What were the Troubles?
MA, History (University of Edinburgh)
Date Published: 27.06.2024,
Last Updated: 27.06.2024
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Definition and background
For people of Northern Ireland, burnt-out buses and bomb scares were a reality during the latter part of the 20th century. Soldiers patrolled the city center of Belfast and army checkpoints for cars were commonplace. Bombings and shootings between warring factions were a regular occurrence, with citizens caught in the crossfire. Decades of religious and economic divide had erupted into the period of conflict known as the Troubles.
The Troubles were a period in Northern Irish history in which sectarian conflict (i.e., religious or political disputes) came to a head between loyalists, republicans, and the British Army over the status of Northern Ireland, from the end of the 1960s to the end of the 1990s (though violence continued into the 21st century). According to Aaron Edwards in The Northern Ireland Troubles (2023), for more than a generation, “Northern Ireland was the site of one of Europe’s bloodiest and most protracted conflicts”:
Between 1969 and 2007 the ‘Troubles’, as the conflict became euphemistically known, claimed the lives of around 3,700 people, with over ten times as many injured in countless bomb and gun attacks.
Aaron Edwards
Between 1969 and 2007 the ‘Troubles’, as the conflict became euphemistically known, claimed the lives of around 3,700 people, with over ten times as many injured in countless bomb and gun attacks.
Protestant unionists and Catholic nationalists primarily fought during the conflict, with unionists wanting to remain with Great Britain while Catholic nationalists wanted to break away and separate from British influence. Loyalists (i.e., extreme Protestants) and republicans (i.e., extreme Catholics) were responsible for many of the murders and bombings that occurred during the conflict.
During the Troubles, paramilitary groups, or groups outside of legitimate armed forces, came to power, causing chaos and hysteria in communities and worsening sectarian division. These paramilitary groups used guerilla warfare tactics, like raiding, bombing, and ambushing, to incite fear and intimidate the police or political authorities. In Northern Ireland, paramilitary groups included, but were not limited to, the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and the Ulster Defense Association (UDA), which supported loyalist ideas, and the Irish Republican Army (IRA), which promoted republican ideology. Though the IRA had been around for years, the Provisional Irish Republican Army (Provos), a separate branch formed at the start of the Troubles, focused its work on the republican cause in the North.
With the influence of these paramilitary groups, rioting could be seen on the streets of Belfast for decades. Concrete and steel “peace walls” segregated nationalist and unionist communities. Bombings instigated by these paramilitary groups and shoot-outs between these groups and the British Army, which had been deployed to Northern Ireland to settle the unrest, were frequent. Ultimately, the Troubles divided families and destroyed lives, with thousands losing their lives during the conflict and some disappearing never to be seen or heard from again.
This guide will explain why the Troubles occurred, focusing specifically on the history of sectarianism in Northern Ireland. The guide will then discuss key moments during the conflict and the aftermath of the Troubles in Northern Irish society today.
Sectarian stains in Northern Ireland: The origins of the conflict
Sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland can be traced back to the Anglo-Norman invasion in the 12th century and continued for nearly 800 years, as Great Britain controlled affairs in Ireland. The Anglo-Norman invasion of Ireland was a significant event as it ushered in the beginning of direct English rule in Ireland which later evolved into British colonial control in Ireland. The animosity between the indigenous Irish and the Anglo-Norman invaders began as Irish lands were being turned over to the Anglo-Normans and their Gaelic culture was overlooked.
Ulster Plantations
In the early 17th century in Ulster, the northernmost region of Ireland, British landlords (backed by the British Crown) began colonizing the area, displacing many Irish landholders. English and Scottish settlers, or “planters,” were tenants under British landlords, displacing the native Irish from their livelihoods and land. These “Ulster Plantations” as they came to be called created widespread tension between the native Irish and the British newcomers, commencing major rebellions led by the Irish against British rule. The majority of the English and Scottish settlers and their descendants did not assimilate with the Irish. These settlers remained loyal to the British Crown and stayed steadfast in their Protestant beliefs (Caroline Kennedy-Pipe, The Origins of the Present Troubles in Northern Ireland, 2014).
