Historians have long contrasted the more nakedly sectarian conflict in Belfast (c. 500 deaths in 1920–2) with the conduct of the War of Independence elsewhere. With disturbances costing twenty lives in June 1920, Derry seemed to be heading the same way but never reached the same level of intensity. Why not? What was the relationship between the city and its rural hinterland, including Donegal? What role did the region’s substantial Hibernian element play?

 

Listen to Tommy Graham, editor of History Ireland, discuss these, and related, questions with Liz Gillis, Adrian Grant, Breandán Mac Suibhne and Brian Walker.