Miami Showband killings
Encyclopedia
The Miami Showband killings (also called the Miami Showband Massacre) 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 (UVF) gunmen, including three members of The Miami Showband
. The band, one of Ireland's most popular cabaret bands
, had been travelling home to Dublin after a performance in Banbridge
, County Down
.
The band's minibus
was stopped at a bogus military checkpoint seven miles (11 km) north of Newry
. Gunmen, dressed in British Army
uniforms, ordered them out of their van and to line-up by the roadside. Although at least four of the gunmen were members of the British Army's Ulster Defence Regiment
(UDR), all were members of the UVF, a loyalist
paramilitary group. While two of the gunmen were hiding a time bomb
on the minibus, it exploded prematurely and killed them. The remaining gunmen opened fire on the band members, killing three and wounding two. Two UDR soldiers and one former soldier were found guilty of murder and received life sentences; they were released in 1998.
Allegations of collusion between British Military Intelligence and the loyalist paramilitaries, leading to the attack, persist. According to former MI6 agent Captain Fred Holroyd
, the killings were organised by British Army officer and member of 14th Intelligence Company, Captain Robert Nairac
in collaboration with Robin Jackson
and the UVF's Mid-Ulster Brigade
, which Jackson commanded. In a report published in the Sunday Mirror
in 1999, Colin Wills called the Miami Showband attack "one of the worst atrocities in the 30-year history of the Troubles". Irish Times diarist Frank McNally summed up the massacre
as "an incident that encapsulated all the madness of the time".
The conflict in Northern Ireland, known as "The Troubles
", began in the late 1960s. The year 1975 was marked by an escalation in sectarian attacks and a vicious feud between the two main loyalist
paramilitary groups, the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and the Ulster Defence Association
(UDA). On 4 April 1974 the proscription against the UVF
had been lifted by Merlyn Rees, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
. This meant that both it and the UDA were legal organisations. The UVF would be once more banned by the British Government on 3 October 1975.
In May 1974 unionists
and loyalists called a general strike
to protest against the Sunningdale Agreement
– an attempt at power-sharing, setting up a Northern Ireland Executive
and a cross-border Council of Ireland
, which would have given the Irish Government a voice in running Northern Ireland. During that strike on 17 May, the UVF carried out the Dublin and Monaghan car bombings
, which killed 33 civilians. The Provisional IRA
were suspected by British police of bombing two pubs
in the English city of Birmingham
the following November, resulting in 21 deaths.
UK Home Secretary
Roy Jenkins
introduced the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which gave the government unprecedented powers against the liberty of individuals in the United Kingdom
in peacetime. At Christmas 1974 the IRA declared a ceasefire, which theoretically lasted throughout most of 1975. This move made loyalists apprehensive and suspicious that a secret accord was being conducted between the British government and the IRA, and that Northern Ireland's Protestants would be "sold out". Their fears were partially grounded in fact, as the MI6 officer Michael Oatley was involved in negotiations with a member of the IRA Army Council
, during which "structures of disengagement" from Ireland were discussed. This had meant the possible withdrawal of British troops from Northern Ireland. The existence of these talks led loyalists to believe that they were about to be abandoned by the British government and forced into a united Ireland; as a result, the loyalist paramilitary groups reacted with a violence that, combined with the tit-for-tat retaliations from the IRA (despite their ceasefire), made 1975 one of the "bloodiest years of the conflict".
In early 1975 Merlyn Rees set up elections for the Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention
at which all of Northern Ireland's politicians would plan their way forward. These were held on 1 May 1975 and the United Ulster Unionist Council
(UUUC), which had won 11 out of 12 Northern Irish seats in the February 1974 general election
, won a majority again. As the UUUC would not back any form of power sharing with the Irish government, no agreement could be reached and the convention failed, again marginalising Northern Ireland's politicians and the communities they represented.
operated mainly around the Portadown
and Lurgan
areas. It had been set up in Lurgan in 1972 by part-time UDR captain and staff instructor Billy Hanna
, who made himself commander of the brigade. His leadership was endorsed by the UVF's leader Gusty Spence
. The brigade was described by author Don Mullan
as one of the most ruthless battalions operating in the 1970s. At the time of the attack the Mid-Ulster Brigade was commanded by Robin Jackson
, also known as The Jackal. Jackson had assumed command of the Mid-Ulster UVF just a few days before the Miami Showband attack, when he had taken over from Hanna. Hanna had been shot dead outside his home in Lurgan on 27 July 1975, a killing in which Jackson was allegedly involved. According to authors Paul Larkin and Martin Dillon, Jackson was accompanied by Harris Boyle
when he killed Hanna. Hanna was named by former British soldier and psychological warfare
operative Colin Wallace
as having organised and led the 1974 Dublin car bombings, along with Jackson. Journalist Joe Tiernan suggested that Hanna was shot for refusing to participate in the Miami Showband attack. He also alleged that Hanna became an informer for the Gardaí in exchange for immunity from prosecution for the Dublin bombings. Dillon suggested that because a large number of UDR/UVF members were to be used for the planned Miami Showband ambush, Hanna was considered to have been a "security risk", therefore the UVF decided he had to be killed before he could alert the authorities.
Jackson was an alleged Royal Ulster Constabulary
(RUC) Special Branch
agent who was said by the narrator of Yorkshire Television's The Hidden Hand: The Forgotten Massacre programme to have had links to British Military Intelligence and Captain Robert Nairac
. A report in the Irish Times implicated Jackson in the Dublin bombings. More than 100 killings were attributed to him, according to the Pat Finucane Centre
, the Derry
-based civil rights group.
, "Beatle-like devotion" from fans on both sides of the Irish border. A typical Irish showband
was based on the popular six or seven member dance band. Its basic repertoire included cover versions of pop songs
that were currently in the charts and standard dance numbers. The music ranged from rock
and country and western to Dixieland jazz
. Sometimes the showbands played traditional Irish music at their performances.
Originally called the Downbeats Quartet, the Miami Showband was reformed in 1962 by rock promoter Tom Doherty, who gave them their new name. With Dublin-born singer Dickie Rock as frontman, the Miami Showband underwent many personnel changes over the years. In December 1972, Rock left the band to be briefly replaced by two brothers, Frankie and Johnny Simon. That same year keyboardist Francis "Fran" O'Toole (from Bray
, County Wicklow
) had won the Gold Star Award on RTÉ
's Reach For the Stars television programme. In early 1973, Billy MacDonald (aka "Billy Mac") took over as the group's frontman when the Simon brothers quit the band. The following year, Fran O'Toole became the band's lead vocalist after Mick Roche (Billy Mac's replacement) was sacked. O'Toole was noted for his good looks and popularity with female fans. was described by the Miami Showband's former bass guitarist, Paul Ashford, as having been the "greatest soul singer" in Ireland. Ashford had been asked to leave the band in 1973, for complaining that performing in Northern Ireland put their lives at risk. He was replaced by Johnny Brown, who in turn was replaced by Dave Monks until Stephen Travers eventually became the band's permanent bass player. In late 1974, the Miami Showband's song Clap Your Hands and Stomp Your Feet (featuring O'Toole on lead vocals) reached number eight in the Irish charts
.
The 1975 lineup comprised four Catholics and two Protestants. They were: lead vocalist and keyboard player Fran O'Toole (29, Catholic), guitarist Anthony "Tony" Geraghty (23, Catholic) from Dublin, trumpeter Brian McCoy (33, Protestant) from Caledon, County Tyrone
, saxophonist Des McAlea (aka "Des Lee"), a Catholic from Belfast
, bassist Stephen Travers (24, Catholic) from Carrick-on-Suir
, County Tipperary
and drummer Ray Millar (Protestant) from Antrim
. O'Toole and McCoy were both married; each had two children. Geraghty was engaged to be married.
Their music was described as "contemporary and trans-atlantic", with no reference to the Northern Ireland conflict. By 1975 they had gained a large following, playing to crowds of people in dancehalls and ballrooms across the island. The band had no overt interest in politics nor in the religious beliefs of the people who made up their audience. They were prepared to travel anywhere in Ireland to perform for their fans.
According to the Irish Times, at the height of the Irish showband's popularity (from the 1950s to the 1970s), up to as many as 700 bands travelled to venues all over Ireland on a nightly basis.
, County Down
on Thursday 31 July 1975. Ray Millar, the band's drummer, was not with them as he had chosen to go to his home town of Antrim to spend the night with his parents. The band's road manager, Brian Maguire, had already gone ahead a few minutes earlier in the equipment van. At about 2.30 a.m., when the band was seven miles (11 km) north of Newry on the main A1 road, their Volkswagen
minibus (driven by trumpeter Brian McCoy with Stephen Travers in the front seat beside him) reached the townland
of Buskhill. There they were flagged-down by armed men dressed in British Army
uniforms waving a red torch in a circular motion. During "The Troubles" it was normal for the British Army to set up checkpoints daily, at any time.
