Harris Boyle
Encyclopedia
Harris Boyle was a Ulster Defence Regiment
Ulster Defence Regiment
The Ulster Defence Regiment was an infantry regiment of the British Army which became operational in 1970, formed on similar lines to other British reserve forces but with the operational role of defence of life or property in Northern Ireland against armed attack or sabotage...

 (UDR) soldier and a high-ranking member of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF), a Northern Irish loyalist
Ulster loyalism
Ulster loyalism is an ideology that is opposed to a united Ireland. It can mean either support for upholding Northern Ireland's status as a constituent part of the United Kingdom , support for Northern Ireland independence, or support for loyalist paramilitaries...

 paramilitary organisation. Boyle was implicated in the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings
Dublin and Monaghan Bombings
The Dublin and Monaghan bombings of 17 May 1974 were a series of car bombings in Dublin and Monaghan in the Republic of Ireland. The attacks killed 33 civilians and wounded almost 300 – the highest number of casualties in any single day during the conflict known as The Troubles.A loyalist...

 which left a total of 33 people dead. Boyle took part in the attack at Buskhill, County Down
County Down
-Cities:*Belfast *Newry -Large towns:*Dundonald*Newtownards*Bangor-Medium towns:...

 when an armed UVF gang
Miami Showband killings
The Miami Showband killings was a paramilitary attack at Buskhill, County Down, Northern Ireland, in the early morning of 31 July 1975. It left five people dead at the hands of Ulster Volunteer Force gunmen, including three members of The Miami Showband...

 wearing British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...

 uniforms ambushed The Miami Showband
The Miami Showband
The Miami Showband were one of the most successful and popular showbands in Ireland in the 1960s and 1970s. Led at first by singer Dickie Rock, and later by Fran O'Toole, they had seven number one records on the Irish singles chart...

 at a bogus military checkpoint. The popular Irish cabaret band was driving home to Dublin after a performance in Banbridge
Banbridge
Banbridge is a town in County Down, Northern Ireland. It lies on the River Bann and the A1 road. It was named after a bridge built over the Bann in 1712. The town grew as a coaching stop on the road from Belfast to Dublin and thrived from Irish linen manufacturing...

. He was one of the two gunmen killed when the bomb they had loaded onto the band's minibus exploded prematurely.

He is sometimes referred to as Horace Boyle.

Ulster Volunteer Force

Boyle was born in Portadown
Portadown
Portadown is a town in County Armagh, Northern Ireland. The town sits on the River Bann in the north of the county, about 23 miles south-west of Belfast...

, County Armagh
County Armagh
-History:Ancient Armagh was the territory of the Ulaid before the fourth century AD. It was ruled by the Red Branch, whose capital was Emain Macha near Armagh. The site, and subsequently the city, were named after the goddess Macha...

, Northern Ireland, the son of Harris Boyle, and grew up in the working-class Killycomain estate. He was raised in the Protestant religion and attended Edenderry Primary School
Edenderry Primary School, Portadown
Edenderry Primary School is a non-denominational primary school situated in Portadown, County Armagh, Northern Ireland. It is in the Southern Education and Library Board area....

. On an unknown date, Boyle joined both the Portadown company of the UDR (as a part-time member) and the Portadown unit of the UVF's Mid-Ulster Brigade
UVF Mid-Ulster Brigade
UVF Mid-Ulster Brigade formed part of the loyalist paramilitary Ulster Volunteer Force in Northern Ireland. The brigade was established in Lurgan, County Armagh in 1972 by its first commander Billy Hanna. The unit operated mainly around the Lurgan and Portadown areas. Subsequent leaders of the...

. He held the rank of major
Major
Major is a rank of commissioned officer, with corresponding ranks existing in almost every military in the world.When used unhyphenated, in conjunction with no other indicator of rank, the term refers to the rank just senior to that of an Army captain and just below the rank of lieutenant colonel. ...

 in the latter organisation, which at the time was commanded by Billy Hanna
Billy Hanna
William Henry Wilson "Billy" Hanna MM was a high-ranking Northern Irish loyalist who founded and led the Mid-Ulster Brigade of the Ulster Volunteer Force until he was killed, allegedly by Robin Jackson, who took over command of the brigade.According to RUC Special Patrol Group officer John Weir,...

