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Paisley chose prison over a pledge
March on the assembly
The Presbyterian church was holding its annual assembly, and Paisley decided to lead 1,500 supporters against it for what he called its Romanizing tendencies. He routed them deliberately through a very Catholic area. Local youths attacked, and the melee ended with stone throwing, fighting, and bricks thrown at the RUC.
Prison over a pledge
The magistrates ordered Paisley to sign a pledge to keep the peace. He refused, and they sentenced him to three months in Crumlin Road prison. Thousands of his supporters went on the rampage, chanting his name and attacking Catholic-owned businesses and shops.
O'Neill loses patience
At that point Terence O'Neill declared he had lost patience. He banned all marches, Protestant or Catholic, for three months and gave the RUC the power to shut down any meeting of more than three people. In a speech at Stormont he asked to whom Paisley and his supporters, who called themselves loyalists, were loyal: the Queen, whose personal representatives they reviled; the United Kingdom, where their fellow citizens viewed their conduct with ridicule and contempt; or Protestantism, many of whose leaders they had personally abused.
O'Neill kept losing momentum, though, and Paisley kept gaining it. His church and its political wing, Ulster Protestant Action, drew more recruits. He had founded the group with two aims: to deter the IRA, and to keep loyal workers in employment in times of deep depression.
What was Crumlin Road prison like?
Crumlin Road Gaol opened in 1846 as a Victorian prison designed for hundreds of inmates. A tunnel ran beneath the road to the courthouse opposite, so prisoners could be moved without crossing the street. Seventeen men were hanged there between 1854 and 1961. The prison closed in 1996.
Why were marches such a flashpoint?
Parades are a central part of the Northern Irish calendar, especially the Orange Order's Twelfth of July marches. They commemorate William of Orange's victory at the Boyne in 1690. When a route passes through or near a Catholic district, the march can read as a show of dominance to residents. The route Paisley chose in 1966 took his supporters through exactly that kind of area.
Why did Presbyterians matter in Ulster?
Presbyterians are the largest Protestant denomination in Northern Ireland, and most descend from Scottish settlers who arrived in the 17th century. Many were radicals in the 18th century and helped found the Society of United Irishmen in Belfast in 1791. Their church is governed by elected elders and an annual General Assembly rather than by bishops.
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