Assuming it was a legitimate checkpoint, McCoy informed the others inside the minibus of a military checkpoint up ahead and pulled in at the lay-by as directed by the armed men. As McCoy rolled down the window and produced his driving licence, gunmen came up to the minibus and one of them said in a Northern Irish accent, "Goodnight, fellas. How are things? Can you step out of the van for a few minutes and we'll just do a check". The unsuspecting band members (still wearing their stage clothes) got out and were politely told to line-up facing the ditch at the rear of the minibus with their hands on their heads. More uniformed men appeared from out of the darkness, their guns pointed at the minibus. About 10 gunmen were at the checkpoint, according to author and journalist Martin Dillon
.
After McCoy told them they were the Miami Showband, one gunman, Thomas Crozier (who had a notebook) asked the band members for their names and addresses, while the others bantered with them about the success of their performance that night. As Crozier took down the information, a car pulled up and another uniformed man appeared on the scene. He wore a uniform and beret noticeably different from the others. He spoke with an educated English accent and immediately took charge, ordering a man who appeared to have been the leader of the patrol, to tell Crozier to obtain their names and dates of birth instead of addresses.
The jocular mood of the gunmen abruptly ceased. At no time did this new soldier speak to any of the band members nor did he directly address Crozier. He relayed all his instructions to the gunman in command. Travers, the band's new bass player, assumed he was a British Army officer; an opinion shared by McCoy. Just after the arrival of this mysterious soldier, McCoy nudged Travers, who was standing beside him, and reassured him by saying "Don't worry Stephen, this is British Army". Travers thought that McCoy, a Protestant from Northern Ireland, was familiar with security checkpoints and had reckoned the regular British Army would be more efficient than the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR), who had a reputation for unprofessional and unpredictable behaviour especially towards people from the Irish Republic.
McCoy had close relatives in the security forces; his brother-in-law was a former member of the B Specials which had been disbanded in 1970. Travers described McCoy as a "sophisticated, father-type figure. Everybody was respectful to Brian". McCoy's words, therefore, were taken seriously by the other band members, and anything he said was considered to be accurate.
Out of sight of the band members, two of the gunmen placed a ten-pound (4.5 kg) time bomb
in the rear of the minibus. The UVF's plan was that the bomb would explode once the minibus had reached Newry, killing all on board. However, Martin Dillon alleged that the bomb was meant to go off in the Irish Republic. He suggested that had all gone according to plan, the loyalist extremists would have been able to clandestinely bomb the Republic of Ireland, yet claim that the band were republican
bomb-smugglers carrying explosives on behalf of the IRA. They had hoped to embarrass the Irish government, as well as to draw attention to its underpatrolled border. This would have resulted in the Irish authorities enforcing tighter controls over people crossing the border, thus greatly restricting IRA operations. Dillon opined that another reason the UVF decided to target the Miami Showband was because the nationalist
community held them in high regard; to attack the band was to strike the nationalists indirectly.
Stephen Travers heard the gunmen rummaging in the back of the minibus, where he kept his guitar. Concerned it may be damaged, he approached the two gunmen and told them to be careful. Asked whether he had anything valuable inside the case, Travers replied no. The gunman turned him round, punched him in the back and pushed him on the shoulder back into the line-up.
When the two gunmen closed the rear door, clumsy soldering on the clock used as a timer caused the device to explode prematurely, blowing the minibus apart and killing the gunmen Harris Boyle
(aged 22, a telephone wireman from Portadown) and Wesley Somerville
(aged 34, a textile worker from Moygashel
) instantly. Hurled in opposite directions, they were both decapitated and their bodies dismembered. What little that remained intact of their bodies was burnt beyond recognition; one of the limbless torsos was completely charred.
Brian McCoy was the first to die, having received nine rounds in the back from a 9 mm Luger pistol in the initial volley of gunfire. Fran O'Toole attempted to run away, but was quickly chased down by the gunmen who had immediately jumped down into the field in pursuit. He was then machine-gunned twenty-two times in the face as he lay supine on the ground.
Tony Geraghty also attempted to escape; but he was caught by the gunmen and shot at least four times in the back. Both men had pleaded for their lives before they were shot; one had cried out, "Please don't shoot me, don't kill me".
Bassist Stephen Travers was seriously wounded by a dum-dum bullet which had struck him when the gunmen had first begun shooting. He survived by pretending he was dead, as he lay beside the body of McCoy. Saxophone player Des McAlea was hit by the minibus' door when it was blown off in the explosion, but was not badly wounded. He lay hidden in thick undergrowth, undetected by the gunmen. He also survived, and was able to hitch a lift to alert the RUC at their barracks in Newry after the gunmen had left the scene, assuming everyone else had been killed. Travers later recalled hearing one of the departing gunmen tell his comrade who had kicked McCoy's body to make sure he was not alive: "Come on, those bastards are dead. I got them with dum-dums".
One of the first RUC men who arrived at Buskhill in the wake of the killings was Scenes of Crime Officer
James O'Neill. He described the scene as having "just the smell of utterly death about the place ... burning blood, burning tyres". He also added that "that bomb was definitely placed there with a view to killing all in that band".
The only identifiable body part from the bombers to survive the blast (which had been heard up to four miles away) was a severed arm belonging to Wesley Somerville. It was found one hundred yards from the site with a "UVF Portadown" tattoo on it.
The RUC's investigative unit, the Assassination or "A" Squad of detectives, was set up to investigate the crime and to discover the identities of the UVF gunmen who perpetrated the killings.
Afterwards, as Travers recovered in hospital, the second survivor Des McAlea gave the police a description of McDowell as the gunman with a moustache and wearing dark glasses who appeared to have been the leader of the patrol.
Some time after the attack, RUC officers questioned Stephen Travers at Dublin Castle
. He subsequently stated they refused to accept his description of the different-coloured beret worn by the soldier with the English accent. The UVF gunmen had worn green UDR berets, whereas the other man's had been lighter in colour.
The dead bombers were named by the UVF, in a statement issued within twelve hours of the attack. Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville were UDR soldiers as well as holding the rank of major and lieutenant, respectively, in the UVF. In 1993 Boyle was named by The Hidden Hand programme as one of the Dublin car bombers.
The stolen Ford Escort belonged to a man from Portadown, who according to Captain Fred Holroyd
, had links with one of the UVF bombers and the driver of the bomb car which had been left to explode in Parnell Street
, Dublin on 17 May 1974. He was also one of the prime suspects in the sectarian killing of Dorothy Traynor on 1 April 1975 in Portadown.
Ballistic evidence indicates that the ten-member gang took at least six guns with them on the attack. An independent panel of inquiry commissioned by the Pat Finucane Centre has established that among the weapons actually used in the killings were two Sterling 9 mm submachine guns and a 9 mm Luger pistol serial no. U 4. The submachine guns were linked to prior and later sectarian killings, whereas the Luger had been used to kill leading IRA member, John Francis Green
, the previous January.
Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville were given UVF paramilitary funerals conducted by Free Presbyterian
minister William McCrea
, who is also a Democratic Unionist Party
(DUP) politician.
The killings shocked everybody in Ireland. They also put a serious strain on Anglo-Irish relations. The Irish Times reported that on the night following the attack, the British ambassador Sir Arthur Galsworthy was summoned to hear the Irish Government's strong feelings regarding the murder of the three band members. The government held the view that the British Government had not done enough to stop sectarian assassinations in Northern Ireland.
Following the post-mortems, funerals were held for the three slain musicians; they received televised news coverage by RTÉ
, Ireland's public service broadcaster. According to the RTÉ, "Their families were in deep mourning and Ireland mourned with them".
According to Peter Taylor, the Provisional IRA's gun and bomb attack on the loyalist Bayardo Bar
in Belfast's Shankill Road the following 13 August was in retaliation for the Miami Showband ambush. Four Protestant civilians (two men and two women) and UVF member Hugh Harris were killed in the attack.
supporters, Colm McCartney and Sean Farmer, were stopped in their car by a UVF patrol wearing full military combat uniforms at a bogus vehicle checkpoint. The two men were ordered out of the car and then both were shot dead a short distance away. Three RUC men had earlier been stopped in their unmarked car by the same "soldiers", who let them through upon ascertaining their identity. The RUC, however, had suspected that the checkpoint had been fake. After receiving radio confirmation that there were no authorised regular Army or UDR checkpoints in the area that night, they reported the incident and requested help from the British Army to investigate it, but no action was taken. UDR corporal Robert McConnell
was implicated by RUC Special Patrol Group
officer John Weir
in this attack.
A number of suspects were arrested by the RUC in early August 1975. One of these men, Lance-Corporal Thomas Raymond Crozier (aged 25, a painting contractor from Lurgan) of C Company, 11th Battalion UDR
was charged with the Miami killings. It was believed he had been betrayed to the RUC by a member of the gang.
Thomas Crozier recounted that on the night of the killings, he had driven to the grounds of a school in Lurgan where he had picked up two men. He then drove to a lay-by on the Newry-Banbridge dual carriageway
and met up with another five men, who were all wearing British Army uniforms. They subsequently set up a roadblock with "all the trappings of a regular military checkpoint". Crozier told police, and later a court, that he had not played a large part in the attack. He refused to name his accomplices, as he felt that to do so would put the lives of his family in danger.
On 22 January 1976, a second UDR soldier, Sergeant James Roderick McDowell (aged 29, an optical worker, also from Lurgan) was arrested and charged with the Miami killings. He served in C Company, 11th Battalion UDR. The RUC were led to him through his glasses which had been found at the murder scene. Tests done on the glasses, which were eventually traced back to McDowell, revealed that the lens were of a prescription worn by just 1 in 500,000 of the population.