. It was maintained in The Hidden Hand: The Forgotten Massacre documentary about the Dublin and Monaghan bombings which was broadcast by Yorkshire Television in 1993 that Boyle was second-in-command to Hanna. The brigade formed part of what later became known as the Glenanne gang
Glenanne gang
The Glenanne gang was a name given, since 2003, to a loose alliance of Northern Irish loyalist extremists who carried out sectarian killings and bomb attacks in the 1970s against the Irish Catholic and Irish nationalist community. Most of its attacks took place in the area of County Armagh and mid...

. This was a violent loyalist group which operated out of a farm owned by RUC
Royal Ulster Constabulary
The Royal Ulster Constabulary was the name of the police force in Northern Ireland from 1922 to 2000. Following the awarding of the George Cross in 2000, it was subsequently known as the Royal Ulster Constabulary GC. It was founded on 1 June 1922 out of the Royal Irish Constabulary...

 reservist James Mitchell, and comprised rogue elements of Northern Ireland's security forces as well as the UVF and to a lesser extent, the Ulster Defence Association
Ulster Defence Association
The Ulster Defence Association is the largest although not the deadliest loyalist paramilitary and vigilante group in Northern Ireland. It was formed in September 1971 and undertook a campaign of almost twenty-four years during "The Troubles"...

 (UDA). This loose alliance of extremists carried out a series of sectarian attacks and killings against the Irish Nationalist and Catholic community in the 1970s.

He was charged with the possession of weapons and ammunition in suspicious circumstances on 9 September 1972 when he was 19 years old.

Boyle was implicated in the Dublin and Monaghan car bombings which took place on 17 May 1974. RUC Special Patrol Group
Special Patrol Group
The Special Patrol Group was a unit of Greater London's Metropolitan Police Service, responsible for providing a centrally-based mobile capability for combating serious public disorder and crime that could not be dealt with by local divisions....

 officer John Weir
John Weir (loyalist)
John Oliver Weir , is an Ulster loyalist born in the Republic of Ireland. He served as an officer in Northern Ireland's Royal Ulster Constabulary's Special Patrol Group , and was a volunteer in the illegal Ulster Volunteer Force...

 named Billy Hanna, Robin Jackson
Robin Jackson
Robert John "Robin" Jackson, known as the Jackal was a Northern Irish loyalist who held the rank of brigadier in the Ulster Volunteer Force during the period of violent religious and political conflict in Northern Ireland known as the Troubles.From his home in the small village of Donaghcloney,...

 and Davy Payne
Davy Payne
David "Davy" Payne was a senior Northern Irish loyalist and a high-ranking member of the Ulster Defence Association during the Troubles serving as brigadier of the North Belfast Brigade. He was second-in-command of the Shankill Road brigade of the Ulster Freedom Fighters , which was the "cover...

 (UDA
Ulster Defence Association
The Ulster Defence Association is the largest although not the deadliest loyalist paramilitary and vigilante group in Northern Ireland. It was formed in September 1971 and undertook a campaign of almost twenty-four years during "The Troubles"...

) as having planned and led one of the UVF teams that drove three bomb cars into Dublin's city centre during evening rush hour, killing 26 people. His allegations were published in 2003 in the Barron Report which was the findings of the official investigation into the bombings by Irish Supreme Court Justice Henry Barron. According to submissions received by Mr. Justice Barron, the Monaghan bomb (which exploded 90 minutes after the Dublin bombs), was assembled at Boyle's home in Festival Road in the Killycomain estate.

The Hidden Hand stated that Boyle (along with Jackson and Hanna) was run as an agent by Captain Robert Nairac
Robert Nairac
Captain Robert Laurence Nairac GC was a British Army officer who was abducted from a pub in south County Armagh during an undercover operation and killed by the Provisional Irish Republican Army on his fourth tour of duty in Northern Ireland as a Military Intelligence Liaison Officer...

