A Day That Shook The World: Bloody Sunday

On 30 January 1972, 26 unarmed civil rights protesters and bystanders were shot by members of the British Army in Derry in what came to be known as ‘Bloody Sunday.’

Sometimes called the Bogside Massacre, so named for the region of Derry in which the killings took place, the tragedies occurred during a march by the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association.

Tensions between Catholics, Protestants and the British Army stationed in the area had been growing for weeks.

The events further stalled the peace process and two investigations have since been held by the British government, the second of which ruled that the killings were both “unjustified and unjustifiable.”

Watch original footage from that tragic day on this British Pathe newsreel (above).