(c)The copyright on the original Greaves Diaries resides with Anthony Coughlan, with whom right of access and permission to publish any extracts must currently be negotiated, prior to their eventual deposition in the National Library of Ireland. Copyright relating to these abstracts and commentary belongs also to Roy Johnston, any extracts from which must be cleared by both parties. As usual, I use italics where the text is primarily my comment, or my abstraction and analysis of a major chunk of CDG text. The commentary is of course exclusively mine and should not be taken as representing the views of Anthony Coughlan on the matters referred to.

This abstracts the 1960s Greaves diaries where they relate to the genesis of the NICRA. Italics are RJ's comments.

from Volume 14

Here CDG is working quietly to get the nationalists and republicans to talk with the Belfast Trades Council on topics relating to the objectives of the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL). This is the embryo of the broad-based Civil Rights movement.

In October 26 1963 CDG visits Jack Bennett, whom he regards as identifying himself with the Republicans totally, and '...has no intention of working for any partial demands that will bring the two sides together..'. The next day he lunches with Betty Sinclair: 'she tells me Caughey came in to see her last week and told her he will act as election agent for Sinn Fein at the next election. JB confirms this but claims that the 'Irish Union' thing was Caughey's own nonsense, and that he and Caughey were summoned to Dundalk to give an account of themselves, and that Caughey deliberately left him behind so that his disagreement would not be known. And that is the way they fool about. I also met Art McMillan...'.

Back to Liverpool on November 17 1963 where he notes the first hints of what turned out to be his sister Phyllis's terminal illness; then in London from the 19th. In Hyde Park on Sunday November 24 they pass a resolution of sympathy with President Kennedy's widow, despite begrudgery from ultra-left elements. Then on December 6 there is some discussion on the question of a joint programme between the CPNI and the IWL, an issue which remained fraught with difficulties. On December 12 CDG recounts an episode in which an article of his, requested by Peace News, on 'Civil Liberties in Northern Ireland' had got suppressed, on the basis of 'expert advice' from some un-named Edinburgh academic; it seems he had not 'done the Unionists justice'. One can understand CDG's increasing distrust of academics.

The next interesting entry is on January 26 1964; it is based on the conference of the Movement for Colonial Freedom (MCF). The key issue was Fenner Brockway's Bill of Rights, aimed at bringing the Irish question back into British politics. This continues over several days; there is a delegation of nationalists staying at the Irish Club; this represented a historic link-up between the British Labour and Irish national movements. There are many pages on this, and it needs further elaboration. It seemed however that Wilson had refused to meet the delegation. CDG comments however that the CA was able to get the Nationalists to do what the Irish Embassy had been unable to do; the CA had shown itself to be a national power. He realises the weakness of the position, however: '..we have forced rather than forged unity and must not expect such an arrangement to endure..'.

from Volume 15

On June 8 he went to Dungannon and met Mrs McCluskey, whose house overlooked Dungannon on the site of the O'Neill castle. He urged her to get reliable distribution for their Social Justice publications in Britain. He welcomed Austin Currie's nomination for East Tyrone, identifying this as representative of a new wave of nationalist party energy, the old-timers all being moribund. Back then to London via Liverpool arriving June 10.

In London on July 31 1964 ....CDG has a pejorative reference to one Egan who '..came in representing some high-titled Northern Ireland Civil Rights Society... half a dozen... students wanting to make their names... and a few pounds for an article in the Observer..'. This must have been Bowes Egan, who subsequently with Michael Farrell was associated with the Peoples Democracy group in Queens. One has to ask, with hindsight, was CDG not unduly dismissive of the emergence of an interest in Civil Rights among Queens students? Could this trend not have been welcomed and cultivated, turning it in a positive direction?

from Volume 16

The overall result was positive and a significant step in the direction of achieving a cross-community civil rights movement in NI, and of breaking down the barriers between the 'catholic nationalist' tradition and that of Marxist-democracy.

On April 23 1965 the National Council for Civil Liberties conference begins, where Sean Redmond is pushing CA motions, with support from London Trades Council where Irish trade unionists had been active politically. The target is to get a public enquiry into the working of the Government of Ireland Act. The details of these entries would require analysis in greater depth in the context of a focused historical study of the work of the CA.

The next day in the evening the CA office had a visit from Scotland Yard; there had been a bomb at the Irish embassy, and they were looking for one John Read, whom they suspected, and whose name had been appended to an appeal to picket the Ulster Office, and who had give the address of the CA office. There had been some ultra-left or pseudo-left squatters in the building some days earlier. This would appear to suggest the work of the British dirty tricks department, seeking to discredit the CA with the Irish, even at this early stage of the development of a democratic political approach to the NI situation.

There took place what CDG described as a 'historic event' on May 8 1965 in the Belfast ATGWU hall: '...there were about a hundred present.... these included all political parties but Unionists and Nationalists. H(ughie) M(oore), Jim Stewart and Sean Morrissey were there. Caughey, Mulholland and a young, red-headed very Sinn-Fein-looking lad called (Gorman?) for the Republicans. Duffy, the lame lad, represented the "National Party", Cllr Allen the NILP, but Fitt and Hanna's people were absent. Many more Unions were there. It was interesting to hear the Catholic delegates of the ITGWU getting up explaining discrimination to Protestants who were listening for the first time. There was unfortunately no declaration against discrimination from a Protestant as such - though there were several speeches that assumed that attitude - and the strongest speeches came from people who described themselves as atheists, some from one side, others from the other. The republicans of course could not resist using the platform, and Sean Morrissey visibly squirmed, such is the duality of his position as an ex-republican. I had a talk with Andy Barr and HM afterwards, and all agree it was a historic event, the fact that there was here a meeting of Protestant and Catholic workers under the auspices of the Labour Movement directed to democratising the State.'