McDowell's statement of admission was published in David McKittrick
's book Lost Lives:
On 15 October 1976, Crozier and McDowell both received life sentences for the Miami Showband murders. McDowell had pleaded guilty. Crozier had pleaded not guilty. The judge, by sentencing McDowell and Crozier to 35 years imprisonment each, had handed down the longest life sentences in the history of Northern Ireland; he commented that "killings like the Miami Showband must be stopped". He added that had the death penalty not been abolished, it would have been imposed in this case.
A third person, former UDR soldier John James Somerville (aged 37, a lorry-helper and the brother of Wesley), was arrested following an RUC raid in Dungannon
on 26 September 1980. He was charged with the Miami Showband killings and the killing of Patrick Falls in 1974. He was given a total of four life sentences (three for the murders of the Miami Showband members and one for the Falls murder) on 9 November 1981; he had pleaded not guilty. The three convicted UVF men, although admitting to having been at the scene, denied having shot anyone. None of the men ever named their accomplices, and the other UVF gunmen were never caught. The three men were sent to serve their sentence in the Maze Prison, on the outskirts of Lisburn
. Fortnight Magazine
reported that on 1 June 1982, John James Somerville began a hunger strike at the Maze to obtain special category status. Crozier, McDowell, and Somerville were released after 1998 under the terms of the Belfast Agreement
.
at the scene. Former serving Secret Intelligence Service
agent Captain Fred Holroyd, and others, suggested that Nairac had organised the attack in cooperation with Robin Jackson and the Mid-Ulster UVF. In his maiden parliamentary
speech on 7 July 1987, Ken Livingstone
MP told the House of Commons, "it was likely" that Nairac had organised the attack. Surviving band members Stephen Travers and Des McAlea told police and later testified in court that a British Army officer with a "crisp, clipped English accent" oversaw the Buskhill attack, the implication being that this was Nairac. In his book The Dirty War, Martin Dillon adamantly dismissed the allegation that Nairac had been present. He believed it was based on the erroneous linkage of Nairac to the earlier murder of IRA man John Francis Green
in County Monaghan
– the same pistol was used in both attacks. Regarding the soldier with the English accent, Dillon wrote:
aired a documentary in 1987 in which it claimed that former UVF associates of Harris Boyle revealed to the programme's researchers that Nairac had deliberately detonated the bomb in order to eliminate Boyle, with whom he had carried out the Green killing. Journalist Emily O'Reilly
noted in the Sunday Tribune
that none of the three men convicted of the massacre ever implicated Nairac in the attack or accused him of causing Boyle's death.
The band's road manager, Brian Maguire stated that when he drove away from Banbridge in the lead, a few minutes ahead of the band's minibus, he passed through security barriers manned by the RUC. As Maguire continued ahead, up the by-pass towards Newry, he noticed a blue Triumph 2000 pulling-out from where it had been parked in a lay-by. Maguire recalled that the car first slowed down, then it accelerated, flashing its lights.
Another persistent allegation is the direct involvement of Mid-Ulster UVF leader Robin Jackson. He was one of the men taken in by the RUC in August 1975 and questioned as a suspect in the killings, but was released without charge. The independent panel of inquiry commissioned by the Pat Finucane Centre concluded that there was "credible evidence that the principal perpetrator [of the Miami Showband attack] was a man who was not prosecuted – alleged RUC Special Branch agent Robin Jackson". The same panel revealed that about six weeks before the attack, Thomas Crozier, Jackson, and the latter's brother-in-law Samuel Fulton Neill, were arrested for the possession of four shotguns. Neill's car was one of those allegedly used in the Buskhill attack. He was later shot dead in Portadown on 25 January 1976, allegedly by Jackson for having informed the RUC about Thomas Crozier's participation in the attack. The panel stated that it was unclear why Crozier, Jackson, and Neill were not in police custody at the time the Miami Showband killings took place. Martin Dillon maintained in The Dirty War that the Miami Showband attack was planned weeks before at a house in Portadown, and the person in charge of the overall operation was a former UDR man, whom Dillon referred to for legal reasons as "Mr. A". Dillon also opined in God and the Gun: the Church and Irish Terrorism that the dead bombers, Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville, had actually led the UVF gang at Buskhill. Journalists Kevin Dowling and Liam Collins in the Irish Independent
however, suggested in their respective articles that Jackson had been the leader of the unit.
The Pat Finucane Centre has named the Miami Showband killings as one of the 87 violent attacks perpetrated by the Glenanne gang
against the Irish nationalist
community in the 1970s. The Glenanne gang was a loose alliance of loyalist extremists allegedly operating under the command of British Military Intelligence and/or RUC Special Branch. It comprised rogue elements of the British security forces who, together with the UVF, carried out sectarian killings in the Mid-Ulster/County Armagh area. Their name comes from a farm in Glenanne, County Armagh, which was owned by RUC reservist James Mitchell
; according to RUC Special Patrol Group officer John Weir, it was used as a UVF arms dump and bomb-making site. Weir alleged the bomb used in the Miami Showband attack came from Mitchell's farm. Weir's affidavit
implicating Robin Jackson in a number of attacks including the 1974 Dublin bombings was published in the 2003 Barron Report; the findings of an official investigation into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings commissioned by Irish Supreme Court Judge Henry Barron.
s later in the decade meant that ballrooms were converted into nightclubs, leaving the showbands with few venues available in which to perform. By the mid-1980s, the showbands had lost their appeal for the Irish public; although The Miami Showband, albeit with a series of different lineups, did not disband until 1986.
The Miami Showband reformed in 2008, with Travers, Des McAlea, Ray Millar and other new members. It is fronted by McAlea, who returned to Northern Ireland the same year after living in South Africa
since about 1982.
In 1994, Eric Smyth, a former UDR member and the husband of Brian McCoy's sister, Sheila, was killed by the IRA.
Travers travelled to Belfast in 2006 for a secret meeting with the second-in-command of the UVF's Brigade Staff, in an attempt to come to terms with the killing of his former colleagues and friends. The meeting was arranged by Rev. Chris Hudson, a former intermediary between the Irish Government and the UVF, whose role was crucial to the Northern Ireland peace process
. Hudson had been a close friend of Fran O'Toole. The encounter took place inside Hudson's church. The UVF man, who identified himself only as "the Craftsman", apologised to Travers for the attack, and explained that the UVF gunmen had opened fire on the band because they "had panicked" that night. It was revealed in Peter Taylor's book Loyalists that "the Craftsman" had been instrumental in bringing about the 1994 Combined Loyalist Military Command
(CLMC) ceasefire.
Travers also visited the home of Thomas Crozier, hoping to meet with him, but the latter did not come to the door. He presently resides near Craigavon
. James McDowell lives in Lurgan, and John James Somerville is an evangelical minister in Belfast.
, Bertie Ahern
, who made a tribute. The monument, made of limestone, bronze and granite, by County Donegal
sculptor Redmond Herrity
, is at the site of the old National Ballroom, where the band often played.
A mural and memorial plaque to Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville is in the Killycomain Estate in Portadown
, where Boyle had lived. The plaque describes them as having been "killed in action".
In a report on Nairac's alleged involvement in the massacre, published in the Sunday Mirror
newspaper on 16 May 1999, Colin Wills called the attack "one of the worst atrocities in the 30-year history of the Troubles". Irish Times diarist, Frank McNally, summed up the massacre as "an incident that encapsulated all the madness of the time".
A stamp was issued in Ireland on 22 September 2010 commemorating the Miami Showband. The 55-cent stamp, designed with a 1967 publicity photograph of the band, included two of the slain members Fran O'Toole and Brian McCoy as part of the lineup when Dickie Rock was the frontman. It was one of a series of four stamps issued by An Post
, celebrating the "golden age of the Irish showband era from the 1950s to the 1970s".
County Down
-Cities:*Belfast *Newry -Large towns:*Dundonald*Newtownards*Bangor-Medium towns:...
, Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
, in the early morning of 31 July 1975. It left five people dead at the hands of Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) gunmen, including three members of 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...
. The band, one of Ireland's most popular cabaret bands
Irish showband
The Irish Showband was a dance band format which was popular in Ireland during the early rock and roll era from mid 1950s to the late 1970s. The showband was based on the internationally popular six or seven piece dance band. The band's basic repertoire included standard dance numbers and cover...
, had been travelling 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...
, County Down
County Down
-Cities:*Belfast *Newry -Large towns:*Dundonald*Newtownards*Bangor-Medium towns:...
.
The band's minibus
Minibus
A minibus or minicoach is a passenger carrying motor vehicle that is designed to carry more people than a multi-purpose vehicle or minivan, but fewer people than a full-size bus. In the United Kingdom, the word "minibus" is used to describe any full-sized passenger carrying van. Minibuses have a...
was stopped at a bogus military checkpoint seven miles (11 km) north of Newry
Newry
Newry is a city in Northern Ireland. The River Clanrye, which runs through the city, formed the historic border between County Armagh and County Down. It is from Belfast and from Dublin. Newry had a population of 27,433 at the 2001 Census, while Newry and Mourne Council Area had a population...
