1970s Church of Ireland Gazette editions now online

The RCB Library has announced the online release of all the Church of Ireland Gazette's editions published in the 1970s. They can now be searched and viewed, free of charge, at https://esearch.informa.ie/rcb, along with all previous editions back to 1856.

Church of Ireland Gazette, 2nd May 1975

In the now familiar pattern of the RCBL's Borderless Church series, the latest release is the subject of the Library's Archive of the Month presentation.

Written by David Bird, it examines the decade through the lens of the Church's weekly paper, and its viewpoint on the political, social and economic issues and events of the day.

These occurred as a “darkening cloud was gathering over the island of Ireland” – the intensifying “murder and mayhem” characterising this phase of The Troubles.

Mr Bird writes: “Most of the bombings, shootings and murders occurred in the North... the pages of the Gazette are full of the events of this period. Among them were the shooting of unarmed civilians on Bloody Sunday in Derry and the bombing of the Abercorn Restaurant in 1972, and, in 1979, the assasination of MP Airey Neave, the killing of 18 British soldiers at Warrenpoint, and the murder of Queen Elizabeth's second cousin, Earl Mountbatten.

Yet the presentation also clearly shows that green shoots of hope began to emerge with a growing desire for peace throughout the island. Click the image above to view the Library's Archive of the Month for December: 'Charting a course through the 1970s'.

The digitisation of the Gazette is an ongoing project to make freely available the complete run of the Church's all-island paper. It has been made possible with the support of the Irish Government’s Reconciliation Fund, administered by the Department of Foreign Affairs.