CDG subsequently held that this should have been the seed-bed for further developments,and that the NICRA as it emerged from the War Memorial Hall meeting in 1966 was doomed to disaster due to its failure to develop organic links with the labour movement. The initiative to set up the NICRA came via the Dublin Wolfe Tone Society, basically from Anthony Coughlan. It did not follow organically from the above May 6 1965 meeting. We are here in the presence of one of history's fortuitous events, in that CDG in the following months became increasingly concerned with his sister Phyllis's fatal illness. Had he been pursuing his normal priorities he would undoubtedly have been cultivating the opportunities opened up by this meeting, so that the War Memorial Hall initiative, which came from AC via the WTS in Dublin, would have not seemed necessary. The NICRA or its equivalent would perhaps have emerged with a stronger trade union basis. The politicising republicans would have supported this, without being able to project a sense of 'ownership', as subsequently happened with the NICRA, to the detriment of the latter.

from Volume 18

(SR is Sean Redmond, then Secretary of the Connolly Association)

This is a reference to the seminal War Memorial Hall meeting from which the NICRA arose. It had come about on the initiative of the Dublin WTS, via the Belfast WTS, and prior work had been done on the republican network at the two Maghera meetings in Kevin Agnew's house; the first was to plan the meeting with the aid of the Belfast WTS, and the second was to persuade the republican grassroots to support it, while keeping their heads down. The second of these meetings was the one referred to by Tim Pat Coogan as having involved Eoin Harris. The role of the latter, who at the time was a somewhat uncommitted fringe member of the Dublin WTS, was simply to read the Coughlan script, Coughlan being committed elsewhere on the day (having to go to his father's funeral), and the present writer, who should have read it being the Dublin WTS representative, being inhibited by a stammer.

Speakers at the War Memorial Hall meeting from Dublin included Kader Asmal, the leader of the anti-apartheid movement, Ciaran Mac an Aili, who was explicitly a supporter of non-violence and had played an earlier Civil Rights role in the republican interest, and Professor Michael Dolley, of Queens. Writer John D Stewart was in the chair. So it seems CDG was aware of the War Memorial Hall meeting and was supportive of the initiative, which must be credited to Anthony Coughlan, who produced the seminal Tuairisc paper from the Dublin WTS.

Work continues in London in the CA and elsewhere; then there is a long entry on December 8 1966 in the middle of which the following occurs:

'...the Irish Times had a report that Fitt was speaking favourably of the EEC. I had a letter from Art McMillan and mentioned this in my reply. I also wrote to JB and suggested a campaign to lift the ban on the UI so the people on the Falls Road can see the case against entry...'. The next day SR reported on the NCCL meeting the previous night: '...there was a letter from McCartney reporting on the Belfast meeting which complained that "too many republicans" were there, and what was as bad JB (Jack Bennett) seemed to be running things. Some of them had objected to taking up civil liberties other than political ones. Tony Smythe disclosed that when the meeting was announced the NILP had rung NCCL to ask if they were running it. They replied in the negative. Now they want Tony Smythe to go over as quickly as he can. SR was against this. He too was hesitant. Ennals looked on with a sardonic smile. One of McCartney's complaints was that "too many people from Dublin" were at the meeting - they were indeed McAnally who defended Smythe after he had been bitten by the police dog that took a snap at Dr Browne, and Kader Asmal whose father-in-law is on the same EC. But SR had the impression that there had been fierce battles on the Irish question for a long time past. We decided to urge JB to invite Smythe, and thus to spike McCarthy's guns...'.

The next day January 1 1967 CDG records that AC told him that '..the Belfast Civil Liberties meeting was most representative, and that Eddie McAteer was present. Also McCartney made himself most objectionable, and tried to prevent the committee being established, objecting that this would prevent the British NCCL from doing anything. It was generally agreed that it would not. AC added that McCartney blocked the anti-apartheid in the same way. He regards McCartney as a soured embittered individualist who must rule. But JB regards him as a careerist.

(AC is of course Anthony Coughlan)

Back to Liverpool and then London, where on March 16 1967 CDG has a visit from Sean Garland: '...Last night AC telephoned saying that there might be ructions in Belfast next weekend and that somebody was coming to see us about sending an observer... (this) proved to be Sean Garland. I had met him for two minutes once at Cathal's. He told me that the Republican Clubs, which had been made illegal in the Six Counties, had decided to defy the law and hold a Convention in the Ard Scoil Divis St on Sunday. They wanted me and Sean to go, as many British MPs as possible, and observers of all kinds. What were we going to observe? He could not say, anything might happen. I roundly ticked him off for not consulting us over something he wanted us to take part in, and added that I could think of nothing more foolish than for an illegal organisation to bring all its members together in one place ready for the authorities. I did not think that we would participate. However I would see what could be done about observers. I asked why they had decided on this action, and he replied that they felt that if they did not do something they might as well give in. I would prefer the alternative course of a legal campaign for the lifting of the law, I said. He was throwing in his main forces without consulting his allies, merely expecting them to follow suit, and I was afraid they might split the Civil Liberties committee over there. He listened to all this quite quietly. He was here to get what he could, I presume, and an observer would be better than nothing...'.

The next day March 17 1967 we have '..Garland came again in the morning. I got him to tell SR what he had told me before I told Sean my own view. SR did not perhaps put things as forcefully, but his conclusion was the same. I then asked SR to take him up to Tony Smythe, and see what NCCL would do. They went up, and came back laughing. Instead of urging caution, Smythe had thumped the table and cried "That's the way to treat those laws! Direct Action!". He was all for the NCCL sending somebody, and later offered to go himself if we paid for the trip and his EC members did not object. Meanwhile we wired the Leicester group of Amnesty International which is studying the Special Powers Act. Johnson telephoned and said he thought somebody would go, and I phoned JB asking him to have these facts announced. Smythe was to meet Garland at the dance at the Porchester Hall (this was the annual St Patrick's Day event organised by the CA). Marcus Lipton was there. "I hope Tony Smythe is not going to get into trouble" he said to J(oe) D(eighan) as he left... "...two weeks jail will not hurt him and 'twill make wonderful propaganda..". When speaking to Garland I adverted to the prospect that Amnesty's man would be hit on the head by the RUC. He replied "we can only pray for it". So these allies are highly expendable..!.

Smythe said his EC had decided he should go, and leaked stories to the papers, and started arranging a press conference at London Airport to mark his triumphant return. The next day, March 18 1967, after noting the performance of the ultra-left element who had infested the dance unsuccessfully, they met in the office. SR was to get an emergency resolution passed at the conference of the MCF. Contact with Belfast trade union people (DATA) indicated that they could not touch it. From JB it emerged that the convention had been 'cleared' by the police: '...in other words an illegal organisation had asked police permission to hold a meeting of its entire membership, and had obtained it.... Kelleher was in the office at the time and told us that AC was going. But he entirely agreed that we would be wise not to do so, as we would hardly be classed as disinterested observers, and would be fulfilling the purpose the republicans wanted us to fulfil rather than the one decided at our own conference...'.