, the Military Intelligence Liaison officer attached to 14th Intelligence Company. The programme also named Harris Boyle as one of the prime suspects in the Dublin car bombings. Former British soldier and psychological warfare
Psychological warfare
Psychological warfare , or the basic aspects of modern psychological operations , have been known by many other names or terms, including Psy Ops, Political Warfare, “Hearts and Minds,” and Propaganda...

 operative Colin Wallace
Colin Wallace
John Colin Wallace is a former British soldier and psychological warfare operative who was one of the members of the 'Clockwork Orange' project, which is alleged to have been an attempt to smear a number of British politicians in the early 1970s.-Early life:...

 confirmed that Boyle had "close social links" to Captain Nairac.

John Weir alleged that Boyle was part of the Glenanne gang unit who shot Provisional IRA
Provisional Irish Republican Army
The Provisional Irish Republican Army is an Irish republican paramilitary organisation whose aim was to remove Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom and bring about a socialist republic within a united Ireland by force of arms and political persuasion...

 member John Francis Green
John Francis Green
John Francis Green , was a leading member of the North Armagh Brigade of the Provisional IRA, holding the rank of Staff Captain and Intelligence Officer. He was killed in a farmhouse outside Castleblayney, County Monaghan, by members of the Mid-Ulster Brigade of the Ulster Volunteer Force...

 to death in Mullyash, outside Castleblaney in the Irish Republic on 10 January 1975.

Miami Showband attack

Boyle was one of the Mid-Ulster Brigade UVF gang that carried out the attack against the popular Irish cabaret band, the Miami Showband on 31 July 1975. Author Martin Dillon
Martin Dillon
Martin Dillon is an author and journalist from Northern Ireland. He worked for eighteen years at the BBC and has written a number of plays and novels, but he is best known for his non-fiction books about the Troubles....

 suggested in his book God and the Gun: the Church and Irish Terrorism that he was one of the leaders of the unit. At about 2.30 a.m. as the band was returning home to Dublin from a performance at the Castle Ballroom in Banbridge
Banbridge
Banbridge is a town in County Down, Northern Ireland. It lies on the River Bann and the A1 road. It was named after a bridge built over the Bann in 1712. The town grew as a coaching stop on the road from Belfast to Dublin and thrived from Irish linen manufacturing...

, their minibus (driven by trumpeter Brian McCoy) was stopped on the A1 road
A1 road (Northern Ireland)
The A1 is a major route in Northern Ireland. It runs from Belfast via Lisburn and Banbridge to the border with the Republic of Ireland south of Newry, from where the road continues to Dublin, becoming the N1 road and M1 motorway...

 at the townland of Buskhill, seven miles (11 km) north of Newry, at a bogus military checkpoint by UVF gunmen dressed in British Army uniforms. At least four of the men like Boyle were serving members of the UDR. The bandmembers were lined-up with their hands on their heads facing a ditch and asked to give their names and addresses. Saxophonist Des McAlea, who survived the attack, later testified that Boyle had become angry at some of the other gunmen who had joked with the bandmembers about the success of their performance that night. At this point, Boyle and Wesley Somerville
Wesley Somerville
Wesley Somerville was a Northern Irish loyalist, who held the rank of lieutenant in the Ulster Volunteer Force's Mid-Ulster Brigade during the period of religious-political conflict known as "The Troubles". He also served as a member of the Ulster Defence Regiment...

 went to the rear of the minibus and placed a ten-pound time bomb
Time bomb
A time bomb is a bomb whose detonation is triggered by a timer. The use time bombs has been for various purposes ranging from insurance fraud to warfare to assassination; however, the most common use has been for politically-motivated terrorism.-Construction:The explosive charge is the main...

 on board. This was meant to explode as the band drove through either Newry. or after they reached the Irish Republic, killing all five band members on board. According to Dillon in The Dirty War, the plan behind the UVF bombing was to portray the band members as republicans
Irish Republicanism
Irish republicanism is an ideology based on the belief that all of Ireland should be an independent republic.In 1801, under the Act of Union, the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland merged to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland...

 smuggling explosives for the Provisional IRA.