With the formal unification of Great Britain and Ireland under the Act of Union (1800), Ulster continued to be a location where Protestant settlers greatly outnumbered the indigenous Irish Catholics. In their work, The Northern Ireland Conflict (2012), Aaron Edwards and Cillian McGrattan explain why and how Ulster grew into a Protestant-controlled region:
The Northern Ireland state was a unique construct in that it reinforced the power of Ulster Protestants, who held a majority share of the population in the six counties in the north-east of Ireland, but who were a minority community in the island of Ireland, with their demographic roots in the Plantation migrants who had crossed to Ireland in the seventeenth century. What made the north-east counties so different from the rest of Ireland was their close proximity to Great Britain, a heavy industrial base concentrated in the Lagan Valley in Belfast, and unfettered access to the financial markets of the British Empire.
Aaron Edwards and Cillian McGrattan
The Northern Ireland state was a unique construct in that it reinforced the power of Ulster Protestants, who held a majority share of the population in the six counties in the north-east of Ireland, but who were a minority community in the island of Ireland, with their demographic roots in the Plantation migrants who had crossed to Ireland in the seventeenth century. What made the north-east counties so different from the rest of Ireland was their close proximity to Great Britain, a heavy industrial base concentrated in the Lagan Valley in Belfast, and unfettered access to the financial markets of the British Empire.
However, Ireland’s Catholic majority wished to be emancipated from the British Protestant influence making its way into Ireland. Irish nationalists believed in Irish autonomy and strongly disagreed with Ireland’s formal union with Great Britain in 1800.
The Irish War of Independence
Many descendants of the settlers felt superior economically, culturally, and socially to the indigenous Irish people, and they felt their enclave in the North needed to be protected at all costs against the Irish-Catholic state (Kennedy-Pipe, 2014). These tensions eventually culminated in the Irish War of Independence (1919-1921). In 1920, during the war, the Parliament in the United Kingdom granted the wishes of Ulster unionists with the Government of Ireland Act (1920). This act divided Ireland into two self-governing areas. Ulster’s four majority unionist counties — Antrim, Down, Armagh, and Londonderry/Derry — along with two counties which had Catholic, nationalist majorities — Fermanagh and Tyrone — formed Northern Ireland. The three other counties in the north of Ireland — Donegal, Cavan, and Monaghan — joined the island’s remaining 23 counties in the south (the Republic of Ireland). These counties in the south held strong Catholic, nationalist majorities.
The Irish War of Independence ended with the Anglo-Irish Treaty, and the Irish Free State was created in the south. This gave the Republic of Ireland dominion status within the British Empire, and Northern Ireland was allowed to remain outside the Free State (Michael Hopkinson, The Irish War of Independence, 2004).
Northern Ireland self-rule
From 1922, Northern Ireland was a self-governing region of the United Kingdom. With unionists holding a numerical advantage over nationalists, local politics were controlled by unionist interests. Gerrymandering, or the manipulation of electoral districts, ultimately minimized Catholic representation. Protestants were generally given the better paying, more skilled jobs in Northern Ireland. Catholics complained that they were being discriminated against in all aspects of life, especially when it came to public housing and public service jobs, and they believed they were being targeted by the police force, which was overwhelmingly Protestant (Paul Dixon and Eamonn O’Kane, Northern Ireland Since 1969, 2014). Along with these grievances, Catholics felt their culture and identity were being stolen from them. This set in motion decades of immeasurable sectarian conflict that would leave thousands dead and would change many lives forever.
Key moments in the Troubles
The Troubles, which lasted for nearly 30 years, was a conflict that involved civil rights marches, paramilitary raids, hunger strikes, disappearances, and even bombings. In this section, we will explore key moments in the conflict, including the Good Friday Agreement, which ultimately ended the Northern Ireland conflict.