.....Then later JB rang from Belfast to the effect that Craig had announced on the radio that the convention was after all banned, whereupon the republicans announced that they would hold it in a 'secret place'. JB was left with the problem of how to get the observers there, which presumably was resolved; in the March 20 entry he notes that there were 80-100 people present, including Gerry Fitt, Betty Sinclair and Tony Coughlan. Six resolutions were passed. The preamble had involved the Trades Council, to which Betty Sinclair objected, as they had not been consulted in advance. '..They cannot involve organisations through individuals..'. In the aftermath Tom Mitchell was arrested, and Tony Smyth and Gerry Fitt went to enquire about him were told he was not there, though they could see him. '..The second in command, who is to take over shortly, showed visible embarrassment - and spoke with an impeccable Oxford accent..'.

Regrettably the record of this episode from the SF side is missing; they had after the 1966 Ard Fheis set up a Standing Committee to work between Ard Comhairle meetings, and did not get round to minuting it properly until the following June. It was clearly a seminal event. Yet its impact was already being undermined by Mac Stiofain, who claims in his memoirs to have been organising from 1967 the Northern IRA units from the angle of military intelligence, in a role given him by Goulding. The process was riven with contradictions.

Routine CA business continues, between London, Liverpool and Glasgow; on April 17 there is a mention of how the Clann na hEireann people had been to Dublin to see if it was OK for them to join the CA: '..The idea was abroad that CG had urged them to "make use of" the CA and it was very clear to me that my man was completely oriented in this direction..'. The entry continues with an analysis of the current 'left-republican honeymoon' and problems of dual membership, with the prospect of the CA becoming a 'front' organisation.

After various events and contacts in Scotland CDG goes on April 20 1967 to Belfast from Glasgow, where he meets with Betty Sinclair in her office: '...She told me that she discovered that when she was prevented from speaking at Casement Park it was not the fault of the GAA but that the republicans had cold feet at the last minute. How she found this out was that on the way to Murlough last year Sean Steenson drove her up in his car. "I believe you objected to my speaking last year" she remarked. "Not a bit of it". The republicans had told her they would be delighted to have her but they had been threatened that if she spoke they would never get the Park again. Even when she got to Murlough she was left off the agenda and the chairman was closing the meeting after SR spoke. But one of the officials ran to the chairman. Betty wondered it a fight would ensue. Then the chairman, a local man, said "Miss Sinclair wished to say a few words". Such is he fear of Communism...'.

CDG continues on Betty Sinclair: '...she described the banned meeting, and her remarks which Tony Smythe had dismissed as "striking a jarring note". There were of course reasons: she had objected to the description of the six counties as a police State because it was to frighten people. She told Tom Mitchell "what a job you could have done for us if you had taken your seat - a real Irishman there." And she described refusal to enter Leinster House as "mock heroics". Then, later: '...at a meeting of the Civil Liberty organisation Billy McMillan had said there should be free speech for everybody, to which she replied "you stopped me from speaking at Casement Park". He blushed a deep red..'.

Later CDG gets to talk to Liam (Billy) McMillan, Art's brother (and at that time O/C of Belfast RJ). There was talk of a possible trip to London in June. '...he showed me an exercise book in which he was endeavouring to get to grips with political ideas. He said "the Army would like to co-operate with everybody, including Communists, but there is a strong group of old-fashioned Sinn Fein in the way". He asked if I thought Betty Sinclair would co-operate in a campaign against unemployment. I said I was sure she would provided they did not attempt to usurp the functions of the Labour Movement. For that is the danger. She thinks they are all very suspicious of Protestants, and that the Protestants feel lost, not knowing what nationality they belong to, or having any history or culture. But he did not show signs of this. He is probably the most thoughtful and broadminded though the brother is more forceful...'.

Here CDG is getting to grips with the width of the culture-gap between the left-politicising Belfast IRA and the Protestant radical tradition which was expressed in the CP. I was of course aware of this, and was similarly feeling my way towards bridging it. He goes back across the water on April 21, after a brief encounter with Sean Caughey, who expressed a high opinion of Gerry Fitt, and was optimistic about the way things were going. CDG spends some time in Scotland and then is back in London on April 24 1967.

There is a long gap in NICRA-related references, with CDG occupied mainly with the CA and his writings.

from Volume 20

CDG must by now have been regretting his inability to encourage the follow through from the May 6 1965 event, which had been the seed-bed for the alternative approach to Civil Rights, rooted in the Labour Movement. He must have been regretted his being relatively immobilised by his sister's illness at this crucial time; most of his Irish contacting had been in the context of historical research. Those with the hands-on experience, such as AC and myself, he must have seen as taking initiatives which in some cases he would have regarded as ill-advised.

He returns to Dublin, and stays until October 14, when he returns to London. Later on October 19 1968 he encounters Betty Sinclair, who regales him with the '..sharp internal differences within the Civil Rights Committee.. the anti-communism of Heatley. What is bad is the refusal of the CP to participate effectively. At the Political Committee when she raised the question the Chairman Andy Barr looked at his watch. She says that both he and Graham wanted TU jobs, and Barr particularly will fight strenuously any line of policy that would lose him ground in the trade union. This Party policy is made subordinate to the Sheet Metal Union - the old old story, the unholy alliance I have been battering my head against for twenty and more years... Of McCann she says if he was on the platform she would walk off... she has high praise for McAteer who... stood by her side through the meeting. We discussed the republicans who she says are very difficult to work with. They invited her to one of their committee meetings, secret no doubt, but she did not go. I said I thought she was right..'.

A proposal had arisen, initiated by Heatley, to the effect that those who had participated in the 'illegal march' at Derry should sign a paper saying they had done so. Betty agreed initially to this at the meeting, then went home and had second thoughts, conveying these to McAneany the secretary, who also began to have doubts. Together they went to a third, who felt the same. Heatley was indignant. Some compromise formula was agreed.

Betty, whose heart was in the right place, was thus being left out on a limb by the Party. Her wavering on the signing issue must have been influenced by her relative exposure. The inability of the Labour Movement to take up the issues in the manner that CDG had hoped must have been increasingly obvious.

The Connolly Association conference took place on November 23-24 1968 in the MCF Hall; CDG has little to say about the conference itself, except to mention the presence of '..quite a few young people..'. There was an observer from Clann na hEireann, and representatives from the Campaign for Democracy in Ulster (CDU). '..There was a general feeling that the Unionist "reforms" meant nothing but window dressing, but we deferred our campaign for a Bill of Rights until a campaign of pressure had been undertaken to press for their enlargement.. next Sunday efforts will be made at Belfast to "soft-pedal" the campaign, McAteer leading the way. This may well happen, and I can imagine that people like Andy Barr, who has been getting Paisley resolutions in their unions, might also prefer things to go that way. It will be very interesting to see the outcome..'.