Immediately after Boyle and Somerville closed the rear door, clumsy soldering on the clock which was used as a timer came apart and the bomb detonated prematurely. The bus was blown in half; Boyle and Somerville, who were both in the vicinity of the explosion, took the full force of the blast and were killed instantly with their bodies hurled in opposite directions. Boyle's body landed in the road, fifty yards away from the front half of the destroyed vehicle. It was ripped in two and badly burned. They were both decapitated and dismembered; the limbless torso of one of the dead men was completely charred. A severed arm with the tattoo "UVF Portadown" was later found a hundred yards from the scene. According to Michael Browne of the Irish Mail on Sunday the arm belonged to Wesley Somerville. Boyle was aged 22 at the time of his death; he was unmarried and worked as a telephone wireman.

The remaining UVF gunmen opened fire on the Miami Showband members who had been blown down into the field below the level of the road. Three of the band members were killed: trumpeter Brian McCoy, guitarist Tony Geraghty, and lead singer Fran O'Toole. Saxophone player Des McAlea and bassist Stephen Travers were both wounded, the latter having been shot with dum-dum bullets. Several days before the Showband attack, Mid-Ulster UVF leader Billy Hanna was shot dead, allegedly by Robin Jackson, who assumed command of the brigade. According to authors Martin Dillon and Paul Larkin, and journalist Joe Tiernan, Boyle had accompanied Jackson when the latter shot Hanna outside his home in Lurgan
Lurgan
Lurgan is a town in County Armagh, Northern Ireland. The town is near the southern shore of Lough Neagh and in the north-eastern corner of the county. Part of the Craigavon Borough Council area, Lurgan is about 18 miles south-west of Belfast and is linked to the city by both the M1 motorway...

. Weir maintained that Jackson was an RUC Special Branch
Special Branch
Special Branch is a label customarily used to identify units responsible for matters of national security in British and Commonwealth police forces, as well as in the Royal Thai Police...

 agent. An international panel of inquiry (headed by Professor Douglass Cassel, formerly of Northwestern University School of Law
Northwestern University School of Law
The Northwestern University School of Law is a private American law school in Chicago, Illinois. The law school was founded in 1859 as the Union College of Law of the Old University of Chicago. The first law school established in Chicago, it became jointly controlled by Northwestern University in...

) commissioned by the Pat Finucane Centre
Pat Finucane Centre
The Pat Finucane Centre is a human rights advocacy and lobbying entity in Northern Ireland. Named in honour of murdered solicitor Pat Finucane, it operates advice centres in Derry and Newry, dealing mainly with complaints from nationalists and republicans...

 to investigate allegations of collusion between loyalist paramilitaries and the security forces concluded that there was credible evidence that Jackson was the principal perpetrator of the Miami Showband killings, and although he was questioned afterwards by the RUC, he never faced charges. Two serving UDR soldiers and one former UDR soldier: Lance-Corporal Thomas Crozier, Sergeant James McDowell, and John James Somerville (brother of Wesley) were given life sentences for the killings.

At the time the Miami Showband attack occurred, the UVF was not an illegal organisation, the ban against them having been lifted in April 1974, by Merlyn Rees, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, informally the Northern Ireland Secretary, is the principal secretary of state in the government of the United Kingdom with responsibilities for Northern Ireland. The Secretary of State is a Minister of the Crown who is accountable to the Parliament of...

. They would be proscribed by the British Government again in October 1975.