March on Londonderry/Derry, 1968
Historians argue that the catalyst for the Troubles was the march on Londonderry/Derry on October 5, 1968. The march was led by local supporters of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA). They called for social change in Northern Ireland, demanding an end to gerrymandering, discrimination against nationalists, and Catholic oppression regarding voting and equal housing opportunities in Londonderry/Derry. The march was inspired by the success of the American Civil Rights Movement. The Londonderry Corporation, who ran the city of Londonderry/Derry effectively as a predecessor to the present-day city council, openly discriminated against the Catholic and nationalist population as its housing policy favored Protestant, unionist applicants. Catholics were being forced into homelessness or renting and often lived in decrepit conditions, whilst unionists maintained control and disregarded pleas for change. Catholic resentment was also increased with the decision to locate Ulster’s second university in Coleraine, which was a mostly Protestant city, instead of Londonderry/Derry, a more populous and mostly Catholic city (Jonathan Tonge, Northern Ireland, 2013).
On the day of the march, peaceful protests began with activists holding banners and calling out for equal housing opportunities and a more just police force. However, just as soon as the protests began, violence erupted. Police began using water cannons and beating the activists. Simon Prince in Northern Ireland's '68 (2018) indicates that men and women were seen being clubbed by the police, trampled, thrown over fences, and beaten, with some left with serious head trauma and other injuries like broken limbs:
When a couple of policemen attempted to seize the banner, the younger onlookers intervened. This rapidly degenerated into a full-scale riot that enveloped the Diamond and the streets on the edge of the Bogside [...] As night fell, in excess of 1,000 young people – many of them armed with steel rods and bricks – attempted to force their way back into the Diamond. When the police lines held, the rioters retreated behind hastily constructed barricades and began to hurl petrol bombs. The Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) used Land Rovers and the water wagon to demolish these barriers. Sworn testimony was later given that some officers had shouted sectarian insults.
Simon Prince
When a couple of policemen attempted to seize the banner, the younger onlookers intervened. This rapidly degenerated into a full-scale riot that enveloped the Diamond and the streets on the edge of the Bogside [...] As night fell, in excess of 1,000 young people – many of them armed with steel rods and bricks – attempted to force their way back into the Diamond. When the police lines held, the rioters retreated behind hastily constructed barricades and began to hurl petrol bombs. The Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) used Land Rovers and the water wagon to demolish these barriers. Sworn testimony was later given that some officers had shouted sectarian insults.
People across Northern Ireland and even the world were shocked by what they were seeing and were especially appalled by the police brutality. Tension ignited between the Protestant and Catholic communities as Catholics did not feel that they had a voice in their government or even in their community. When the British Army was brought in to restore peace and calm in Northern Ireland following more protests and riots in 1969, violence escalated.
Bloody Sunday, 1972
Over the next few years, violence intensified in Northern Ireland. Then, on January 30, 1972 in Londonderry/Derry, a peaceful day turned into a day of bloodshed. Nearly 15,000 people, led by the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association, gathered in the Creggan area of Londonderry/Derry to fight against internment, a law which gave authorities the power to imprison people without trial, used nearly exclusively on Catholics. The government at Stormont in Belfast had banned protests and rallies so troops were sent to patrol the march. The protestors had planned to march to the city center, but the British Army barricaded the protestors and they were directed towards the Bogside. The Army and activists started arguing, so soldiers from the Parachute Regiment began making arrests. As protestors began throwing rocks, soldiers responded with tear gas, water cannons, and rubber bullets, wounding protestors. Suddenly, shots rang out amidst the arrests, with over 20 soldiers firing their guns, discharging 108 live rounds. Thirteen people died that day, many only seventeen years old, and another victim later succumbed to his injuries (Patrick Hayes and Jim Campbell, Bloody Sunday, 2005). This day became known as Bloody Sunday.
According to Peter Pringle and Philip Jacobson in Those Are Real Bullets, Aren't They? (2016), the violence on Bloody Sunday changed the course of the Troubles:
Bloody Sunday marked a crucial turning point in the Troubles that flared anew in 1968. The fury among Catholics produced a queue of volunteers to swell the depleted ranks of the IRA. A terrorist war was launched, bringing assassinations; bombs to Belfast, Birmingham, Westminster and Whitehall; arms shipments were smuggled from Libya and millions of dollars were raised to buy arms from the Irish community in America.
Peter Pringle and Philip Jacobson
Bloody Sunday marked a crucial turning point in the Troubles that flared anew in 1968. The fury among Catholics produced a queue of volunteers to swell the depleted ranks of the IRA. A terrorist war was launched, bringing assassinations; bombs to Belfast, Birmingham, Westminster and Whitehall; arms shipments were smuggled from Libya and millions of dollars were raised to buy arms from the Irish community in America.