The crucial year 1969 begins for CDG with news of Betty Sinclair, who has broken her wrist slipping on ice, but is expected over the following week. She makes contact however on the phone on January 2 1969: '..the civil rights marchers were held up at Randalstown and would we try to do something about it. We got Brockway and people like that to send wires and phone calls. And in the evening we got 12 people on a poster parade along Oxford Street...'. He notes however a hint of 'trotskyism', about which ultra-leftist threat he has shown increasing concern.

In Belfast on February 26 1969 he tried to contact Betty Sinclair and Hughie Moore a Belfast CP official; both were out. In the end he tracked down McAnerny who filled CDG in on how the students movement was being taken over by 'manipulators' who are no longer students themselves. '...A carefully packed meeting, poorly attended by the ordinary members, was called, and the candidates went up... The "manipulators" will not allow properly constituted committees of officers. The world and his wife can come in... these "scuts" as McAnerny calls them are trying to oust Betty Sinclair from the chairmanship of the NICRA. The Derry pair, Hume and Cooper, disaffiliated from the NICRA so as to be able to pursue their political ambitions..'. He then goes into the origins of Hume and his role in ousting McAteer. CDG goes on: '..McAnerny is not a republican. He is not even anti-partitionist. He wants to remain with the UK and continue to receive British subsidies. But he is a level-headed rational small businessman, very solid, sociable and broad-minded. He has no objection to the students preaching "Trotskyist communism" but objects to its being done under his banner...'. Later he saw Hughie Moore who predicted Betty was in for a tough time. He then went to Dublin on the Enterprise, and was met by AC, in whose house he stayed....

After some historical contacting on March 4 CDG arrives back at Cathal's to find '...C(athal) G(oulding), S(eamus) C(ostello) and another republican drinking with Tony... there was a great argument. I find them personally very modest but politically very arrogant. I was trying to head them off this move that is being planned for creating a breakdown of law and order that will compel England to abolish Stormont. "But that would be no harm" says CG "it would show it is Britain's responsibility". I had great difficulty in persuading him that this was now admitted (and) we must move on to the next stage - working out a policy. I don't know whether much was agreed, but they will think over what has been said, and, what I forgot to say at the start, they had come up so as to find out my views on matters in general..'.

In New Books (in Dublin) later on March 8 CDG picks up from Sean Nolan that '...the development in Belfast is about as bad as could be.. Betty Sinclair had gone up for the chairmanship of NICRA and received only two votes. One of the PD people got it (Frank Gogarty) and the vice-chairman is Vincent McDowell, who doesn't even live in the six counties, but in Dublin! The republicans voted against Betty. I was talking to MOR about this....' It seems that MOR had been on to CG and had been reassured that the republicans would support Betty; in fact it had the status of an "order", but they disobeyed...'.

CG is Cathal Goulding the IRA chief; MOR is Micheal O Riordain the IWP chief. At this time they were attempting some degree of political convergence.

This was the crunch issue; Betty would have helped keep the NICRA on a constitutional path avoiding adventurism; the new leadership represented a move towards the adventurist 'abolition of Stormont via breakdown of law and order' policy. The republican vote was crucial, but McMillan and McGurran, who were attempting to implement republican support for basically moderate NICRA policies, lacked the political experience necessary to contain the adventurist policies being promoted by the PD group (Boyle, Farrell, Gogarty et al). The 'chain of command' emanating from the Dublin politicisers was no substitute for political skill.

CDG confines his comments to local and CA matters until May 8 1969 when he notes a meeting of the NICRA at the Irish Club, with the '...embassy-controlled United Ireland Association very much in evidence... the republicans are completely untrustworthy and cannot keep out of intrigue. Their connection with the Embassy is quite noticeable over a period...'.

This merits further investigation. I suspect this may have been an early indication of what later became a concerted Fianna Fail intrigue to take over the NICRA, rather than actually a republican initiative. I am surprised that CDG does not pick this up. A republican initiative involving the embassy in London is somewhat incredible.

He has the following comments on May 14: '...what is clear is that the petite-bourgeoisie, always plentiful in Irish circles in London, are moving in to make the Civil Rights issue their own. We decided we would make the Bill of Rights case. Miss Devlin is squatting with gypsies in Middlesex now. It seems likely to me that NICRA will end as a farce. The Trafalgar Square rally they had planned for June 22 (selecting the date Clann na hEireann are at Bodenstown, and the day we usually have the square) has got the Devlin woman, Hume and Cooper speaking. They are all left-wing opportunists. It will be a mad meeting. But after a time there may be no bandwagon to jump on. Eamonn McCann says that in order to win the Protestants the Civil Rights movement needs to "split horizontally". He thinks if they kick out the middle-class Catholics they will win the working-class Protestants. So all that may be left are the three Labour movement organisations, CA, CDU, MCF. What is useful is that there is a certain measure of agreement...'.

CDG visits Belfast on June 5 1969, and then goes on down to Dublin, where he stays with AC. In Belfast he meets Betty Sinclair, who had been near a nervous breakdown: '...she felt naturally displeased with Moore and Barr who showed no interest in her work, and then listened to Mrs McGlade's chatter passed through CG and MOR back to Belfast. She was surprised to have annoyed some of the republicans... she was also upset that MOR had not come to her first, and rightly so. She says she has kept a full diary of all the events in the past few months and it should be an interesting record. She criticises HM and Stewart. They cut out of one of her articles a derogatory reference to Chinese policy because it might offend the young people who are pro-Chinese. They are boosting Peoples Democracy in their paper because it has certain support..'.

I have made enquiries about the Betty Sinclair diary and so far drawn a blank. If this ever turns up it could be important.

Talking to O Riordain on June 7 1969 CDG picks up the Dublin version of the Betty Sinclair story; it seems she got drunk at a CPNI party and insulted some republicans who blew in. The Party dismissed her from the executive, and banned her from the paper. MOR disagreed with this. CDG: '...time we all grew up..'. Betty's support for the NICRA was personal; she lacked official support from the Trades Council of from the Party. The stress inherent in this situation would have made her drink problem more acute.

Business as usual then between Liverpool and London, until August 16 1969 when CDG phones Jack Bennett in Belfast to get a report on the situation: '..he expressed the opinion that the IRA was operating in such a way as to bring about a breakdown of "law and order" so that British troops would be brought in..'. He echoes Goulding as evidenced in the arguments of March 4 noted above. CDG goes on: '..but you don't mean to say that they've risked raising this sectarian frenzy?..'. JB. somewhat irritated, supposed they had, but it would '..break the deadlock..'. CDG swore he would not go to see JB when next in Belfast.

