland may at last be coming to an end. How the past 35 years and more have impacted on the residents and familie's in the North-West is of interest to me.

Those years certainly had a dramatic effect on me and my relations, both north and south of the border. If this subject is of interest to you personally and you would like to share your experience's and memorie's, please share your own views .

I hope this subject is not against the North- West forum rules and regulations, if it is not, I will share my own personal experience's, but I will leave it to someone else
to open the thread properly, and I must stress this is not meant to be a 'Political thread' it is a personal experience's thread, and simply that.

If you wish to contribute, in an open and honest manner "without prejudice", I would be grateful.

Thank you.

P. :cool:

il gatto

I have relations in the North, so spent alot of time up and down during the troubles. Fortunately nobody close to me was ever killed or injured. There were alot of times when they or I was close to some incident, but never actually caught up.
Being born in the seventies and visiting the north every few weeks, it was something I took for granted. I found it very strange after the ceasefire being able to cross the border without looking down the barrell of an SA80 or a Steyr. Being stopped in the middle of nowhere in the small hours by police, UDR or soldiers was part and parcel of any time spent up there.
A few incidents stick out. Going to the sports complex on the Shankhill Road to play indoor football (don't ask:) ) was an expirience. Another was watching an Orange March go by while my grandfather was on his deathbed in the house. I didn't feel threatened in any way but to witness it up close (Portadown style, not Rossnowlagh) was strange.
Another was passing through Enniskillen the night before the Rememberence Day bomb in the wee hours, and driving around the statue on Belmore Street (outside the hall that was bombed) and going back to a chipper, and then driving back down by the hall again. It was a shock the next morning to think you'd passed by it only a few hours previous and that the bomb might already have been in place.

muffler

This is a good enough topic but be warned - it will be both strictly monitored and moderated.

il gatto

That's understandable, considering the nature of the topic, and the tendancy for people to go off on undesireable tangants when discussing it. Hopefully people will read the OP's carefully worded query before posting.

DublinWriter

I know I'm a wee-bit OT with this, but during the 80's my folks used to travel up and down to Newry quite a bit from Dublin for shopping.

As a small kid, I'll never forget the image of a British solider kneeling over the bonnet of a parked car at the canal and 'scoping and leading' passing shoppers through his rifle as the other members of his patrol moved about the corners.

My Dad refused to go back up the North after coming home being stopped by guys wearing balaclavas and holding guns quite late one dark winter's evening.

I recently went back up to Newry after about 20 years as I'm now living in East Meath and it's only 30 minutes up the road on a good day. It was great to see how 'normalised' it all was. I didn't even see one regular PSNI patrol car, never mind any British Army presence. The only thing that shocked me was the lack of any decent non-alcoholic bargains in Sainsburys!

Paddy20

muffler wrote:

This is a good enough topic but be warned - it will be both strictly monitored and moderated.

I must agree with 'muffler' on this, as I am particularly interested in the basic humanatarian personal stories that really matter.

I honestly believe people in the North-West have a unique view to express, that could prove historically important provided the posts are truthful and unprejudiced.

Many thanks to il gatto for starting the personal aspect of this very delicate thread and subject.

P. :cool:

muffler

I could write a lot about my personal experiences but I wont. Having been born and reared (some may offer a different description ) near Lifford and lived in Strabane for a couple of years its safe to say that I had mixed experiences of the troubles.

I recall how we left Strabane within a year of getting married. My wife was expecting our first child at the time and after our place was "raided" a few times she decided she had enough and had to get back out to Lifford again. It probably wouldnt have bothered her as much had she not been pregnant. In fairness any of the searches carried out at the time were done mostly without any great hassle.

In a way I was lucky enough as I had just bought my first car a couple of months beforehand and I was able to bring it out duty free when we moved (not to mention new telly that I bought the morning we moved)

Of course there were fun times as well but I will reserve one of those stories for later.

The huge difference I see nowadays compared to years ago is that you are not worried or concerned about going into the North to shop or whatever. And your family are not worried about you going in either. Another thing is being able to drive around without encountering the dreaded checkpoints. How could you ever forget the mile long tailback from the "Camels Hump" almost every day of the week.

Long live peace

flynnser19

im from near newry and im really from south armagh livin in dundalk at the moment!!i always notice that alot of people from the south of ireland have this perception of northern ireland being a bit like a iraq but its not!!its been "normalised" as u put it for a LONG time now like. the north has grown so much since them days there's nothing to fear anymore!!!

Paddy20

My first memoy of the difference between living in the Twin-Towns and Strabane, are of an incident in 1961 when I was walking back to Strabane at night in total darkness, from Lifford cinema.

Suddenly I was engulfed in a very bright white light, I could not see a thing until I walked further towards the hump back bridge, there at aged 14 I was confronted with a large sub machine gun situated on an army type jeep and a loud voice asking me "Who the hell I was and where I was going" I replied I was going to my home in lower main Street,Strabane. I was told to get on my way fast "

This was even before the real trouble's began, but it left an indelible mark on my psyche which has lasted to this day.

As I ws born in The Twin-Towns where I grew up with people of all religions and never experienced any problems, it was a sort of baptism of fire in relation to how life in Northern Ireland had been and might become.

Shortly after I emigrated to London aged only 15 years, as the atmosphere in Strabane indicated that serious trouble by way of public unrest was coming, and I would have naturally had to become involved and would no doubt be long dead as I was alway's a 'Community activist'.

I will elaborate further on how the trouble's had a startling effect on me both in the U.K. and when I came home on holiday's.

However, as this thread is for everyone, I will leave it to someone else to contribute another real life experience ?...please.


P.

AdrianR

When I was very young, back in the beginning of the seventies, things were pretty bad in the 6 counties, my grandfather on my mothers side was dead but both my grandparents on my fathers side were fit and well. When I was around 3 years old I asked one day where my other grandfather was, I was told that he was dead, I couldn't comprehend this so I asked if he got "shot up in the north". At the time for a 3 or 4 year exposed to the meadia coverage of what was going on in the north this seemed to be the simplest understanding of how someone could die.

We were over and back across the border all my life, trips in the seventies involved shopping for just about anything going as everything "up there" was cheaper, I guess some things never change. All the telivisions we ever had came from the north. When it came to checkpoints be it British army, UDR, RUC or whatever the one we dreaded most was....the Irish Customs and excise, I remember my father worrying as we passed the customs checkpoint in Swanlinbar, luckily, most of the time they never bothered even coming out to check, they just waved us on. It was said that they had a room full of TVs at the back, luckily none of our TVs were ever added to that mountain of valve technology that was said to exist there.

During the eighties there was still a steady stream of TVs heading south, this time though the shopping trips were made in cars run on petrol fumes which were only given a dacent drink on the way back home, I remember at one point in the mid eighties petrol was £1 a gallon cheaper in the north, I guess some things do change.