The question of who fired first on Bloody Sunday is still hotly contested to this day and remains a point of contention between the loyalist and republican communities, despite the Saville Inquiry (2010) establishing that paratroopers fired the first shot. In the aftermath of Bloody Sunday, the Provos experienced a spike in recruitment and violence around Northern Ireland ensued. 1972 was the bloodiest year of the Troubles, with violence escalating on all sides of the conflict.
Bloody Friday, 1972 and other paramilitary bombings
During the Troubles, houses were burned down, like those in Bombay Street, and bombings were common not only in Belfast but across the island and in England. On Friday, July 21, 1972, in Belfast, the Provos detonated around twenty bombs, killing nine people and injuring many more. This event became known as Bloody Friday.
Later, in October 1984 at a Conservative Party Conference in Brighton, England, the Provos detonated another bomb, which not only took the lives of five people but also nearly killed Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and her husband (Stephen Kelly, Margaret Thatcher, the Conservative Party and the Northern Ireland Conflict, 1975-1990, 2021). The UVF also took part in bombings in Northern Ireland, including the 1993 machine-gunning of eight people at a pub frequented by Catholics in Greysteel (Tonge, 2013). Violent marches, deadly shootings, and bombings left Northern Ireland in disarray.
Hunger strikes, 1980 and 1981
The hunger strike campaigns in 1980 and 1981 also greatly impacted the course of the Troubles. Young people were tired of the unrest on the streets in Belfast and wanted a change. They also wanted to protest the decision of the British government to withdraw special category status for paramilitary prisoners, changing the status from prisoner of war to criminal. Inspired by the success of the blanket protest in 1976, the dirty protest in 1978, and hunger strikes throughout history, like the hunger strikes during the suffragette movement, men and women in Belfast implemented their own campaign to show the world the atrocities being committed in Northern Ireland.
Therefore, in the HM Prison Maze in October 1980, seven republican IRA prisoners went on hunger strike. In December of that year in Armagh Women’s Prison, three women also went on strike. The hunger strike lasted for 53 days. Following this, on January of 1981, republican prisoners once again went on hunger strike after they decided that the British government was not going to follow their demands. On March 1, IRA Prison Officer Commanding Bobby Sands began the second hunger strike. The prisoners joined one at a time in an effort to put pressure on Thatcher who would not acknowledge the prisoners’ demands and refused to back down or negotiate. However, unlike the first hunger strike, the second proved lethal. After 66 days, Sands passed away. More men died on hunger strike following Sands’s death, with 10 men in total dying for the republican cause. In October of 1981, the strike ceased and partial concessions were given to the prisoners (Richard O’ Rawe, Afterlives, 2011).
In his posthumously published diary entry from March 1, 1981, Bobby Sands reflects on why he allowed his body to suffer for the cause of a united Ireland:
I am a political prisoner. I am a political prisoner because I am a casualty of a perennial war that is being fought between the oppressed Irish people and an alien, oppressive, unwanted regime that refuses to withdraw from our land. I believe and stand by the God-given right of the Irish nation to sovereign independence, and the right of any Irishman or woman to assert this right in armed revolution. That is why I am incarcerated, naked and tortured. Foremost in my tortured mind is the thought that there can never be peace in Ireland until the foreign, oppressive British presence is removed, leaving all the Irish people as a unit to control their own affairs and determine their own destinies as a sovereign people, free in mind and body, separate and distinct physically, culturally and economically (Writings from Prison, 1998).
Bobby Sands
I am a political prisoner. I am a political prisoner because I am a casualty of a perennial war that is being fought between the oppressed Irish people and an alien, oppressive, unwanted regime that refuses to withdraw from our land. I believe and stand by the God-given right of the Irish nation to sovereign independence, and the right of any Irishman or woman to assert this right in armed revolution. That is why I am incarcerated, naked and tortured. Foremost in my tortured mind is the thought that there can never be peace in Ireland until the foreign, oppressive British presence is removed, leaving all the Irish people as a unit to control their own affairs and determine their own destinies as a sovereign people, free in mind and body, separate and distinct physically, culturally and economically (Writings from Prison, 1998).
