SHOOTINGS:THE FIRST shots fired on Bloody Sunday injured two civilians and came from the British army and not republicans, Lord Saville concluded.
Firing started at about 3.55pm on the day as rioting was taking place. Col Wilford sent a radio message to his senior commander at brigade headquarters suggesting sending soldiers under his command on an arrest mission through Barrier 14, which was in place to prevent the march reaching the Guildhall.
At around the same time as he made radio contact with his superiors at Ebrington barracks, two soldiers of machine gun platoon fired five shots between them.
According to Saville: “Their target was Damien Donaghey (15) who was on the other side of William Street and who was wounded in the thigh.”
The findings add: “Unknown to the soldiers, John Johnston (55), who was a little distance behind Damien Donaghey, was also hit and injured by fragments from this gunfire.” The report, in a key section, states that a rifle was fired by a member of the Official IRA, referred to by the report as OIRA1, aimed at soldiers in the vicinity.
“The shot by OIRA1 missed soldiers and hit a drainpipe running down the side of the Presbyterian church. OIRA1 and another Official IRA man (OIRA2) insisted that this shot had been fired as a reprisal for the shooting of Damien Donaghey and John Johnston.”
Saville says he and his colleagues are not convinced of this. However, he also adds: “We considered on balance that the IRA shot was fired after the wounding of Damien Donaghey and John Johnston.
“In our view these two Official IRA members had gone to a pre-arranged sniping position in order to fire at the soldiers; and probably did so when an opportunity presented itself rather than because two civilians had been injured.”
At 4.07pm Brig MacLellan ordered paratroopers to mount an arrest operation but not to conduct “a running battle down Rossville Street”, the report found.
Saville says the brigadier was rightly concerned that chasing people down the street would effectively merge peaceful marchers with those engaged in rioting, and jeopardise the possibility of arresting those throwing missiles at the army.
However, following the firing of the first shots, Col Wilford “did not comply with Brig MacLellan’s order”, the report states. “The effect was that soldiers of Support Company did chase people down Rossville Street. Some of those people had been rioting, but many were peaceful marchers.”