Aftermath

Within 12 hours after the attack, the UVF issued the following statement giving their own fabricated account of the event:
"A UVF patrol led by Major Boyle was suspicious of two vehicles, a minibus and a car parked near the border. Major Boyle ordered his patrol to apprehend the occupants for questioning. As they were being questioned, Major Boyle and Lieutenant Somerville began to search the minibus. As they began to enter the vehicle, a bomb was detonated and both men were killed outright. At the precise moment of the explosion, the patrol came under intense automatic fire from the occupants of the other vehicle. The patrol sergeant immediately ordered fire to be returned. Using self-loading rifles and sub-machine guns, the patrol returned fire killing three of their attackers and wounding another. The patrol later recovered two Armalite rifles and a pistol. The UVF maintains regular border patrols due to the continued activity of the Provisional IRA. The Mid-Ulster Battalion has been assisting the South Down-South Armagh units since the IRA Forkhill boobytrap which killed four British soldiers. Three UVF members are being treated for gunshot wounds after last night but not in hospital."
"It would appear that the UVF patrol surprised members of a terrorist organization transferring weapons the Miami Showband minibus and that an explosive device of some description was being carried by the Showband for an unlawful purpose. It is obvious, therefore, that the UVF patrol was justified in taking the action it did and that the killing of the three Showband members should be regarded as justifiable homicide. The Officers and Agents of the Ulster Central Intelligence Agency commend the UVF on their actions and tender their deepest sympathy to the relatives of the two Officers who died while attempting to remove the bomb from the minibus."


Boyle and Somerville were both given UVF paramilitary funerals complete with gun volleys. Eight women dressed in black walked in front of the cortege. The service was conducted by Free Presbyterian
Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster
The Free Presbyterian Church is a Presbyterian denomination founded by the Rev. Ian Paisley in 1951. Most of its members live in Northern Ireland...

 minister William McCrea
William McCrea (politician)
Robert Thomas William McCrea is a politician from Northern Ireland, and a member of the Democratic Unionist Party.-Career:...

, a Democratic Unionist (DUP) politician. The UVF journal Combat published sympathy letters from both the "A" Company of the UDR's 9th Battalion and the Protestant Action Force, a cover name used by the UVF.

According to Martin Dillon, Boyle and Wesley Somerville served as role models for Loyalist Volunteer Force
Loyalist Volunteer Force
The Loyalist Volunteer Force is a loyalist paramilitary group in Northern Ireland. It was formed by Billy Wright in 1996 when he and the Portadown unit of the Ulster Volunteer Force's Mid-Ulster Brigade was stood down by the UVF leadership. He had been the commander of the Mid-Ulster Brigade. The...

 (LVF) leader Billy Wright
Billy Wright (loyalist)
William Stephen "Billy" Wright was a prominent Ulster loyalist during the period of violent religious/political conflict known as "The Troubles". He joined the Ulster Volunteer Force in 1975 and became commander of its Mid-Ulster Brigade in the early 1990s...

, and it was their violent deaths which had inspired him to join the UVF in 1975. Wright took over the Mid-Ulster UVF Brigade from Robin Jackson in the early 1990s before going on to form the LVF.

The RTE programme Today Tonight
Today Tonight (Ireland)
Today Tonight is an Irish news and current affairs programme noted for its in-depth analysis, robust cross-examination of senior politicians and investigative reporting. The programme was brodacast on RTÉ One for the first time on Monday 6 October 1982....

aired a documentary in 1987 in which it claimed that former UVF associates of Boyle revealed to the programme's researchers that Captain Nairac detonated the bomb deliberately at Buskhill in order to eliminate Boyle, with whom he had carried out the Green assassination. Sunday Tribune journalist Emily O'Reilly noted that none of the three men convicted of the Miami Showband attack ever implicated Nairac in the massacre or accused him of causing Boyle's death.

There is also a mural
Northern Irish murals
Murals in Northern Ireland have become symbols of Northern Ireland, depicting the region's past and present political and religious divisions.Northern Ireland contains arguably the most famous political murals. Almost 2,000 murals have been documented in Northern Ireland since the 1970s...

and memorial plaque dedicated to Boyle in Portadown's Killycomain housing estate where he had grown up. About 100 people, 16 loyalist bands and a UVF military guard of honour were present at the mural's unveiling on 30 July 2005, following a parade through the estate. The plaque describes Boyle as having been "killed in action".
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