Sands, along with the other hunger strikers, became martyrs for the republican cause, influencing others to join paramilitary groups and protest the presence of the British Army in Northern Ireland.
The Disappeared
Paramilitary groups, especially the IRA, were responsible for many abductions and disappearances during the decades-long conflict. These victims who were abducted, subsequently murdered, and secretly buried became known as the “Disappeared.” One such victim who was later recovered was the missing mother of 10, Jean McConville. In 2003 on Shelling Hill Beach in County Louth, Republic of Ireland, a body belonging to a woman was found alongside a diaper pin. The diaper pin led her family and investigators to believe that the body did in fact belong to McConville, who went missing in December 1972. A convert to the Catholic faith, she had been under suspicion for passing information to the British Army. She was kidnapped from her residence in West Belfast, a predominantly Catholic and republican area, and later murdered. Members of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) believed she was an informer to the police, a grave sin in the eyes of paramilitary groups, and informers were often murdered.
The Independent Commission for the Location of Victims’ Remains (ICLVR) continues to search for missing and presumed murdered victims of the Troubles. The families of the “Disappeared” continue to seek out answers regarding their loved ones. So far, the ICLVR has found 13 of the 16 victims.
The Good Friday Agreement, 1998
Throughout the 1970s and into the early 1990s, the streets of Belfast were riddled with rubber bullets, petrol bombs, and violence. On April 10, 1998, the Good Friday Agreement was reached, which created an arrangement for cross-border cooperation between the Irish and Northern Irish governments and established a framework for which British and Irish governments would work together to ensure peace in Ireland. In The Good Friday Agreement (2018), Siobhán Fenton explains some of the parameters of the agreement:
In recognition of the human rights abuses which were alleged to have occurred throughout the conflict, often at the hands of the British or Northern Irish states, a new emphasis on human rights and equality would be key to the new government. Bodies tasked with this safeguarding focus were set up, including the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland and the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission. 76 Prisoners who were jailed as a result of violence related to the conflict would be eligible for early release if the paramilitary groups they were associated with stuck to their ceasefires. People born in Northern Ireland would be entitled to have British citizenship, Irish citizenship, both or neither, and would have the right to identify as they saw fit.
Siobhán Fenton
In recognition of the human rights abuses which were alleged to have occurred throughout the conflict, often at the hands of the British or Northern Irish states, a new emphasis on human rights and equality would be key to the new government. Bodies tasked with this safeguarding focus were set up, including the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland and the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission. 76 Prisoners who were jailed as a result of violence related to the conflict would be eligible for early release if the paramilitary groups they were associated with stuck to their ceasefires. People born in Northern Ireland would be entitled to have British citizenship, Irish citizenship, both or neither, and would have the right to identify as they saw fit.
The agreement was accepted by most, though some rejected the peace talks. For example, the Real Irish Republican Army (RIRA), a splinter group from the IRA, violated the agreement with their bombing in Omagh in August 1998, which took the lives of 29 people. Sectarian acts of violence between the paramilitary groups continued and the decommissioning of the groups and the disarming of weapons was slow. Despite this, the Troubles had come to an end.
The aftermath of the Troubles
Though the violence in Northern Ireland has ceased, this traumatic period in history continues to impact families across the North. This can be seen in conflict-induced intergenerational trauma, a type of trauma that is transmitted from one generation to the next due to pain, loss, stress, discrimination, and oppression. As Colin Coulter et. al explain in Northern Ireland a generation after Good Friday (2021), intergenerational trauma may be the cause of suicide deaths amongst young people in Northern Ireland:
Indeed, more people have died at their own hand since the GFA [Good Friday Agreement] – in excess of 5,000 in total – than lost their lives during the Troubles. This sobering statistic might prompt the suspicion, to which we return later, that the advent of the Northern Irish peace process has not meant that violence has ended but rather that it has come to assume other, and more varied, forms.