. Gunmen, dressed in 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, ordered them out of their van and to line-up by the roadside. Although at least four of the gunmen were members of the British Army's 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), all were members of the UVF, a 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 group. While two of the gunmen were hiding a 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 the minibus, it exploded prematurely and killed them. The remaining gunmen opened fire on the band members, killing three and wounding two. Two UDR soldiers and one former soldier were found guilty of murder and received life sentences; they were released in 1998.
Allegations of collusion between British Military Intelligence and the loyalist paramilitaries, leading to the attack, persist. According to former MI6 agent Captain Fred Holroyd
Fred Holroyd
Captain Frederick John Holroyd was a British soldier who was based at the British Army's 3 Brigade HQ in mid-Ulster, Northern Ireland during the 1970s. He enlisted as a gunner in the Royal Artillery, and three years later, in 1964, he was commissioned into the Royal Army Service Corps...
, the killings were organised by British Army officer and member of 14th Intelligence Company, 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...
in collaboration with 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 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...
, which Jackson commanded. In a report published in the Sunday Mirror
Sunday Mirror
The Sunday Mirror is the Sunday sister paper of the Daily Mirror. It began life in 1915 as the Sunday Pictorial and was renamed the Sunday Mirror in 1963. Trinity Mirror also owns The People...
in 1999, Colin Wills called the Miami Showband attack "one of the worst atrocities in the 30-year history of the Troubles". Irish Times diarist Frank McNally summed up the massacre
Massacre
A massacre is an event with a heavy death toll.Massacre may also refer to:-Entertainment:*Massacre , a DC Comics villain*Massacre , a 1932 drama film starring Richard Barthelmess*Massacre, a 1956 Western starring Dane Clark...
as "an incident that encapsulated all the madness of the time".
Political situation in Northern Ireland
The Troubles
The Troubles was a period of ethno-political conflict in Northern Ireland which spilled over at various times into England, the Republic of Ireland, and mainland Europe. The duration of the Troubles is conventionally dated from the late 1960s and considered by many to have ended with the Belfast...
", began in the late 1960s. The year 1975 was marked by an escalation in sectarian attacks and a vicious feud between the two main 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 groups, the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and 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). On 4 April 1974 the proscription against the UVF
Ulster Volunteer Force
The Ulster Volunteer Force is a loyalist paramilitary group in Northern Ireland. It was formed in late 1965 or early 1966 and named after the Ulster Volunteer Force of 1913. The group's volunteers undertook an armed campaign of almost thirty years during The Troubles...
had been lifted 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...
. This meant that both it and the UDA were legal organisations. The UVF would be once more banned by the British Government on 3 October 1975.
In May 1974 unionists
Unionism in Ireland
Unionism in Ireland is an ideology that favours the continuation of some form of political union between the islands of Ireland and Great Britain...
and loyalists called a general strike
Ulster Workers' Council Strike
The Ulster Workers' Council strike was a general strike that took place in Northern Ireland between 15 May and 28 May 1974, during "The Troubles". The strike was called by loyalists and unionists who were against the Sunningdale Agreement, which had been signed in December 1973...
to protest against the Sunningdale Agreement
Sunningdale Agreement
The Sunningdale Agreement was an attempt to establish a power-sharing Northern Ireland Executive and a cross-border Council of Ireland. The Agreement was signed at the Civil Service College in Sunningdale Park located in Sunningdale, Berkshire, on 9 December 1973.Unionist opposition, violence and...
– an attempt at power-sharing, setting up a Northern Ireland Executive
Northern Ireland Executive
The Northern Ireland Executive is the executive arm of the Northern Ireland Assembly, the devolved legislature for Northern Ireland. It is answerable to the Assembly and was established according to the terms of the Northern Ireland Act 1998, which followed the Good Friday Agreement...
and a cross-border Council of Ireland
Council of Ireland
The Council of Ireland may refer to one of two councils, one established in the 1920s, the other in the 1970s.-Council of Ireland :...
, which would have given the Irish Government a voice in running Northern Ireland. During that strike on 17 May, the UVF carried out the Dublin and Monaghan car 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 killed 33 civilians. The 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...
were suspected by British police of bombing two pubs
Birmingham pub bombings
The Birmingham pub bombings occurred on 21 November 1974 in Birmingham, England. The explosions killed 21 people and injured 182. The devices were placed in two central Birmingham pubs – the Mulberry Bush and the Tavern in the Town . Although warnings were sent, the pubs were not evacuated in time...
in the English city of Birmingham
Birmingham
Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...
the following November, resulting in 21 deaths.
UK Home Secretary
Home Secretary
The Secretary of State for the Home Department, commonly known as the Home Secretary, is the minister in charge of the Home Office of the United Kingdom, and one of the country's four Great Offices of State...
Roy Jenkins
Roy Jenkins
Roy Harris Jenkins, Baron Jenkins of Hillhead OM, PC was a British politician.The son of a Welsh coal miner who later became a union official and Labour MP, Roy Jenkins served with distinction in World War II. Elected to Parliament as a Labour member in 1948, he served in several major posts in...
introduced the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which gave the government unprecedented powers against the liberty of individuals in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
in peacetime. At Christmas 1974 the IRA declared a ceasefire, which theoretically lasted throughout most of 1975. This move made loyalists apprehensive and suspicious that a secret accord was being conducted between the British government and the IRA, and that Northern Ireland's Protestants would be "sold out". Their fears were partially grounded in fact, as the MI6 officer Michael Oatley was involved in negotiations with a member of the IRA Army Council
IRA Army Council
The IRA Army Council was the decision-making body of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, more commonly known as the IRA, a paramilitary group dedicated to bringing about the end of the Union between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom. The council had seven members, said by the...
, during which "structures of disengagement" from Ireland were discussed. This had meant the possible withdrawal of British troops from Northern Ireland. The existence of these talks led loyalists to believe that they were about to be abandoned by the British government and forced into a united Ireland; as a result, the loyalist paramilitary groups reacted with a violence that, combined with the tit-for-tat retaliations from the IRA (despite their ceasefire), made 1975 one of the "bloodiest years of the conflict".
In early 1975 Merlyn Rees set up elections for the Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention
Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention
The Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention was an elected body set up in 1975 by the UK Labour government of Harold Wilson as an attempt to deal with constitutional issues surrounding the status of Northern Ireland....
at which all of Northern Ireland's politicians would plan their way forward. These were held on 1 May 1975 and the United Ulster Unionist Council
United Ulster Unionist Council
The United Ulster Unionist Council was a body that sought to bring together the Unionists opposed to the Sunningdale Agreement in Northern Ireland.-Formation:The UUUC was established in January 1974...
(UUUC), which had won 11 out of 12 Northern Irish seats in the February 1974 general election
United Kingdom general election, February 1974
The United Kingdom's general election of February 1974 was held on the 28th of that month. It was the first of two United Kingdom general elections held that year, and the first election since the Second World War not to produce an overall majority in the House of Commons for the winning party,...
, won a majority again. As the UUUC would not back any form of power sharing with the Irish government, no agreement could be reached and the convention failed, again marginalising Northern Ireland's politicians and the communities they represented.
Robin Jackson and the Mid-Ulster UVF
The Ulster Volunteer Force's (UVF) Mid-Ulster BrigadeUVF 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...
operated mainly around the 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...
and 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...
areas. It had been set up in Lurgan in 1972 by part-time UDR captain and staff instructor 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,...
, who made himself commander of the brigade. His leadership was endorsed by the UVF's leader Gusty Spence
Gusty Spence
Augustus Andrew "Gusty" Spence was a leader of the Ulster Volunteer Force and a leading loyalist politician. One of the first UVF members to be convicted of murder, Spence was a senior figure in the organisation for over a decade but later renounced violence and joined the Progressive Unionist...
. The brigade was described by author Don Mullan
Don Mullan
Don Mullan is an Irish bestselling author/humanitarian and media producer. His book Eyewitness Bloody Sunday is officially recognised as a primary catalyst for a new Bloody Sunday Inquiry which became the longest running and most expensive in British Legal History...
as one of the most ruthless battalions operating in the 1970s. At the time of the attack the Mid-Ulster Brigade was commanded by 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,...
, also known as The Jackal. Jackson had assumed command of the Mid-Ulster UVF just a few days before the Miami Showband attack, when he had taken over from Hanna. Hanna had been shot dead outside his home in Lurgan on 27 July 1975, a killing in which Jackson was allegedly involved. According to authors Paul Larkin and Martin Dillon, Jackson was accompanied by Harris Boyle
Harris Boyle
Harris Boyle was a Ulster Defence Regiment soldier and a high-ranking member of the Ulster Volunteer Force , a Northern Irish loyalist paramilitary organisation. Boyle was implicated in the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings which left a total of 33 people dead...
when he killed Hanna. Hanna was named by 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:...
as having organised and led the 1974 Dublin car bombings, along with Jackson. Journalist Joe Tiernan suggested that Hanna was shot for refusing to participate in the Miami Showband attack. He also alleged that Hanna became an informer for the Gardaí in exchange for immunity from prosecution for the Dublin bombings. Dillon suggested that because a large number of UDR/UVF members were to be used for the planned Miami Showband ambush, Hanna was considered to have been a "security risk", therefore the UVF decided he had to be killed before he could alert the authorities.
