The Year London Blew Up: [2] August to December 1974
Falcon
August 1974
The London Provisional IRA active service unit (ASU) moves into its first
London home in Fulham, in Waldemar Avenue SW6. It's clean and quiet and
there's no Irish community to speak of nearby. Here O'Connell and Dowd start
drawing up targets, using the Army List, Civil Service Yearbook, Debrett's
Peerage, Whitaker's Alamanac, Who's Who among other reference books.
5 October 1974
By this Saturday afternoon, the team is ready for their first operation. Two
young women from north London carry the bombs. Dowd drives the team to two
pubs in Guildford, Surrey in a white Avenger. O'Connell and one of the women
go into the Seven Stars pub, and Dowd and the other woman into the Horse and
Groom. As each pub fills up with army boys and WRAC, the Irish couples order
drinks. Bags containing the bombs are slipped under seats and they leave.
The four meet up in a car park. Dowd is 15 minutes late, and then they get
caught in the one-way system. They turn on the car radio to listen to the
news. At 8.30pm, the bomb at the Horse and Groom explodes and five people
(one soldier and four civilians) are killed and more than 100 were injured.
When the bomb at the Seven Stars goes off an hour later, the landlord has
been able to evacuate it and there are no injuries.
9 October 1974
Dowd and O'Connell mistakenly kidnap Basil Dalton, East Kent bus inspector,
from the coach station in Buckingham Palace Road SW1. He is later found
unharmed in the boot of his Corsair.
9-10 October 1974
Duggan and Butler arrive in London, renting another flat in Waldemar Avenue.
11 October 1974
Bombs containing coach bolts are thrown at both the Victory Club in Seymour
Street, near Marble Arch, and the Army and Navy Club in St James's Square
SW1, where 70 members of the Royal West Africa Frontier Force are having
their annual reunion.
18 October 1974
Dowd and O'Connell are disturbed by two police officers as they try keys on
cars in Semley Place SW1. Dowd draws a .45 automatic. PC Michael Lloyd is
tied up and has his watch stolen. The other police officer escapes.
22 October 1974
A 5 lb bomb is thrown at Brooks Club, 400 metres from the Army and Navy
Club. Len Murray of the TUC was inside the restaurant. Former prime minister
Edward Heath, dining nearby, comes to see the damage. Three wine waiters are
hurt.
24 October 1974
The Press Association (PA) receives a warning: 'There is a bomb at Harrow
school. There is a warning this time, but if nothing is done, there won't be
any more. If you don't move the kids, they will be OK.' The bomb at Harrow
explodes outside one of the masters' flats.
6 November 1974
The King's Arms in Woolwich is opposite the Royal Artillery depot. When the
ASU recce'd the area, they realised that they couldn't plant a bomb here;
they would have to throw it and run. They make the bomb, using bolts that
are 3 inches (7.5 centimetres) long and a seven-second fuse. They drive to
Woolwich with it, but abort the mission - there are too few customers in the
pub.
7 November 1974
Dowd, O'Connell, Duggan and Butler drive back to the King's Arms, Woolwich,
in a stolen Cortina. They park for a while, worried that they are being
watched by a man in a gas board van.
Then O'Connell throws the bomb through the pub window. It goes off before
they get back to the car. A barman and a soldier die in the explosion;
another soldier has a leg blown off. The terrorists pull away slowly, then
drive three miles before abandoning the car in Charlton. They get the bus
back to Fulham.
11 November 1974
O'Connell shoots dead 58-year-old Allan Quartermaine as he sits in his
chauffer-driven car at traffic lights in Chelsea. Quartermaine was an RAF
pilot during World War II and, until his murder, was a director of Leslie &
Gordon Ltd.
17 November 1974
IRA chief of staff Daithi O'Connellonail is interviewed on ITV's Weekend
World:
DO: Over 12 months ago, the IRA stated that they would strike at British
military personnel when and wherever they deemed necessary.
Interviewer: Even if it means killing children, even if it means killing
civilians?
DO: They warned civilians not to frequent places where military personnel
are known to have established haunts.
Interviewer: Will you escalate that campaign?
DO: We will .The British government must realise that, because of the terror
waged by troops in Ireland, they must suffer the consequences.
21 November 1974
The Provisional IRA plants bombs in two Birmingham pubs: the Mulberry Bush
and the Tavern in the Town. Twenty-one people die and 182 are injured.
22 November 1974
Reprisals in London for the Birmingham pub bombs include petrol bombs thrown
at the Prince of Wales pub in Ealing, and supermarkets have to take
Kerrygold butter off their shelves.
