Bloody Sunday Study

Q1. Source A shows a picture of the catholic civil rights marchers. This source shows that there were people marching on the 30th January 1972 so they were therefore involved in the march but the source does not tell us why they were marching. The source also shows the civil rights marchers are marching peacefully and there is no sign of trouble amongst them.

Source B is an article from a British newspaper.Although the newspaper is British, it supports the Catholics, by saying that the protestant councils have discriminated against the Catholics, One reason is that the Protestants had been put in better houses than the Catholics and they both had to pay the same amount of rent. The fact that the British newspapers were supporting the Catholics could suggest that this is a reliable and unbiased source! This could be one of the reasons the Catholics were marching, it could be another reason alongside interment.Source C is probably an unbiased source because it is part of what a historian says about 'Bloody Sunday'; most historians look for the truth. This source does not say why the civil rights marchers were marching, but is still a very useful source because it tells us where the march originated.

Source D shows that the Catholics were being treated less fairly than the Protestants, the source also says that the 'Ulster Protestant Action' (UPA) was formed. This was to keep Protestants and loyal workers in employment in times of depression in preference to their fellow Catholic workers.Sources A to D are all useful to historians but not all the sources are useful for finding out why Catholics were marching on 'Bloody Sunday'. There are only two sources that are useful for this, and they are sources B and D.Q2.

Sources E to K give different interpretations of what happened on 'Bloody Sunday', because they are people who have written the sources from the Catholic and Protestant point of give view, so that there are bound to be different stories of what happened, of which some are biased!Source E is a picture taken of the civil rights marchers confronting the army at the barricades prior to the shootings. The problem with this photograph is that by it can only show a small part of what is actually going on - it doesn't showThe whole picture! From what we can see, it looks like the soldier at the far end, by the fence, is holding up his weapon ready to fire. Source F is written by the British Government, this could be considered a biased because the government might try to back up the actions of its armed forces. This source suggests that the marchers fired first and goes on to say that every solider was his own judge - that some were responsible and that others were reckless. Source G was taken from a commander of a parachute regiment, which could indicate that he might also biased in what he says happened.

This source says that the Irish started the shooting. It states that the army were under fire and had petrol bombs and acid thrown at them. The commander said that they had to protect themselves. This could mean that they didn't just kill anyone with a gun, but that they killed indiscriminatelyHe would say this to ensure that he and his troops didn't get into any trouble for shooting unarmed civilians.

A reporter working for the Daily Telegraph who was there at the scene of the shooting wrote source H. It is not a biased piece of information, nor is it unbiased. He explains that there were many people lying prone on the ground and it was impossible to tell who actually shot fist. This indicates he didn't take sides. Source I is from a Catholic Priest and is very pro-Catholic.Even though he is a priest, this source is probably biased, as it is a Catholic priest supporting the Catholic community.

He says the army was the army was to blame for the 'massacre' and he also says that he saw none of the civil rights marchers shooting at the troops. He says that the army shot without choosing targets, which could be true because in source F, the British Government suggested that some soldiers may have been reckless.Source J, is written by a reporter from the Guardian, a British newspaper. This source is possibly an unbiased one because he is a British reporter supporting the Irish.

His report sounds a little contradictory. He says that the IRA did not fire first, but says that one shot was fired into the air! He goes onto say that even if they did, it did not justify the unwarranted retaliation by the soldiers. He said he did not see hear any nail or petrol being thrown. He says he has heard many nail bombs in his life but did not hear any on the 30th January. This could be because he was so scared that his first instinct was to save himself and was not focused on the sounds around him. He also says that the British Army was shooting offensively and the IRA was not!Source K is a clip from an ITV film called 'Bloody Sunday'.

Although the film is British, it is very anti army. This could be because the producer may have been against the British government and the army? According to the film, the army fired warning shots into the crowd, which suggests they fired first. It was clear to see that the protest march was about 'Internment'. The reason I know this is because many of the marchers were holding up banners against internment. From what I know, some of the marchers were shot in the back and this in not the act of a soldier shooting to defend himself although this can be contradicted by saying that the soldiers were trying to protect there comrades by eliminating possible threats.Q3.

'Bloody Sunday was a massacre of innocent people' is a statement that the sources cannot support. One reason being that there are to few sources to draw an accurate conclusion from. Sources F.G.H & J say that there were people being killed but none actually say there was a massacre! The only source supporting this theory was source I.Source F says.

.. 'Soldiers who identified armed gunmen fired upon them in accordance with the standing order in the yellow card.'Source G says..

. 'When we are fired at, we must protect ourselves.'Source H says..

. 'Pinned to ground, it was impossible to tell who fired the first shots.'Source J says...

'I saw three people hit, but I honestly and truly did not see any guns.'To be able to say there was a massacre, you would have to know what the word really means, and even if you did, it is still a very harsh word to use. In the English dictionary massacre means to kill indiscriminately or large-scale killing. Even the sources against the army don't show signs of a massacre apart from source I. Seeing as source I says that there was a true, full out massacre, this source could be biased as it is the only source mentioning a massacre. Source k, shown on TV, does show a lot of shooting by the army and quite a few people being killed, but I don't that this constitutes a massacre!Te majority of sources suggest that the army was to blame for Bloody Sunday.

Some of the sources supporting the Irish were of British origin - e.g. British newspapers, but there were not any Irish sources supporting the army. This suggests that the army was to blame, but from the sources and from what I already know about 'Bloody Sunday', I do not believe the Irish in the civil rights march were slaughtered because there is not enough evidence to support that it happened.

I also do not think that there was enough evidence to suggest who started the shooting either. It is possible that the army were killing the IRA in order to prevent any other killings by the IRA.