Jackson was an alleged Royal Ulster Constabulary
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...
(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 who was said by the narrator of Yorkshire Television's The Hidden Hand: The Forgotten Massacre programme to have had links to British Military Intelligence and 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...
. A report in the Irish Times implicated Jackson in the Dublin bombings. More than 100 killings were attributed to him, according to 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...
, the Derry
Derry
Derry or Londonderry is the second-biggest city in Northern Ireland and the fourth-biggest city on the island of Ireland. The name Derry is an anglicisation of the Irish name Doire or Doire Cholmcille meaning "oak-wood of Colmcille"...
-based civil rights group.
The Miami Showband
The Miami Showband was a popular Dublin-based cabaret band, enjoying fame and, according to journalist Peter TaylorPeter Taylor (Journalist)
Peter Taylor born in Scarborough, North Riding of Yorkshire is a British journalist and documentary-maker who had covered for many years the political and armed conflict in Northern Ireland, widely known as the Troubles...
, "Beatle-like devotion" from fans on both sides of the Irish border. A typical Irish showband
Irish showband
The Irish Showband was a dance band format which was popular in Ireland during the early rock and roll era from mid 1950s to the late 1970s. The showband was based on the internationally popular six or seven piece dance band. The band's basic repertoire included standard dance numbers and cover...
was based on the popular six or seven member dance band. Its basic repertoire included cover versions of pop songs
Pop music
Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...
that were currently in the charts and standard dance numbers. The music ranged from rock
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
and country and western to Dixieland jazz
Dixieland Jazz
Dixieland Jazz was a Canadian music television series which aired on CBC Television in 1954.-Premise:The series host was Trump Davidson, a cornet player. He also hosted a radio music series on CBC's Trans-Canada Network.-Scheduling:...
. Sometimes the showbands played traditional Irish music at their performances.
Originally called the Downbeats Quartet, the Miami Showband was reformed in 1962 by rock promoter Tom Doherty, who gave them their new name. With Dublin-born singer Dickie Rock as frontman, the Miami Showband underwent many personnel changes over the years. In December 1972, Rock left the band to be briefly replaced by two brothers, Frankie and Johnny Simon. That same year keyboardist Francis "Fran" O'Toole (from Bray
Bray
Bray is a town in north County Wicklow, Ireland. It is a busy urban centre and seaside resort, with a population of 31,901 making it the fourth largest in Ireland as of the 2006 census...
, County Wicklow
County Wicklow
County Wicklow is a county in Ireland. It is part of the Mid-East Region and is also located in the province of Leinster. It is named after the town of Wicklow, which derives from the Old Norse name Víkingalág or Wykynlo. Wicklow County Council is the local authority for the county...
) had won the Gold Star Award on RTÉ
Raidió Teilifís Éireann
Raidió Teilifís Éireann is a semi-state company and the public service broadcaster of Ireland. It both produces programmes and broadcasts them on television, radio and the Internet. The radio service began on January 1, 1926, while regular television broadcasts began on December 31, 1961, making...
's Reach For the Stars television programme. In early 1973, Billy MacDonald (aka "Billy Mac") took over as the group's frontman when the Simon brothers quit the band. The following year, Fran O'Toole became the band's lead vocalist after Mick Roche (Billy Mac's replacement) was sacked. O'Toole was noted for his good looks and popularity with female fans. was described by the Miami Showband's former bass guitarist, Paul Ashford, as having been the "greatest soul singer" in Ireland. Ashford had been asked to leave the band in 1973, for complaining that performing in Northern Ireland put their lives at risk. He was replaced by Johnny Brown, who in turn was replaced by Dave Monks until Stephen Travers eventually became the band's permanent bass player. In late 1974, the Miami Showband's song Clap Your Hands and Stomp Your Feet (featuring O'Toole on lead vocals) reached number eight in the Irish charts
Irish Singles Chart
The Irish Singles Chart is Ireland's music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by the Irish Recorded Music Association and compiled on behalf of the IRMA by Chart-Track. Chart rankings are based on sales, which are compiled through over-the-counter retail data captured...
.
The 1975 lineup comprised four Catholics and two Protestants. They were: lead vocalist and keyboard player Fran O'Toole (29, Catholic), guitarist Anthony "Tony" Geraghty (23, Catholic) from Dublin, trumpeter Brian McCoy (33, Protestant) from Caledon, County Tyrone
Caledon, County Tyrone
Caledon , historically known as Kinnaird , is a small village and townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It is in the Clogher Valley on the banks of the River Blackwater, 7 miles from Armagh. It lies in the southeast of Tyrone and near the borders of County Armagh and County Monaghan. In the...
, saxophonist Des McAlea (aka "Des Lee"), a Catholic from Belfast
Belfast
Belfast is the capital of and largest city in Northern Ireland. By population, it is the 14th biggest city in the United Kingdom and second biggest on the island of Ireland . It is the seat of the devolved government and legislative Northern Ireland Assembly...
, bassist Stephen Travers (24, Catholic) from Carrick-on-Suir
Carrick-on-Suir
Carrick-on-Suir is a town in South Tipperary in Ireland. As the name – meaning "the rock of the Suir" – suggests, the town is situated on the River Suir. The of the town gives the population as 5,906 and shows that it has grown by 5.7% since 2002...
, County Tipperary
County Tipperary
County Tipperary is a county of Ireland. It is located in the province of Munster and is named after the town of Tipperary. The area of the county does not have a single local authority; local government is split between two authorities. In North Tipperary, part of the Mid-West Region, local...
and drummer Ray Millar (Protestant) from Antrim
Antrim, County Antrim
Antrim is a town in County Antrim in the northeast of Northern Ireland, on the banks of the Six Mile Water, half a mile north-east of Lough Neagh. It had a population of 20,001 people in the 2001 Census. The town is the administrative centre of Antrim Borough Council...
. O'Toole and McCoy were both married; each had two children. Geraghty was engaged to be married.
Their music was described as "contemporary and trans-atlantic", with no reference to the Northern Ireland conflict. By 1975 they had gained a large following, playing to crowds of people in dancehalls and ballrooms across the island. The band had no overt interest in politics nor in the religious beliefs of the people who made up their audience. They were prepared to travel anywhere in Ireland to perform for their fans.
According to the Irish Times, at the height of the Irish showband's popularity (from the 1950s to the 1970s), up to as many as 700 bands travelled to venues all over Ireland on a nightly basis.
Bogus checkpoint
Five members of the Dublin-based band were travelling home after a performance at the Castle Ballroom in BanbridgeBanbridge
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...
, County Down
County Down
-Cities:*Belfast *Newry -Large towns:*Dundonald*Newtownards*Bangor-Medium towns:...
on Thursday 31 July 1975. Ray Millar, the band's drummer, was not with them as he had chosen to go to his home town of Antrim to spend the night with his parents. The band's road manager, Brian Maguire, had already gone ahead a few minutes earlier in the equipment van. At about 2.30 a.m., when the band was seven miles (11 km) north of Newry on the main A1 road, their Volkswagen
Volkswagen
Volkswagen is a German automobile manufacturer and is the original and biggest-selling marque of the Volkswagen Group, which now also owns the Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, SEAT, and Škoda marques and the truck manufacturer Scania.Volkswagen means "people's car" in German, where it is...
minibus (driven by trumpeter Brian McCoy with Stephen Travers in the front seat beside him) reached the townland
Townland
A townland or bally is a small geographical division of land used in Ireland. The townland system is of Gaelic origin—most townlands are believed to pre-date the Norman invasion and most have names derived from the Irish language...
of Buskhill. There they were flagged-down by armed men dressed in 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 waving a red torch in a circular motion. During "The Troubles" it was normal for the British Army to set up checkpoints daily, at any time.
Assuming it was a legitimate checkpoint, McCoy informed the others inside the minibus of a military checkpoint up ahead and pulled in at the lay-by as directed by the armed men. As McCoy rolled down the window and produced his driving licence, gunmen came up to the minibus and one of them said in a Northern Irish accent, "Goodnight, fellas. How are things? Can you step out of the van for a few minutes and we'll just do a check". The unsuspecting band members (still wearing their stage clothes) got out and were politely told to line-up facing the ditch at the rear of the minibus with their hands on their heads. More uniformed men appeared from out of the darkness, their guns pointed at the minibus. About 10 gunmen were at the checkpoint, according to author and journalist 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....
.
After McCoy told them they were the Miami Showband, one gunman, Thomas Crozier (who had a notebook) asked the band members for their names and addresses, while the others bantered with them about the success of their performance that night. As Crozier took down the information, a car pulled up and another uniformed man appeared on the scene. He wore a uniform and beret noticeably different from the others. He spoke with an educated English accent and immediately took charge, ordering a man who appeared to have been the leader of the patrol, to tell Crozier to obtain their names and dates of birth instead of addresses.