Colin Coulter, Niall Gilmartin, Katy Hayward and Peter Shirlow
Indeed, more people have died at their own hand since the GFA [Good Friday Agreement] – in excess of 5,000 in total – than lost their lives during the Troubles. This sobering statistic might prompt the suspicion, to which we return later, that the advent of the Northern Irish peace process has not meant that violence has ended but rather that it has come to assume other, and more varied, forms.
Despite the trauma inflicted on families across Northern Ireland, cross-community, cross-cultural efforts have worked to establish relationships between young people in different communities. Youth organizations like Youth Initiatives NI encourage young people to give back to their communities through service and leadership. Regardless of differing cultural backgrounds, these young people build lifelong friendships with one another and learn how to tackle racism, discrimination, and sectarianism in their communities.
Though elements of sectarianism remain in Northern Ireland, most people have chosen to move on and work towards a peaceful existence. The Troubles reminds us of the dangers of sectarianism and how discrimination and prejudice along religious and political grounds can lead to societal destruction.
Further reading on Perlego
Irish Women's Prison Writing (2022) by Red Washburn
Who Was Responsible for the Troubles? (2020) by Liam Kennedy
Agents of Influence (2021) by Aaron Edwards
My Life in Loyalism (2020) by Billy Hutchinson and Gareth Mulvenna
The Bloodiest Year 1972 (2011) by Ken Wharton
The Roots of Ireland's Troubles (2019) by Robert Stedall
A Belfast Child (2020) by John Chambers
Death in the Fields (2023) by Jonathan Trigg
External resources
If you are interested in learning more about The Troubles, Oisin Feeney’s podcast The Troubles Podcast is very informative and interesting listen. The BBC’s documentary Once Upon a Time in Northern Ireland (Bluemel and Mcilwaine, 2023)also provides insightful first-hand accounts of the conflict.
What were the Troubles in simple terms?
What caused the Troubles?
What was a key event during the Troubles?
What ended the Troubles?
Bibliography
Coulter, C. et al. (2021) Northern Ireland a generation after Good Friday: Lost futures and new horizons in the ‘long peace’. Manchester University Press. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/2739914
Dixon, P. and O’Kane, E. (2014) Northern Ireland Since 1969. Routledge. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/1547945
Edwards, A. (2023) The Northern Ireland Troubles: 1969-2007. Osprey Publishing. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/4181319
Edwards, A. and McGrattan, C. (2012) The Northern Ireland Conflict: A Beginner’s Guide. Oneworld Publications. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/949967
Fenton, S. (2018) The Good Friday Agreement. Biteback Publishing. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/3891045
Hayes, P. and Campbell, J. (2005) Bloody Sunday: Trauma, Pain & Politics. Pluto Press. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/664721
Hopkinson, M. (2004) The Irish War of Independence: The Definitive Account of the Anglo-Irish War of 1919-1921. Gill Books. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/2815241
Kelly, S. (2021) Margaret Thatcher, the Conservative Party and the Northern Ireland Conflict, 1975-1990. Bloomsbury Academic. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/2035813
Kennedy-Pipe, C. (2014) The Origins of the Present Troubles in Northern Ireland. Routledge. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/1556286
O’Rawe, R. (2011) Afterlives: The Hunger Strike and the Secret Offer that Changed Irish History. The Lilliput Press. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/3890046
Prince, S. (2018) Northern Ireland’s ’68: Civil Rights, Global Revolt and the Origins of the Troubles. 2nd edn. Merrion Press. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/838650
Pringle, P. and Jacobson, P. (2016) Those Are Real Bullets, Aren’t They?: Bloody Sunday, Derry, 30 January 1972. William Collins. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/696746
Tonge, J. (2013) Northern Ireland: Conflict and Change. 2nd edn. Routledge. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/1555149
Sands, B. (1998) Writings From Prison. Mercier Press. Available at: https://www.perlego.com/book/2795714
MA, History (University of Edinburgh)
Hannah Hamill has a PGDE in Secondary Education (History) from the University of Glasgow and a Master’s degree in History from the University of Edinburgh. She also received a Bachelor’s degree in English from Belmont University. Her research interests include The Troubles in Northern Ireland, Medieval Britain, the American Civil War, and immigration to the southern United States. Her dissertation examined loyalist and republican women’s involvement during The Troubles.