This supports the hypothesis that the Northern IRA units were beginning to be under the influence of Mac Stiofain, who wanted to provoke a military response, and that the trend into politicising via the Clubs had stalled or gone into reverse; Mac Stiofain appears to claim this in his memoirs. On the other hand, Jack Bennett could have been absorbing disinformation spread by those planning the pogrom. The lack of arms in Belfast supports the latter hypothesis.

There was a meeting on August 16 1969 in King St, the CPGB HQ, between representatives of the 3 CPs; Micheal O Riordan for the IWP, Hughie Moore and Jimmy Stewart for the CPNI, John Gollan, George Matthews, Palme Dutt and others for the CPGB; CDG and SR were there as from the Irish Committee of the CPGB; they sat with MOR. JG opened by introducing a Soviet statement which had come on on the teleprinter, said to be 'erroneous'. CDG was worried in case they would concentrate on setting the USSR to rights, but his fears were groundless; Gollan led off with '...a serious and understanding statement which showed he was a man of considerable imagination. Naturally the Russians deserved an answer, but after some discussion they decided not to give it priority, but to concentrate on bringing out a tripartite statement, which they did, CDG doing the drafting. The IRA statement was mentioned in passing; MOR had studied it and concluded it was Goulding's; CDG had thought it might have been mine. It was indeed Goulding's.

Without having the text of the (CPGB) statement to hand, it is possible to infer from CDG's notes that they wanted reform imposed on Stormont by legislation at Westminster under Article 75 of the GIA, rather than to support Lynch's call for UN intervention. Simply to withdraw the troops would be a recipe for extended pogroms.

On August 22 1969 CDG arrives in Belfast, and rings JB, who '...had his bellyful of "breaking the deadlock"..', but was helpful; they went to see Andy Barr: '..he was quite shaken. He is an extremely pleasant person, and was pleased when I told him we intended to pursue the encouragement of reconciliation between the two religions. He said that perhaps he had gone too far in trying to keep open relations of co-operation with Protestants. The trouble was now that men he had known all his life would no longer talk politics with him. The events of the past few weeks had converted the moderates into bigots..'.

Later he sees Gerry Fitt, who described the desperation on the Falls Road and the demand for arms. He had rung Callaghan and got a secretary; finally he got through to the man himself, and soon afterwards the troops came in. Presumably Callaghan had consulted Wilson. Subsequently Callaghan promised to disarm the B-men, and assured Fitt that the reason he was not doing it at one blow was that the arms would then mysteriously disappear. Fitt was on top of the world, and quite convinced that what had happened was a result of a 'plan' that CDG and he had hatched in the car on the road between Liverpool and Manchester. The next step was to get the B-Specials to fire on the British troops. '...Between you and me that's being fixed up now..'.

I have looked back at this entry, which was on May 26 1968, and I can see no evidence of a 'plan' as such, but some evidence that Fitt was in a position to influence Wilson to be critical of the RUC and B-Special situation. This is I think confirmed in the Crossman diaries.

The same day he toured the Falls area with Jimmy Stewart, observing the barricades, and how they had defended themselves against the pogrom. There were 75,000 people behind the barricades. CDG concluded that '..this was no spontaneous pogrom, but a highly organised and well prepared attempt to drive the Catholics out of the city and set up a Paisleyite dictatorship to forestall the introduction of democratic rights..'.

Coming down to Dublin he observed the 'solidarity' meeting on O'Connell St, encountering CMacL, AC, RHWJ, Derry Kelleher, John de Courcy Ireland, Micheal O Loingsigh, Con Lehane, MOR '...indeed everybody..'. He mentioned to AC that he had missed his Democrat deadline. AC went off to a meeting in the UI office. The reason AC let CDG down over his deadline was that AC was helping to produce a special issue of the UI. Noel Harris remarked to him that AC seemed to be following in RJ's footsteps. MOR remarked that "Tony thinks he's following Desmond, but he's not". It seems I tried to defend AC on grounds of the urgency of the situation. According to Cathal AC had produced a document for the WTS which they had had to throw out. CDG noted that Andy Barr had produced a document for a Belfast CPNI meeting which they had to reject; he got this from Jimmy Stewart.

from Volume 21

The next day October 23 CDG notes an attempt to recruit Peter Mulligan, a CA stalwart, into the IRA. It is indicated that there apparently is an intention to resume military action in 1971. This must be an indication of Mac Stiofain's followers already active, prior to the split. It is basically confirmed in Mac Stiofain's memoirs, in principle, though not in detail. He was engaged in active military planning from 1967, either under the false impression that this was what Goulding actually wanted, or, alternatively, with the intention of actively restoring the military agenda, despite the then Army Council policy.

The Connolly Association conference met on November 30 1969; CDG characterises it as a 'recall of the one wrecked by NICRA'. There were delegates from Birmingham, Coventry, Manchester, Oxford and London; the MCF was there, and a few LP and TU people. Hume it seems is in favour of people joining the Ulster Defence Regiment. CDG regards the formation of latter as an 'astute move' on the part of the British, going on to make the remark that '..the absence of theoretical clarity in Belfast left circles seems to prevent their extending influences on the nationalists, who are heavily divided... the IRA members of London NICRA were a the NICRA conference in Belfast..'.

On December 6 CDG receives a letter from Micheal O Riordain, who wants to meet with him urgently, to discuss the question of the republican/IWP school, which has been off, but is now on again. He mentioned that he had finished his life of Frank Ryan. This was the 'Sheelin Shamrock' school, which occurred subsequent to the split, and represented another high point in the left-republican convergence process. More on this later.

In Belfast on December 17 1969 CDG encountered Betty Sinclair, now 'rehabilitated'. She had heard of this 'National Liberation Front' between the republicans and communists; what did it mean? '...She thought the republicans complete amateurs and was hesitant about entering into formal arrangements with them, the more so since it would seem that they would take things their way...'. The Belfast Trades Council was losing affiliations due to amalgamations. When CDG told her Sean Redmond was leaving she said she would not mind the job herself. She would never have returned to Belfast had not McCullough persuaded her. Jimmy Stewart was taking on a full-time position in the Party, but Betty thought the position was not healthy, as a number of Protestant members were falling out. JS was now caught up like JB in the excitement of republicanism, and was now talking like the IRA.