The jocular mood of the gunmen abruptly ceased. At no time did this new soldier speak to any of the band members nor did he directly address Crozier. He relayed all his instructions to the gunman in command. Travers, the band's new bass player, assumed he was a British Army officer; an opinion shared by McCoy. Just after the arrival of this mysterious soldier, McCoy nudged Travers, who was standing beside him, and reassured him by saying "Don't worry Stephen, this is British Army". Travers thought that McCoy, a Protestant from Northern Ireland, was familiar with security checkpoints and had reckoned the regular British Army would be more efficient than the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR), who had a reputation for unprofessional and unpredictable behaviour especially towards people from the Irish Republic.
McCoy had close relatives in the security forces; his brother-in-law was a former member of the B Specials which had been disbanded in 1970. Travers described McCoy as a "sophisticated, father-type figure. Everybody was respectful to Brian". McCoy's words, therefore, were taken seriously by the other band members, and anything he said was considered to be accurate.
Explosion
At least four of the gunmen were British soldiers, but they were actually from the UDR; a locally recruited infantry regiment of the British Army in Northern Ireland. Martin Dillon suggested, in The Dirty War, that at least five serving UDR soldiers were present at the checkpoint. All the gunmen were members of the UVF's Mid-Ulster Brigade, and had been lying in wait to ambush the band having set up the checkpoint just minutes before.Out of sight of the band members, two of the gunmen placed a ten-pound (4.5 kg) 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...
in the rear of the minibus. The UVF's plan was that the bomb would explode once the minibus had reached Newry, killing all on board. However, Martin Dillon alleged that the bomb was meant to go off in the Irish Republic. He suggested that had all gone according to plan, the loyalist extremists would have been able to clandestinely bomb the Republic of Ireland, yet claim that the band were republican
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...
bomb-smugglers carrying explosives on behalf of the IRA. They had hoped to embarrass the Irish government, as well as to draw attention to its underpatrolled border. This would have resulted in the Irish authorities enforcing tighter controls over people crossing the border, thus greatly restricting IRA operations. Dillon opined that another reason the UVF decided to target the Miami Showband was because the nationalist
Irish nationalism
Irish nationalism manifests itself in political and social movements and in sentiment inspired by a love for Irish culture, language and history, and as a sense of pride in Ireland and in the Irish people...
community held them in high regard; to attack the band was to strike the nationalists indirectly.
Stephen Travers heard the gunmen rummaging in the back of the minibus, where he kept his guitar. Concerned it may be damaged, he approached the two gunmen and told them to be careful. Asked whether he had anything valuable inside the case, Travers replied no. The gunman turned him round, punched him in the back and pushed him on the shoulder back into the line-up.
When the two gunmen closed the rear door, clumsy soldering on the clock used as a timer caused the device to explode prematurely, blowing the minibus apart and killing the gunmen Harris Boyle
Harris Boyle
Harris Boyle was a Ulster Defence Regiment soldier and a high-ranking member of the Ulster Volunteer Force , a Northern Irish loyalist paramilitary organisation. Boyle was implicated in the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings which left a total of 33 people dead...
(aged 22, a telephone wireman from Portadown) 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...
(aged 34, a textile worker from Moygashel
Moygashel
Moygashel is a small village and townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It is near the southern edge of Dungannon. Although the village's name is pronounced , the trademark of the Irish linen named after it is pronounced .- History :Moygashel is a mill town and mills have been in operation...
) instantly. Hurled in opposite directions, they were both decapitated and their bodies dismembered. What little that remained intact of their bodies was burnt beyond recognition; one of the limbless torsos was completely charred.
Shootings
Following the explosion, the remaining gunmen opened fire on the dazed band members, who had all been knocked down into the field below the level of the road from the force of the blast. The order to shoot was given by the patrol's apparent leader, James McDowell, to eliminate witnesses to the bogus checkpoint and subsequent bombing. Three of the musicians were killed: lead singer Fran O'Toole, trumpeter Brian McCoy, and guitarist Tony Geraghty.Brian McCoy was the first to die, having received nine rounds in the back from a 9 mm Luger pistol in the initial volley of gunfire. Fran O'Toole attempted to run away, but was quickly chased down by the gunmen who had immediately jumped down into the field in pursuit. He was then machine-gunned twenty-two times in the face as he lay supine on the ground.
Tony Geraghty also attempted to escape; but he was caught by the gunmen and shot at least four times in the back. Both men had pleaded for their lives before they were shot; one had cried out, "Please don't shoot me, don't kill me".
Bassist Stephen Travers was seriously wounded by a dum-dum bullet which had struck him when the gunmen had first begun shooting. He survived by pretending he was dead, as he lay beside the body of McCoy. Saxophone player Des McAlea was hit by the minibus' door when it was blown off in the explosion, but was not badly wounded. He lay hidden in thick undergrowth, undetected by the gunmen. He also survived, and was able to hitch a lift to alert the RUC at their barracks in Newry after the gunmen had left the scene, assuming everyone else had been killed. Travers later recalled hearing one of the departing gunmen tell his comrade who had kicked McCoy's body to make sure he was not alive: "Come on, those bastards are dead. I got them with dum-dums".
Forensic and ballistic evidence
When the RUC arrived at the site they found five dead bodies, a seriously injured Stephen Travers, body parts, the smouldering remains of the destroyed minibus, debris from the bomb blast, bullets, spent cartridges, and the band members' personal possessions, including clothing, shoes, and a photograph of the group, strewn across the area. They also discovered a stolen white Ford Escort registration number 4933 LZ. which had been left behind by the gunmen, along with two guns, ammunition, green UDR berets and a pair of glasses later traced to James McDowell, the gunman who had ordered the shootings.One of the first RUC men who arrived at Buskhill in the wake of the killings was Scenes of Crime Officer
Scenes of Crime Officer
A Scenes of Crime Officer is an officer who gathers forensic evidence for the British police. They are also referred to by some forces as Forensic Scene Investigators , Crime Scene Investigators , or Crime Scene Examiners...
James O'Neill. He described the scene as having "just the smell of utterly death about the place ... burning blood, burning tyres". He also added that "that bomb was definitely placed there with a view to killing all in that band".
The only identifiable body part from the bombers to survive the blast (which had been heard up to four miles away) was a severed arm belonging to Wesley Somerville. It was found one hundred yards from the site with a "UVF Portadown" tattoo on it.
Afterwards, as Travers recovered in hospital, the second survivor Des McAlea gave the police a description of McDowell as the gunman with a moustache and wearing dark glasses who appeared to have been the leader of the patrol.
Some time after the attack, RUC officers questioned Stephen Travers at Dublin Castle
Dublin Castle
Dublin Castle off Dame Street, Dublin, Ireland, was until 1922 the fortified seat of British rule in Ireland, and is now a major Irish government complex. Most of it dates from the 18th century, though a castle has stood on the site since the days of King John, the first Lord of Ireland...
. He subsequently stated they refused to accept his description of the different-coloured beret worn by the soldier with the English accent. The UVF gunmen had worn green UDR berets, whereas the other man's had been lighter in colour.
The dead bombers were named by the UVF, in a statement issued within twelve hours of the attack. Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville were UDR soldiers as well as holding the rank of major and lieutenant, respectively, in the UVF. In 1993 Boyle was named by The Hidden Hand programme as one of the Dublin car bombers.
The stolen Ford Escort belonged to a man from Portadown, who according to Captain Fred Holroyd
Fred Holroyd
Captain Frederick John Holroyd was a British soldier who was based at the British Army's 3 Brigade HQ in mid-Ulster, Northern Ireland during the 1970s. He enlisted as a gunner in the Royal Artillery, and three years later, in 1964, he was commissioned into the Royal Army Service Corps...
, had links with one of the UVF bombers and the driver of the bomb car which had been left to explode in Parnell Street
Parnell Street
Parnell Street is located on Dublin's Northside and runs from Capel Street in the west to Gardiner Street and Mountjoy Square in the east, and is at the north end of O'Connell Street, where it provides the south side of Parnell Square....
, Dublin on 17 May 1974. He was also one of the prime suspects in the sectarian killing of Dorothy Traynor on 1 April 1975 in Portadown.
Ballistic evidence indicates that the ten-member gang took at least six guns with them on the attack. An independent panel of inquiry commissioned by the Pat Finucane Centre has established that among the weapons actually used in the killings were two Sterling 9 mm submachine guns and a 9 mm Luger pistol serial no. U 4. The submachine guns were linked to prior and later sectarian killings, whereas the Luger had been used to kill leading IRA 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...
, the previous January.
Reactions
Within twelve hours of the attack the UVF's Brigade Staff (Belfast leadership) issued a statement. It was released under the heading Ulster Central Intelligence Agency – Miami Showband Incident Report: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 to 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.
Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville were given UVF paramilitary funerals 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:...
, who is also a Democratic Unionist Party
Democratic Unionist Party
The Democratic Unionist Party is the larger of the two main unionist political parties in Northern Ireland. Founded by Ian Paisley and currently led by Peter Robinson, it is currently the largest party in the Northern Ireland Assembly and the fourth-largest party in the House of Commons of the...
(DUP) politician.
The killings shocked everybody in Ireland. They also put a serious strain on Anglo-Irish relations. The Irish Times reported that on the night following the attack, the British ambassador Sir Arthur Galsworthy was summoned to hear the Irish Government's strong feelings regarding the murder of the three band members. The government held the view that the British Government had not done enough to stop sectarian assassinations in Northern Ireland.
