October 19
Published in On this Day listing- 1971 Most internees were transferred to Long Kesh, latterly the Maze Prison, near Lisburn, Co. Antrim.
- 1971 Aontacht Éireann (Unity of Ireland), political party, was founded by Kevin Boland and Seán Sherwin after they left Fianna Fáil in protest at the government’s policies on Northern Ireland.
- 1982 The US car-manufacturer John De Lorean was arrested in Los Angeles on drugs charges, just hours after the British government announced that it was closing the Northern Ireland plant that produced his luxury sports car. The government had provided £80m in aid for the project.
- 1745 Jonathan Swift died.
- 1610 James Butler, 12th earl and 1st duke of Ormond, statesman and soldier who commanded the royalist armies in Ireland against the Catholic Confederacy (1641–7) and coordinated military resistance to Oliver Cromwell (1649–50), was born.
- 1864 The Battle of Cedar Creek (American Civil War), in which General Philip Sheridan, after a famous ten-mile ride to the battlefield, turned imminent defeat into a stunning victory. The battle made Sheridan a Union hero.
- 1914 The first of the three Battles of Ypres (to 22 Nov.), in the Flemish region of northern Belgium, claimed 58,155 British, c. 50,000 French and c. 130,000 German lives.
- 1216 King John (49), generally regarded as the worst king in English history, died from dysentery.
- 1922 Prime Minister Lloyd George, in office since late 1916, resigned. Succeeded by Andrew Bonar-Law who was in office for less than seven months.
'