Later in the Engineers Club with Betty and John McClelland he picks up that '..the Protestant community is sour and suspicious. Arms are coming in all the time. Everybody confidently predicts civil war and regards it as inevitable. Of NICRA he says they are all at sea. The McCluskeys helped "Peoples Democracy" oust Betty. Now they want to remove those who did the former service for them; above all they cannot grasp British responsibility. As for Edwina Menzies who was to replace Betty and set things straight again, she is on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Not that I would have any sympathy for her, after the way she came over to London reporting that she had accepted the bogus London "NICRA" (another name for the IRA) because they could gather people "who would not work with the Connolly Association"..'.

Down to Dublin on December 18 1969 where CDG meets with Micheal O Riordain. The joint school is to be in a hotel in Cavan. There is a proposal to amalgamate the IWP and the CPNI into the CPI. CDG was uneasy about the name, and would have preferred if they had agreed on a joint programme and action first. He goes on: '..I think that recent events have toppled them too far. They do not see that the anti-imperialist forces went into action ideologically unprepared and without their allies, or the allies they could have had later. The two qualities which so often go with Irish courage are precipitancy and intellectual arrogance. And these are about in plenty now. MOR thinks that if they combine forces they would have to think of a national policy. So he is set on speedy reunification and showed me a document. I said nothing, but I had it in my pocket. Betty Sinclair had given me it. It has its points. But it smacks of the "National Liberation Front", which they say is RHJ's invention.... Incidentally they tell me that the IRA has had schools and that they use the group system favoured by the British CP, and who introduced it to them? The same man, I do not doubt without acknowledgement...'.

I did indeed introduce the group system, with discussion of issues introduced in plenary session, and subsequent feedback to the plenary, and I probably did credit the CPGB with having pioneered it in the 1940s, though it had by then since become quite general, and could hardly have been regarded as CPGB property! Is this perhaps a slightly 'petite-bourgeois' attitude on the part of CDG?!

The 'NLF' canard has assumed, to my mind, an undue importance in people's minds. It was never intended as a slogan or a name of a confederating body, or a real movement involving any formal amalgamation. It was used by Mac Stiofain and others to imply the existence of a 'communist threat'. Insofar as I ever used it, it was to connote a process of expansion of the movement to soak up a broader range of progressive forces than Sinn Fein itself, and the embedded politicising IRA who were activating Sinn Fein. The 'Freedom Manifesto' as published in the February 1970 United Irishman is an outline of what we then had in mind for a broader movement.

We were never very specific about this process, but the feeling I had was that the IWP-CPNI amalgamating into the CPI was politically a non-starter, and would be moribund due to the dead hand of Stalinism. People disillusioned with this might be able to think their way into joining an expanded, integrated and politicised republican movement which, as well as the primary objective of national unity through democratic reform in the North, had the core democratic Marxist objective of attaining democratic control over the capital investment process, and creating a friendly environment to co-operative enterprise. The 'NLF' was, for a time, a convenient in-house label for this concept, which we used during internal discussions. We never managed to think of a good name for the concept, although viewed retrospectively it was perfectly valid, taking on board as it did a recognition of the developing crisis in post-Stalinist Marxist orthodoxy, which came to a head subsequently in 1989.

There is a record on December 20 1969 of an encounter with the present writer, on his home ground. It seems I assured him that Brendan McGill, who had been behind various London events, was not acting for the IRA, but was linked with Blaney and co who were influencing the Derry movement from Donegal, in the Fianna Fail interest. CDG found this incredible, as he did my assertion that the Dublin leadership was not behind the Smullen episode in Huddersfield. I told him I had pulled out from all leading bodies, and that the recent Convention had voted 31/8 in favour of political participation. The SF Ard Fheis of course was still to come, as indeed was the verdict of the electorate.

from Volume 22

Back in the NICRA offices Jimmy Stewart arrived and took CDG up to the '...Defence Committee rooms. There were moves on foot to transform it into a Catholic Defence Committee. The priests were coming in, and NICRA is being denounced as "communist". I felt uneasy about the whole position...'. There was discussion about the Ardoyne proposal to re-route Orange processions; CDG's demand would have been to ban them.

On November 22 1970 CDG notes that the Belfast NICRA has endorsed the McRory report, of which he does not approve, writing so to McCorry. Effective local government is gone. The next day he notes that the WTS and the CCL in Dublin have endorsed the draft Bill of Rights. Then on December 1 he learns from Sean Nolan in Dublin that AC is coming to London to attend an EEC meeting; it turns out the next day that AC is to speak at the meeting, filling in for Justin Keating, who has cried off. AC is increasingly putting his efforts into the anti-EEC campaign, the Northern question having become intractable due to the developing Provisional campaign.

On December 11 1970 he gets a letter from one Roland Kennedy, addressing him as 'Dear Sir', and announcing the planning of a massive demonstration for July 11. He goes on '..I was angry and decided not to take it lying down. These people are parasites. They call themselves NICRA, though NICRA Belfast has no branches and its constitution does not provide for it. This enables them to parade in NICRA's cloak..'.

CDG is in Liverpool on January 12 1971 when he gets a phone-call from Sean Redmond to the effect that '..the invitation to Belfast has come..'. It is not clear if it is for him personally or for the CA. It relates to the NICRA conference. Also it seems John Hume has drafted a Bill of Rights of his own. CDG conjectures that pressure has been put on Hume to '...get something prepared as an alternative to the thing those Reds have prepared..'.

This theme extends in the January 18 1971 entry; the Belfast NICRA wants CDG at their conference as the CA's representative, as '..the only organisation doing anything in Britain..'. It seems however that the 'London NICRA' was in a position to claim that it was acting at the express request of the Belfast NICRA. There is evidence of some confusion. On January 22 CDG arrives in Belfast and as usual goes to see Betty Sinclair, who had been at a meeting of West European CPs, and had '..expected to see me there..'. She gave her impressions: '..the old camaraderie of pre-war years has gone... the Dutch will not sign anything... the Italians did not seem to care about anybody but themselves..'. She went on to tell him '..that whereas the Republicans for all their faults would be glad to have Joe Deighan and John McClelland on the Civil Rights executive, the Party (which means the Stewarts) has vetoed it. I was unable to get any closer to the problem..'.

It seems we are increasingly up against the problem of limited political understanding within the CPNI of the nature of the civil rights question, and the role of the republicans, in the NI political context. The reluctance of the Belfast CP to back Joe Deighan or John McClelland, former CA members who were now in the CP, for the NICRA Executive, was probably due to their long-standing opposition to the policies of Greaves and the CA.

