1956 in Northern Ireland

Events during the year 1956 in Northern Ireland.

Incumbents

• Governor - The Lord Wakehurst
• Prime Minister - Basil Brooke

Events

• 12 December – The Irish Republican Army launches its Border Campaign 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 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.
• Tayto (Northern Ireland) established by the Hutchinson family to manufacture potato chips at Tandragee, County Armagh.

Arts and literature

• 23 April – Belfast-born author C. S. Lewis and American poet Joy Gresham have a civil marriage at Oxford register office.

Sport

Football

• Irish League

:Winners: Linfield

• Irish Cup

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

Births

• 14 January – Ronan Bennett, novelist and screenwriter.
• 5 February – Jackie Woodburne, actress.
• 7 February – Rose-Marie, singer (died 2024).
• 11 April – Bobby Storey, Provisional Irish Republican Army activist, escapee and Sinn Féin politician (died 2020).
• 15 April – Christopher Dye, Coordinator of Tuberculosis Monitoring and Evaluation at the World Health Organization and Gresham Professor of Physic.
• 7 May – David Catherwood, composer and conductor.
• 24 May – Michael Jackson, Anglican Bishop of Clogher (2002 - ).
• 2 September – Angelo Fusco, Provisional Irish Republican Army volunteer and escapee.
• 3 September – Pat McGeown, Provisional Irish Republican Army volunteer, participant 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 – Don Mullan, writer and film producer.

Deaths

• 20 February – James Cousins, poet and writer (born 1873).
• 18 March – Benjamin Glazer, Academy Award-winning writer, producer and director (born 1887).
• 23 July – Ella Young, poet (born 1867).
• 5 August – J. M. Andrews, second Prime Minister of Northern Ireland (born 1871).
• 25 November – Robert Bruce Bowers, cricketer (born 1897).

See also

• 1956 in Scotland
• 1956 in Wales

References