Following the post-mortems, funerals were held for the three slain musicians; they received televised news coverage by RTÉ
RTE
RTÉ is the abbreviation for Raidió Teilifís Éireann, the public broadcasting service of the Republic of Ireland.RTE may also refer to:* Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, 25th Prime Minister of Turkey...
, Ireland's public service broadcaster. According to the RTÉ, "Their families were in deep mourning and Ireland mourned with them".
According to Peter Taylor, the Provisional IRA's gun and bomb attack on the loyalist Bayardo Bar
Bayardo Bar attack
The Bayardo Bar attack took place on 13 August 1975 in Belfast, Northern Ireland. A unit of the Provisional IRA Belfast Brigade, led by Brendan McFarlane, launched a bombing and shooting attack on the pub on Aberdeen Street , which was frequented by Ulster Volunteer Force members...
in Belfast's Shankill Road the following 13 August was in retaliation for the Miami Showband ambush. Four Protestant civilians (two men and two women) and UVF member Hugh Harris were killed in the attack.
Altnamachin attack
Less than one month after the Miami Showband massacre, another UVF unit, operating as part of the Glenanne gang, used the same modus operandi on 24 August 1975, at Altnamachin, outside Tullyvallen, close to the border with the Republic of Ireland. Two Gaelic footballGaelic football
Gaelic football , commonly referred to as "football" or "Gaelic", or "Gah" is a form of football played mainly in Ireland...
supporters, Colm McCartney and Sean Farmer, were stopped in their car by a UVF patrol wearing full military combat uniforms at a bogus vehicle checkpoint. The two men were ordered out of the car and then both were shot dead a short distance away. Three RUC men had earlier been stopped in their unmarked car by the same "soldiers", who let them through upon ascertaining their identity. The RUC, however, had suspected that the checkpoint had been fake. After receiving radio confirmation that there were no authorised regular Army or UDR checkpoints in the area that night, they reported the incident and requested help from the British Army to investigate it, but no action was taken. UDR corporal Robert McConnell
Robert McConnell (loyalist)
Robert William McConnell , was a Northern Irish loyalist who allegedly carried out or was an accomplice to a number of sectarian attacks and killings, although he never faced any charges or convictions...
was implicated by 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...
in this attack.
Convictions
11th Battalion Ulster Defence Regiment
The 11th Battalion, Ulster Defence Regiment was formed from companies of the 2nd Battalion Ulster Defence Regiment and the 3rd Battalion Ulster Defence Regiment in 1972...
was charged with the Miami killings. It was believed he had been betrayed to the RUC by a member of the gang.
Thomas Crozier recounted that on the night of the killings, he had driven to the grounds of a school in Lurgan where he had picked up two men. He then drove to a lay-by on the Newry-Banbridge dual carriageway
Dual carriageway
A dual carriageway is a class of highway with two carriageways for traffic travelling in opposite directions separated by a central reservation...
and met up with another five men, who were all wearing British Army uniforms. They subsequently set up a roadblock with "all the trappings of a regular military checkpoint". Crozier told police, and later a court, that he had not played a large part in the attack. He refused to name his accomplices, as he felt that to do so would put the lives of his family in danger.
On 22 January 1976, a second UDR soldier, Sergeant James Roderick McDowell (aged 29, an optical worker, also from Lurgan) was arrested and charged with the Miami killings. He served in C Company, 11th Battalion UDR. The RUC were led to him through his glasses which had been found at the murder scene. Tests done on the glasses, which were eventually traced back to McDowell, revealed that the lens were of a prescription worn by just 1 in 500,000 of the population.
McDowell's statement of admission was published in David McKittrick
David McKittrick
David McKittrick is a Belfast-born journalist who has reported on Northern Ireland since 1971.-Professional career:McKittrick began his career as a reporter for the East Antrim Times. He joined the Irish Times in 1973 as a reporter in Belfast, becoming Northern editor in 1976 and London editor in...
's book Lost Lives:
"There was very little planning. I only came into it because of my UDR connection and the fact that I had a uniform. I was given a sub-machine gun but I had never fired it. I passed out when the explosion happened and that was when I lost the gun, the glasses, and a UDR beret".
On 15 October 1976, Crozier and McDowell both received life sentences for the Miami Showband murders. McDowell had pleaded guilty. Crozier had pleaded not guilty. The judge, by sentencing McDowell and Crozier to 35 years imprisonment each, had handed down the longest life sentences in the history of Northern Ireland; he commented that "killings like the Miami Showband must be stopped". He added that had the death penalty not been abolished, it would have been imposed in this case.
A third person, former UDR soldier John James Somerville (aged 37, a lorry-helper and the brother of Wesley), was arrested following an RUC raid in Dungannon
Dungannon
Dungannon is a medium-sized town in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. It is the third-largest town in the county and a population of 11,139 people was recorded in the 2001 Census. In August 2006, Dungannon won Ulster In Bloom's Best Kept Town Award for the fifth time...
on 26 September 1980. He was charged with the Miami Showband killings and the killing of Patrick Falls in 1974. He was given a total of four life sentences (three for the murders of the Miami Showband members and one for the Falls murder) on 9 November 1981; he had pleaded not guilty. The three convicted UVF men, although admitting to having been at the scene, denied having shot anyone. None of the men ever named their accomplices, and the other UVF gunmen were never caught. The three men were sent to serve their sentence in the Maze Prison, on the outskirts of Lisburn
Lisburn
DemographicsLisburn Urban Area is within Belfast Metropolitan Urban Area and is classified as a Large Town by the . On census day there were 71,465 people living in Lisburn...
. Fortnight Magazine
Fortnight Magazine
Fortnight is a monthly political and cultural magazine published in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The magazine was founded in 1970 and aims to provide analysis and criticism of politics, culture, and the arts from those from both inside and outside the local mainstream. Fortnight is read by and...
reported that on 1 June 1982, John James Somerville began a hunger strike at the Maze to obtain special category status. Crozier, McDowell, and Somerville were released after 1998 under the terms of the Belfast Agreement
Belfast Agreement
The Good Friday Agreement or Belfast Agreement , sometimes called the Stormont Agreement, was a major political development in the Northern Ireland peace process...
.
Allegations
A continued allegation in the case has been the presence of British Army officer and member of , Captain Robert NairacRobert 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...
at the scene. Former serving Secret Intelligence Service
Secret Intelligence Service
The Secret Intelligence Service is responsible for supplying the British Government with foreign intelligence. Alongside the internal Security Service , the Government Communications Headquarters and the Defence Intelligence , it operates under the formal direction of the Joint Intelligence...
agent Captain Fred Holroyd, and others, suggested that Nairac had organised the attack in cooperation with Robin Jackson and the Mid-Ulster UVF. In his maiden parliamentary
Parliament of the United Kingdom
The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body in the United Kingdom, British Crown dependencies and British overseas territories, located in London...
speech on 7 July 1987, Ken Livingstone
Ken Livingstone
Kenneth Robert "Ken" Livingstone is an English politician who is currently a member of the centrist to centre-left Labour Party...
MP told the House of Commons, "it was likely" that Nairac had organised the attack. Surviving band members Stephen Travers and Des McAlea told police and later testified in court that a British Army officer with a "crisp, clipped English accent" oversaw the Buskhill attack, the implication being that this was Nairac. In his book The Dirty War, Martin Dillon adamantly dismissed the allegation that Nairac had been present. He believed it was based on the erroneous linkage of Nairac to the earlier murder of IRA man 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...
in County Monaghan
County Monaghan
County Monaghan is a county in Ireland. It is part of the Border Region and is also located in the province of Ulster. It is named after the town of Monaghan. Monaghan County Council is the local authority for the county...
– the same pistol was used in both attacks. Regarding the soldier with the English accent, Dillon wrote:
it is to say the least highly dubious, if not absurd to conclude from such superficial factors that Nairac was present at the Miami murders. I was told by a source close to "Mr. A" and another loyalist hitman that Nairac was not present at either murder [Miami Showband and John Francis Green].Travers had described the English-accented man as having been of normal height and thought he had fair hair, but was not certain. Travers was not able to positively identify Nairac, from his photograph, as having been the man at Buskhill. 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 Harris Boyle revealed to the programme's researchers that Nairac had deliberately detonated the bomb in order to eliminate Boyle, with whom he had carried out the Green killing. Journalist Emily O'Reilly
Emily O'Reilly
Emily O'Reilly is an author and former journalist and broadcaster who became Ireland's first female Ombudsman in 2003, succeeding Kevin Murphy....
noted in the Sunday Tribune
Sunday Tribune
The Sunday Tribune was an Irish Sunday broadsheet newspaper published by Tribune Newspapers plc. It was edited in its final years by Nóirín Hegarty, who changed both the tone and the physical format of the newspaper from broadsheet to tabloid. Former editors include Conor Brady, Vincent Browne,...
that none of the three men convicted of the massacre ever implicated Nairac in the attack or accused him of causing Boyle's death.
The band's road manager, Brian Maguire stated that when he drove away from Banbridge in the lead, a few minutes ahead of the band's minibus, he passed through security barriers manned by the RUC. As Maguire continued ahead, up the by-pass towards Newry, he noticed a blue Triumph 2000 pulling-out from where it had been parked in a lay-by. Maguire recalled that the car first slowed down, then it accelerated, flashing its lights.