The next day January 23 1971 CDG decides to go to Derry and see Hume, which he does, successfully; Hume makes him welcome, and shows him round the place. It turns out that Hume's 'Bill' is not a Bill at all, but a copy of his submission to the Crowther Commission. He tried to see Kevin Agnew on the way back, was entertained to tea by his wife, who said Kevin was in Enniskillen with McDowell. Kevin was to chair the meeting the next day. This he describes in some detail on January 24; he formed the opinion that it was the result of an 'orange-communist' cabal, analogous to the NILP. Speakers were Kader Asmal, CDG, then Hume. CDG spoke with a 'strong republican bias' given the situation. He suggests that 'they were at their old trick, to demand something and then object to it when they got it, to pose as great reformers before the republicans, but by doing nothing decisive, to hold the Orangemen and the NILP. Hume had been brought in in an effort to confuse the issue..'.

CDG here was attempting to develop a critique of the CPNI, whose role in the development of the NICRA had been ambiguous. In fact this NICRA conference, which took place in St Mary's Hall, Belfast, seems to have been a genuine though somewhat confused attempt to develop public support for the Bill of Rights approach, initiated by CDG in Britain, and which the Goulding republicans were now backing. The CPNI were trying to extend the conference to economic questions. There was also an undercurrent of anti-communism against which they had to try to swim. Kevin Agnew acted as chairman of this public meeting; he was now on the NICRA Executive, reflecting increased political republican influence. This is an important departure - an attempt to push the idea of the Bill of Rights as a 'media via' in Belfast. The initiative for it would have come from Kevin McCorry and Malachy McGurran, the leading NICRA political republicans.

In Liverpool on April 11 1971 CDG receives a visit from AC who regales him with the '..carve-up..' of the NICRA executive positions between the '..IRA and the CP..'. he meant the CP and the Republican Club representatives, some of whom may residually have considered themselves as the 'official IRA' but whose motivations were still political; the leading person in this context was Malachy McGurran. The 'primarily IRA' element had by now gone 'provisional', and would end up suppressing NICRA meetings. Joe Deighan and John McClelland, who were ex-CA stalwarts with long experience of democratic lobbying in the London environment, were sidelined. This reflected a 'Left-Republican convergence' in the worst sense; and it persisted later with organisations like the Resources Protection Campaign in the south: the heavy-handed Stalinist top-down tradition and the Fenian conspiratorial top-down tradition were the key converging philosophies, both being pathological, in a context where a broad movement was needed. In such a situation there was little room for ordinary civil rights activists.

In Belfast on 26th CDG met with Hughie Moore and others, urging them to produce an anti-sectarian pamphlet. Joe Deighan has become more active, and Bobby Heatley has been making mincemeat of the PD. One gets an impression of a withdrawal from the Northern issues and a focusing on the EEC, supported by a general disillusion with the Left. Back in London on April 28 1971 it turns out that Fenner Brockway's Bill of Rights is again on the agenda. This occupies much time and space, culminating in a lengthy account of the lobby on May 5.

The objective of the lobby was to support the introduction of the Bill of Rights, which had been personally drafted by Greaves following discussions with Arthur Latham MP, Geoffrey Bing QC and Lord Brockway, as a private members Bill into both the House of Commons and the House of Lords on 12 May. In the House of Commons the Tories imposed a three-line whip to refuse it a second reading. This was granted in the Lords, but it was defeated on a second reading there in June. This was the pinnacle of CDG's achievement on the Bill of Rights and puts the other entries in context. I leave further exploration of the significance of this to the political historians.

I pass over the next few weeks, which are basically on CA business; then on July 3 1971 CDG devotes an entry to Bernadette Devlin: '..I thought her statement dignified enough, and of a piece with her rigid Trotskyist position..'. It never occurs to CDG to question why people become Trotskyist; with him it is a dismissive label. The pathologies arising from the Soviet revolution have bedevilled all attempts to develop a consistent Marxist position in Western Europe. This problem is still with us.

The entry on July 7 1971 after some references to the provisionals and the 'Callaghan gang' he comes up with the idea of making the CA conference educational, and moving in the direction of an 'Irish Democrat Supporters League' to strengthen the paper, and to get Trade Unions to join. This is a resurrection of his earlier idea, from 1946; he feels the need again to broaden the movement. The entry continues however as follows: '..today the devil Heath announced his EEC plan. The shadow of a West European Fascist Empire hovers over us, and I wonder how well the Celtic peoples, leave alone the working class of England, fare..'. Hostility to the EEC is evidently becoming an increasing factor in CDG's thinking, expressed in somewhat exaggerated wording.

There is a somewhat obscure entry on July 11 dealing with the 'mass meeting' planned some time back by the London 'NICRA', which by now has become the 'ICRA'. There were it seems meetings of various sorts in various places. I am unable to de-cypher the overall political picture, but he has an acid comment at the end: '...Edwina Stewart is in Bulgaria, Madge Davidson is in North Korea while the crisis breaks!..'. In other words he is scathing about how the CPI, the Irish section of the 'international movement' of aspirant post-Stalinist Marxism, has abandoned any attempt actually to give a sensible lead in the deteriorating situation in Ireland.

from Volume 23

There is an entry on February 16 1972 where CDG encounters Joe Cooper, who '..told me that the Civil Rights Movement was initiated by the Belfast Trades Council. That, I said, I knew. "But we were completely brushed aside" he said. And that also is true, for while we (that is SR and I) brought in the republicans to stop the NILP, we had scarcely bargained for the take-over. And we might have told Cooper that the earliest stages were initiated by ourselves, and that there was no need to brush us aside as it was never acknowledged, and that if we had been acknowledged the subsequent balance might have been more to their liking..'.

The context was Joe Cooper from the Belfast Trades Council over in London to address the London Trades Council. In this context CDG I think uses 'ourselves' to mean the Connolly Association, and to be thinking of the early pre-NICRA initiative.

from Volume 24

There is a sequel on March 9 1973 when AC visits CDG in Liverpool: the republicans had indeed packed the NICRA committee. They also want to oust Madge Davidson from her full-time position, and to replace Anne Hope as treasurer. Micheal O Riordain is to see Cathal Goulding about it, and try to get "orders" through to reverse it. The NICRA is said to have money.

We have here again the spectacle of two top-down centralist organisations, the CPI and the Official Republicans, fighting for control of a supposedly broad-based body, though at the top they are supposedly collaborating.

from Volume 25

On March 22 1974 CDG has a chance encounter on the train from Liverpool to London with Madge Davidson, a Belfast CPI activist, dedicated to support of the NICRA and to making the effort to develop links with the official republicans, whose arrogance however she was finding offensive. Her role model was Betty Sinclair. She was interested in literature and archaeology, and regretted that her Protestant education had deprived her of Irish history, which she had discovered late in life.

from Volume 26

On May 14 1974 CDG gets a phone-call from NICRA to the effect that relations have improved since Madge Davidson's visit; Edwina Stewart can't speak on the 20th; they were proposing to replace her with a republican. There is however no subsequent reference to a meeting on the 20th.