25 November 1974
Small bombs using pocket watches as timers are planted in three pillar
boxes: one in the Caledonian Road in north London, one at Piccadilly Circus
and one at Victoria station.
Daithi O'Connellonail in Dublin says that the IRA had not authorised the
pillar box bombing: 'To bomb civilians just because they are civilians, I
would class as murder.' This is a warning to the London ASU to stop. They
ignore it.
27 November 1974
A 'come on' bomb in Tite Street in Chelsea: Butler plants a bomb in a pillar
box and another set to explode four yards away once the explosive experts
are on the scene.
29 November 1974
The Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) is passed after an all-night sitting
of Parliament. In this 'temporary' piece of legislation, the IRA is
proscribed, the police are allowed to detain people without charge for up to
seven days, and other authorities are allowed to 'exclude' people from
entering 'mainland Britain' (which includes people from Northern Ireland).
29/30 November 1974
Police arrest (the wrong) four people for the Guildford pub bombs. Later,
Dowd says that, when the ASU heard about the arrests, they thought it was a
huge joke and roared with laughter. The 'Guildford Four' are eventually
falsely imprisoned for over 15 years.
30 November 1974
Dowd and O'Connell throw two bombs into the Talbot Arms in Little Chester
Street, Belgravia, where a singsong round a piano is in progress. The first
doesn't detonate, but the second does. The unexploded bomb is a
breakthrough, allowing the Bomb Squad to get some fingerprints.
11 December 1974
At the Naval and Military Club in Piccadilly W1, a number of MPs are
debating the return of capital punishment. The supporters of the motion -
all Tories - include Jill Knight, Norman Tebbitt, Rhodes Boyson. Frederic
Bennet, MP for Torbay tries to amend the motion to allow the Treason Act to
be amended so that terrorists are liable for capital punishment. This is
defeated 369 to 217.
While the debate is going on, O'Connell and Dowd throw a bomb into the club.
A cab driver chases them and is fired at twice. After the attack on the
Naval and Military Club, Duggan, Butler and Dowd rake the Cavalry Club, also
in Piccadilly, with fire from an M1 carbine and a sten gun.
14 December 1974
Butler and Dowd (later described by a witness as a 'baby-faced man') fire
into the Churchill Hotel in Portman Square W1.
17 December 1974
After an unidentified woman phones a warning into the Mirror newspaper, a
bomb explodes in New Compton Street in Soho. Then a second one detonates at
the Museum Telephone Exchange in Chenies Street WC1, killing 35-year-old
telephonist George Arthur. A third bomb goes off at the Draycott Avenue
Telephone Exchange in Chelsea.
19 December 1974
O'Connell parks a car with 160 sticks of gelignite outside Selfridge's in
Oxford Street. After a warning is received at the Sun newspaper, the area is
evacuated, Christmas shoppers huddling in the basement rooms of nearby pubs.
There is a massive explosion and a great deal of damage but no deaths or
injuries.
20 December 1974
O'Connell leaves a brown holdall on the platform at Aldershot rail station.
A warning phoned into the Sun allows the bomb to be successfully defused and
examined by the Royal Armaments Research and Development Establishment
(RARDE).
21 December 1974
Harrods had boasted that it was bomb-proof, so the ASU picks it as its next
target. O'Connell and Butler - with 10 lb of explosives strapped round his
waist - go into the department store and create a bomb in the store toilet.
Jack Butler (no relation), a buyer in the housewares department, spots it
and calls for an evacuation, saving all the Christmas shoppers.
22 December 1974
Former prime minister Edward Heath is considered a legitimate target because
he introduced internment in Northern Ireland. The ASU lob a 2 lb bomb on to
the first-floor balcony of his home in Wilton Street, Belgravia, where it
explodes. However, Heath has been conducting a Christmas carol concert in
his constituency at Broadstairs, Kent, and arrives 10 minutes after the bomb
goes off. No one is hurt, but a landscape painted by Winston Churchill and
given to Heath as a present is damaged.
An 11-day Christmas truce called by the Provisional IRA comes into force at
midnight.
--
Falcon:
fide, sed cui vide. (L)
westprog
"Falcon" <fal...@invalid.net> wrote in message
news:l1cSe.658$7p1...@newsfe7-win.ntli.net...
...
> PC Michael Lloyd is tied up and has his watch stolen.
This I find quite bizarre. "We will stop at nothing to free Ireland."
"Today, chaos swept Britain as hundreds of passers-by asked policemen for
the time, only to be turned away following the latest IRA campaign."
"Captured WW2 German watches have been released from storage and issued to
police stations around the country."
J/
SOTW: "When The Levee Breaks" - Led Zeppelin