1956 in Northern Ireland

← 1955 1954 1953 1956 in Northern Ireland → 1957 1958 1959
Centuries:	20th 21st
Decades:	1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s
See also:	1956 in the United Kingdom 1956 in Ireland Other events of 1956 List of years in Northern Ireland

Events

• 12 December - The Irish Republican Army launches its Border Campaign^[1] with the bombing of a BBC relay transmitter in County Londonderry, burning of a courthouse in Magherafelt by a unit led by 18-year-old Seamus Costello^[1] and of an Ulster Special Constabulary post near Newry and blowing up of a half-built British Army barracks at Enniskillen. A raid on Gough Barracks in Armagh is beaten off after a brief exchange of fire.
• 14 December - Border Campaign: An IRA column under Seán Garland detonates bombs outside Lisnaskea Royal Ulster Constabulary station before raking it with gunfire. Further attacks on Derrylin and Roslea RUC barracks are beaten off.
• 21 December - The Government of Northern Ireland under Basil Brooke uses the Special Powers Act to intern several hundred republican suspects without trial.
• 30 December - Border Campaign: The IRA Teeling Column under Noel Kavanagh again attacks the Derrylin RUC barracks, killing constable John Scally, the campaign's first fatality.
• Ulster Protestant Action, a loyalist Protestant fundamentalist vigilante group, is founded at a special meeting at the Ulster Unionist Party's offices in Glengall Street, Belfast.^[2]
• Tayto (Northern Ireland) established by the Hutchinson family to manufacture potato chips at Tandragee, County Armagh.

Sport

Football

• Irish League

Winners: Linfield

• Irish Cup

Winners: Distillery 2 - 2, 0 - 0, 1 - 0 Glentoran

Births

• 5 February - Jackie Woodburne, actress.
• 24 May - Michael Jackson, Bishop of Clogher (2002 - ).
• 2 September - Angelo Fusco, former volunteer in the Provisional Irish Republican Army and escapee.
• 3 September - Pat McGeown, volunteer in the Provisional Irish Republican Army, took part in the 1981 Irish hunger strike (died 1996).
• 13 September - Bobby Campbell, footballer.
• 19 September - Gerry McElhinney, footballer.
• 10 October - Amanda Burton, actress.
• 18 November - Noel Brotherston, footballer (died 1995).

Full date unknown

• Ronan Bennett, novelist and screenwriter.
• David Catherwood, composer and conductor.
• Christopher Dye, Coordinator of Tuberculosis Monitoring and Evaluation at the World Health Organization and Gresham Professor of Physic.
• S. J. Michaels, writer.
• Don Mullan, writer and film producer
• Dermot Seymour, artist

Deaths

• 18 March - Benjamin Glazer, Academy Award-winning writer, producer and director (born 1887).
• 5 August - John Miller Andrews, second Prime Minister of Northern Ireland (born 1871).
• 25 November - Robert Bowers, cricketer (born 1897).

Full date unknown

• James Cousins, poet and writer (born 1873).
• Ella Young, poet (born 1867).

References