November 11 1974: It seems Andy Barr has declined to speak at a meeting on 'somewhat flimsy grounds'. CDG speaks '...to Betty Sinclair about the possibility of getting Micheal O'Riordan to persuade him. She thought it the best plan, though in Liverpool she had told me that there is antagonism to MOR in Dublin, centred on Carmody and Sam Nolan. They are still crying over Czechoslovakia.... another thing ESi told me while we were travelling is that she is anxious to give up the secretaryship of the BTC in order to write a book about Civil Rights. Seemingly she has a voluminous diary..'.

This if true is most important because the Linen Hall library NICRA archive is totally deficient about the early days of NICRA, and her diary if it can be found would be a significant source. The CPI archive, if it is any good, should have it, and we await access to this with interest. At the time of writing I understand that it is in process of being catalogued by one Anne Matthews, in the context of a postgraduate historical project.

CDG visits Dublin on December 15 - 18 1974 for a meeting between the CPI and CPGB, held in the office of Noel Harris, then an ASTMS union official. ....... The meeting considered issuing a joint statement between the CPI and the CPGB calling for the 'declaration of intent to withdraw', but Gollan refused to support it, thus stabbing Greaves in the back, as he had been telling his Dublin support group that they would. He had been arguing that Section 6 of the Bill of Rights should become part of the Constitution of the Six Counties, thus providing for the possibility of merger of government services in certain areas (for example, an all-Ireland Department of Agriculture, to control animal diseases)..

This is a prescient preview, on the part of CDG, of what has in the end emerged under the Good Friday Agreement, showing a recognition of the possibility of a transitional procedure with the Six Counties still in existence, though with a nascent all-Ireland interface. This diary entry, over 2 pages, deserves further study; I am not sure I have picked up its flavour, but it does look as if CDG is closer to the CPI than to the CPGB, and the relevance of the 'international movement' in the context is increasingly being called into question. Gollan's opposition was based on not wanting to make any stipulation for a six county government, because they did not believe there should be any such thing, a basically ultra-leftist doctrinaire position in the context. A further factor would have been the reluctance of leading lights in the CPGB, in particular those with Scottish "Protestant" trade union backgrounds such as Gollan, who were concerned about their Scottish TU support, to adopt a consistent anti-imperialist position on Ireland. The demand for a declaration by the British Government of intention to withdraw from Ireland was fundamental in this context.

On January 2 1975 the window of opportunity presented by the Provisional IRA ceasefire presents itself. CDG is on the phone to MOR who is said to be seeing Andy Barr (then an influential Belfast trade unionist), Paddy Devlin (left-SDLP) and MM (Micheal Mullin, the ITGWU leader). There is talk of their coming over for a meeting. The key issue is to set a date for the ending of internment. The possibility of acceptance of the 'declaration of intent' by the Provisionals is being explored. Joe Deighan on the phone is less optimistic; even if less is on offer, he hopes they will accept, as political life is non-existent. '..If the truce becomes permanent the CA must undertake a swift and radical re-direction of its work..'.

The above false dawn came and went. On March 9 1975 CDG records an encounter with Betty Sinclair in which she updates him on the growing tension between George Jeffares, Sam Nolan and Paddy Carmody on the one hand, and Micheal O Riordain on the other, still on the issue of Czechoslovakia, which has become like a personal feud.

In Britain there is tension between the NCCL and the CA which he describes on March 13; from what I can make out, the NCCL had been cultivating the loyalists, and there was talk of setting up an NCCL office in Belfast, it being increasingly understood that the NICRA was regarded as a republican front. Betty Sinclair to her credit resists this: '..we don't want a Protestant and a Catholic Civil Rights movement..'. CDG: '...the NCCL is trying to manoeuvre into the typical English position, of trying to balance between two camps. No wonder they applied for a subsidy from the Home Office last year..'.

from Volume 27

This concludes the sequence; the NICRA drops from view. The foregoing may be useful as a means of guiding historians of the NICRA towards further analysis, as well as giving insights into the roles of the CPNI, CPI and Republicans in relation to the NICRA. If there were occasional tensions between the Republicans and the CP people on NICRA, these were always quite marginal by comparison with their real struggle, which was to maintain a political approach, through NICRA and the civil rights demands, for a Bill of Rights etc., against an adventurist, militarist approach, initially by the PDs and later by the Provisionals. Both Goulding republicans, with all their problems, and the CP-influenced people, had the same political goal: to keep politics and civil rights to the fore against a reversion to militarism.

What happened for a period in 1968/69 was that the Republicans, because of their lack of political capacity and leadership material on the ground in Belfast, gave the PDs their head on the NICRA executive, and the leading lights in the PDs - specifically Farrell and Boyle - succeeded in isolating Betty Sinclair, whom the Belfast CP people had left entirely alone and unsupported, Derek Peters, who had been an early NICRA activist from the CP, serving initially as Secretary, having dropped out. This situation rendered the development of a broad-based membership organisation difficult. On the other hand, there were some people in the lead who understood the need for a broad-based membership of primarily civil rights activists, and in some situations these seem to have achieved some success. Roles worth exploring, apart from Betty Sinclair, are those of Madge Davison, Kevin McCorry, Daltun O Ceallaigh and Edwina Stewart. The latter three are alive and accessible.

To summarise, the factors which weakened and in the end killed the NICRA were:

(1) the tardiness of the NICRA's development, two years after the Belfast Trades Council 1965 conference;

(2) the disruptive effect of the People's Democracy in 1968/9 in attempting to outflank NICRA on the left;

(3) the political incapacity of the Northern Republicans on the NICRA Executive, and their inability to keep the political show on the road in face of Farrell and Boyle in 1968-70, which contributed to Betty Sinclair's isolation at key points;

(4) the split in republican ranks and the emergence of the Provisional IRA, who were oriented towards armed struggle rather than politics from the beginning.

The NICRA sponsored demonstrations were at all times very broad, popular and hugely supported, at least encompassing all elements on the Nationalist community, and with some liberal Protestant sympathy (or at least neutrality) initially. The last major NICRA sponsored demonstration was Bloody Sunday in Derry, which was certainly a big event.

Some navigational notes:

Copyright Dr Roy Johnston 1999