The heavily armoured RUC vehicle after the attack

Audacious Newry attack kills three RUC

On Saturday 26 July 1986, the IRA carried out an audacious and deadly attack on the hated Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) in Newry town centre, involving two active service units (ASUs).
Fourteen RUC members had been killed in the area in a little over a year. In February 1985, the RUC had suffered their single greatest number of casualties from one attack. The South Down Command had launched a number of improvised mortars at Newry RUC barracks, killing nine RUC personnel and injuring many others.
Crown forces were heavily patrolling the Newry town area due to heavy losses they had endured recently, but the first of the two IRA ASUs managed to secure the Hill Street area while the second ASU, armed with handguns and dressed as shop assistants, approached an armoured RUC car sitting at the juncture of Marcus Square and Hill Street.
Two Volunteers flung open the doors of the heavily armoured vehicle and confronted the three armed members of the RUC militia. Opening fire, the Volunteers killed all three. Flinging a still pinned grenade into the car, they calmly walked away and disappeared without trace. The grenade’s purpose was merely to deter and confuse other members of the crown forces and posed no danger to the public.
The attack brought to 18 the number of RUC personnel killed in the Newry area in as many months and unleashed an hysterical wave of condemnation.
Fine Gael’s Peter Barry, the then Minister of Foreign Affairs, issued through his Department a eulogy to the bravery of the RUC. Bishop Cathal Daly in Armagh blustered that attacks on the RUC were actually sectarian. This was against a backdrop of the same good bishop refusing to debate his position with republicans or to even state his position on the morality of the British presence in Ireland.
The Anglo Irish Agreement had been signed the previous November. The motivation behind it was in no small part due to the increased efficiency of the IRA and in particular the aforementioned mortar attack and Sinn Féin’s rapid electoral advancement. Its intended purpose was to increase co-operation between the London and Dublin governments in an effort to isolate republicans both politically and militarily.
It would take many years for both the London and the Dublin governments to realise that they could not isolate republicans or halt the electoral progress of Sinn Féin. Despite increased security co-operation and repression, the IRA continued to be as popular and as effective as ever.
The Hill Street ambush took place in Newry 21 years ago this week.