![]() ![]() Derry’s famous walled inner world of battlements and rising streets, the sense of a landscape of great coastal beauty on one’s doorstep, could not compensate for the heavily policed atmosphere of the postwar era when ineffective IRA attempts to challenge militarily the government led to the increasing use of a sectarian force of auxiliary police called the B Specials in controlling the largely Catholic and nationalist areas of Derry such as what became known as the Bogside and later the Creggan. The maiden city is in a stunning location, overlooking the Foyle River and estuary and backing into the most westerly and dramatic of the northern counties, Donegal, which as a result of the partition of the island was across the Irish border. Throughout the early decades of Northern Ireland unemployment was notoriously high – one of the highest in Europe – housing conditions were appalling and the normal practices of democratic representation riven by the sectarian gerrymandering of the unionist government. The border city, which was a harbour much engaged with a substantial military camp and naval fleet during the second World War, had been very badly treated since the foundation of the new northern state in 1922. ![]()
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