FEBRUARY 3rd, 1972: The shooting dead of 13 men by British paratroopers in Derry's Bloody Sunday at the end of January 1972 led to an outpouring of anger in the South and the declaration by the Fianna Fáil government of a national day of mourning three days later. Continuous protests were held outside the British embassy in Dublin's Merrion Square during those three days and culminated in the burning of the building. Michael Finlan described the final attack on it in this report.
CROWDS HAD gathered outside the embassy well before noon. Rain fell steadfastly from gloomy skies and about 40 gardaí huddled uncomfortably on the steps and railings of the building whose façade had been scorched from petrol bombs the night before.
Two doors away somebody had set up a sign which read “British Murderers Out”. Before the day was out there were hundreds of other posters bearing more potent and direct expletives . . .
Around two o’clock, the crowds outside the embassy began to thicken. More gardaí arrived at the scene until finally the force protecting the embassy rear and front had grown to about 200.
The rain was spilling down relentlessly and the crowd grew quiet as the sound of drums could be heard in the distance . . . With the throngs from the main parade pouring into the square the crowd became one mighty crush of humanity. Many clambered to vantage points in the trees in the Merrion Park. Others hung from lamp-posts and on the balconies of the Georgian houses.
There was a lull and then from somewhere a rock flew through the air and fell harmlessly into the basement area. A bottle with more accuracy smashed against the bullet-proof glass on the second storey. More rocks and bottles smashed against the solid front of the building. Then the first Molotov cocktail was lobbed onto the second-storey balcony.
Suddenly attention was caught by a young man swinging from a second storey balcony seven houses down from the embassy. With the deftness of a cat burglar he made his sure-footed way along the balconies towards the embassy as the crowd cheered.
When he reached the embassy balcony, he unfurled the Tricolour and ran it up the flagstaff. Later, two other young men made their cautious way from balcony to balcony until they reached the embassy. Then with a hatchet and hammer and with their feet they hammered away at the steel-enforced glass in the windows.
Eventually, they smashed through the windows and kicked in the wooden shutters. Yet another young man made his way via the balcony route to the embassy’s second storey, poured petrol inside, borrowed a box of matches thrown to him from somebody in the crowd and set the petrol ablaze.
The same young man then took the Tricolour with him to safety as the embassy came under a fusillade of petrol bombs. Fire finally took hold at the front doorway. There were cheers from the crowd.
Petrol bombs and red flares flashed through the darkening afternoon and the crowd cried out: “More, more.” When flames finally spurted out from the second-floor windows, the crowd, knowing that the building was doomed, cheered and sang and screamed: “Burn, baby, burn.”
There was nothing the guards could do except keep the crowd at a safe distance from the flames. The fire brigade, aware of the hostility with which the crowd would greet it, tried to fight the fire from the rear. But their efforts were futile.
As the flames burned furiously, a woman shouted: “Will you join me in saying the Rosary? The Rosary has saved Ireland in the past and it will save it now.”
But nobody was listening. All eyes were on the vengeful flames consuming the British embassy.
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