Mass subversion: How the South responded

Abstract

On the night of October 5th 1969 television screens flashed an image that sparked a revolt. An RTE cameraman, Gay O’Brien, filmed a crazed RUC man batoning the heads of Civil Rights marchers as they attempted to defy a Unionist ban on marching. The police had lined up on both sides of Duke Street and launched a charge on the few hundred people who had arrived to march. As the images flashed across living rooms, a wave of anger led to the first mass 32 county movement against partition since the foundation of the Southern state.