Another persistent allegation is the direct involvement of Mid-Ulster UVF leader Robin Jackson. He was one of the men taken in by the RUC in August 1975 and questioned as a suspect in the killings, but was released without charge. The independent panel of inquiry commissioned by the Pat Finucane Centre concluded that there was "credible evidence that the principal perpetrator [of the Miami Showband attack] was a man who was not prosecuted – alleged RUC Special Branch agent Robin Jackson". The same panel revealed that about six weeks before the attack, Thomas Crozier, Jackson, and the latter's brother-in-law Samuel Fulton Neill, were arrested for the possession of four shotguns. Neill's car was one of those allegedly used in the Buskhill attack. He was later shot dead in Portadown on 25 January 1976, allegedly by Jackson for having informed the RUC about Thomas Crozier's participation in the attack. The panel stated that it was unclear why Crozier, Jackson, and Neill were not in police custody at the time the Miami Showband killings took place. Martin Dillon maintained in The Dirty War that the Miami Showband attack was planned weeks before at a house in Portadown, and the person in charge of the overall operation was a former UDR man, whom Dillon referred to for legal reasons as "Mr. A". Dillon also opined in God and the Gun: the Church and Irish Terrorism that the dead bombers, Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville, had actually led the UVF gang at Buskhill. Journalists Kevin Dowling and Liam Collins in the Irish Independent
Irish Independent
The Irish Independent is Ireland's largest-selling daily newspaper that is published in both compact and broadsheet formats. It is the flagship publication of Independent News & Media.-History:...
however, suggested in their respective articles that Jackson had been the leader of the unit.
The Pat Finucane Centre has named the Miami Showband killings as one of the 87 violent attacks perpetrated by 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...
against the Irish nationalist
Irish nationalism
Irish nationalism manifests itself in political and social movements and in sentiment inspired by a love for Irish culture, language and history, and as a sense of pride in Ireland and in the Irish people...
community in the 1970s. The Glenanne gang was a loose alliance of loyalist extremists allegedly operating under the command of British Military Intelligence and/or RUC Special Branch. It comprised rogue elements of the British security forces who, together with the UVF, carried out sectarian killings in the Mid-Ulster/County Armagh area. Their name comes from a farm in Glenanne, County Armagh, which was owned by RUC reservist James Mitchell
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...
; according to RUC Special Patrol Group officer John Weir, it was used as a UVF arms dump and bomb-making site. Weir alleged the bomb used in the Miami Showband attack came from Mitchell's farm. Weir's affidavit
Affidavit
An affidavit is a written sworn statement of fact voluntarily made by an affiant or deponent under an oath or affirmation administered by a person authorized to do so by law. Such statement is witnessed as to the authenticity of the affiant's signature by a taker of oaths, such as a notary public...
implicating Robin Jackson in a number of attacks including the 1974 Dublin bombings was published in the 2003 Barron Report; the findings of an official investigation into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings commissioned by Irish Supreme Court Judge Henry Barron.
Later years
During the six years from the onset of "The Troubles" until the July 1975 attack, there had never been an incident involving any of the showbands. The incident had an adverse effect on the Irish showband scene, with many of the bands afraid to play in Northern Ireland. The emergence of discoDisco
Disco is a genre of dance music. Disco acts charted high during the mid-1970s, and the genre's popularity peaked during the late 1970s. It had its roots in clubs that catered to African American, gay, psychedelic, and other communities in New York City and Philadelphia during the late 1960s and...
s later in the decade meant that ballrooms were converted into nightclubs, leaving the showbands with few venues available in which to perform. By the mid-1980s, the showbands had lost their appeal for the Irish public; although The Miami Showband, albeit with a series of different lineups, did not disband until 1986.
The Miami Showband reformed in 2008, with Travers, Des McAlea, Ray Millar and other new members. It is fronted by McAlea, who returned to Northern Ireland the same year after living in South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
since about 1982.
In 1994, Eric Smyth, a former UDR member and the husband of Brian McCoy's sister, Sheila, was killed by the IRA.
Travers travelled to Belfast in 2006 for a secret meeting with the second-in-command of the UVF's Brigade Staff, in an attempt to come to terms with the killing of his former colleagues and friends. The meeting was arranged by Rev. Chris Hudson, a former intermediary between the Irish Government and the UVF, whose role was crucial to the Northern Ireland peace process
Northern Ireland peace process
The peace process, when discussing the history of Northern Ireland, is often considered to cover the events leading up to the 1994 Provisional Irish Republican Army ceasefire, the end of most of the violence of the Troubles, the Belfast Agreement, and subsequent political developments.-Towards a...
. Hudson had been a close friend of Fran O'Toole. The encounter took place inside Hudson's church. The UVF man, who identified himself only as "the Craftsman", apologised to Travers for the attack, and explained that the UVF gunmen had opened fire on the band because they "had panicked" that night. It was revealed in Peter Taylor's book Loyalists that "the Craftsman" had been instrumental in bringing about the 1994 Combined Loyalist Military Command
Combined Loyalist Military Command
The Combined Loyalist Military Command was an umbrella body for loyalist paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland set up in the early 1990s, recalling the earlier Ulster Army Council and Ulster Loyalist Central Co-ordinating Committee....
(CLMC) ceasefire.
Travers also visited the home of Thomas Crozier, hoping to meet with him, but the latter did not come to the door. He presently resides near Craigavon
Craigavon
Craigavon is a settlement in north County Armagh, Northern Ireland. It was a planned settlement that was begun in 1965 and named after Northern Ireland's first Prime Minister — James Craig, 1st Viscount Craigavon. It was intended to be a linear city incorporating Lurgan and Portadown, but this plan...
. James McDowell lives in Lurgan, and John James Somerville is an evangelical minister in Belfast.
Memorials
A monument dedicated to the dead Miami Showband members was unveiled at a ceremony at Parnell Square North, Dublin, on 10 December 2007. Survivors Stephen Travers and Des McAlea were both present at the unveiling, as was the TaoiseachTaoiseach
The Taoiseach is the head of government or prime minister of Ireland. The Taoiseach is appointed by the President upon the nomination of Dáil Éireann, the lower house of the Oireachtas , and must, in order to remain in office, retain the support of a majority in the Dáil.The current Taoiseach is...
, Bertie Ahern
Bertie Ahern
Patrick Bartholomew "Bertie" Ahern is a former Irish politician who served as Taoiseach of Ireland from 26 June 1997 to 7 May 2008....
, who made a tribute. The monument, made of limestone, bronze and granite, by County Donegal
County Donegal
County Donegal is a county in Ireland. It is part of the Border Region and is also located in the province of Ulster. It is named after the town of Donegal. Donegal County Council is the local authority for the county...
sculptor Redmond Herrity
Redmond Herrity
Redmond Herrity is an Irish sculptor from Letterkenny, County Donegal.Herrity was inspired by street sculptors in India during a visit there in 1997. He later visited Australia where he got to work with stone for the first time. He returned from his tour of the world in 1999. He completed a one...
, is at the site of the old National Ballroom, where the band often played.
A mural and memorial plaque to Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville is in the Killycomain Estate 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...
, where Boyle had lived. The plaque describes them as having been "killed in action".
In a report on Nairac's alleged involvement in the massacre, published in the Sunday Mirror
Sunday Mirror
The Sunday Mirror is the Sunday sister paper of the Daily Mirror. It began life in 1915 as the Sunday Pictorial and was renamed the Sunday Mirror in 1963. Trinity Mirror also owns The People...
newspaper on 16 May 1999, Colin Wills called the attack "one of the worst atrocities in the 30-year history of the Troubles". Irish Times diarist, Frank McNally, summed up the massacre as "an incident that encapsulated all the madness of the time".
A stamp was issued in Ireland on 22 September 2010 commemorating the Miami Showband. The 55-cent stamp, designed with a 1967 publicity photograph of the band, included two of the slain members Fran O'Toole and Brian McCoy as part of the lineup when Dickie Rock was the frontman. It was one of a series of four stamps issued by An Post
An Post
An Post is the State-owned provider of postal services in the Republic of Ireland. An Post provides a universal postal service to all parts of the country as a member of the Universal Postal Union...
, celebrating the "golden age of the Irish showband era from the 1950s to the 1970s".
See also
- List of massacres in the United Kingdom
- Timeline of Ulster Defence Regiment operations
- Timeline of Ulster Volunteer Force actionsTimeline of Ulster Volunteer Force actionsThis is a timeline of actions by the Ulster Volunteer Force , a loyalist paramilitary group formed in 1966. It includes actions carried out by the Red Hand Commando , a group integrated into the UVF shortly after their formation in 1972. It also includes attacks claimed by the Protestant Action...
External links
- Official Miami Showband website
- Interim reports (more detail than 'final') of Irish parliamentary inquiries into Dublin and Monaghan bombings, Kay's Tavern bombing (includes Miami Showband killings information).
- Irish Daily Mail, 30 November 2006 for further information – click on article graphics to read them.
- BBC "On This Day" article about the Miami Showband killings.
- Miami Showband massacre remembered
- 'Miami Showband 1975 YouTube'