Thiepval Barracks in

Lisburn Lisburn (; ) is a city in Northern Ireland. It is southwest of Belfast city centre, on the River Lagan, which forms the boundary between County Antrim and County Down. First laid out in the 17th century by English and Welsh settlers, with ...

County Antrim County Antrim (named after the town of Antrim, ) is one of six counties of Northern Ireland and one of the thirty-two counties of Ireland. Adjoined to the north-east shore of Lough Neagh, the county covers an area of and has a population o ...

, is the headquarters of the

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...

and its 38th (Irish) Brigade.

History

The barracks were built in 1940. They are named after the village of

Thiepval Thiepval (; pcd, Tièbvo) is a commune in the Somme department in Hauts-de-France in northern France. Thiepval is located north of Albert at the crossroads of the D73 and D151 and approximately northeast of Amiens. Population First Wo ...

in Northern France, an important site in the

Battle of the Somme The Battle of the Somme ( French: Bataille de la Somme), also known as the Somme offensive, was a battle of the First World War fought by the armies of the British Empire and French Third Republic against the German Empire. It took place bet ...

and site of the

Thiepval Memorial to the Missing of the Somme The Thiepval Memorial to the Missing of the Somme is a war memorial to 72,337 missing British and South African servicemen who died in the Battles of the Somme of the First World War between 1915 and 1918, with no known grave. It is near the ...

. From 1954 the barracks contained the operational headquarters of No 31 Belfast Group

Royal Observer Corps The Royal Observer Corps (ROC) was a civil defence organisation intended for the visual detection, identification, tracking and reporting of aircraft over Great Britain. It operated in the United Kingdom between 29 October 1925 and 31 December ...

who operated from a protected nuclear bunker on Knox Road within Thiepval Barracks. Converted from a 1940s anti-aircraft operations room (AAOR) the bunker would support over one hundred ROC volunteers and a ten-man

United Kingdom Warning and Monitoring Organisation The United Kingdom Warning and Monitoring Organisation (UKWMO) was a British civilian organisation operating to provide UK military and civilian authorities with data on nuclear explosions and forecasts of fallout across the country in the event ...

warning team responsible for the famous

four-minute warning The four-minute warning was a public alert system conceived by the British Government during the Cold War and operated between 1953 and 1992. The name derived from the approximate length of time from the point at which a Soviet nuclear missile ...

in the event of a nuclear strike on the UK. The ROC would also detect radioactive fallout from the nuclear bursts and warn the public of approaching fallout. The two organisations were stood down at the end of the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...

. In early 1970 the barracks also became home to 39 Infantry Brigade and provided the headquarters for the

Ulster Defence Regiment The Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR) was an infantry regiment of the British Army established in 1970, with a comparatively short existence ending in 1992. Raised through public appeal, newspaper and television advertisements,Potter p25 their offi ...

. The Brigade, as 39 Airportable Brigade, was involved in

The Troubles The Troubles ( ga, Na Trioblóidí) were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it is sometimes described as an "i ...

in Northern Ireland, eventually taking on responsibility, under

HQ Northern Ireland HQ Northern Ireland was the formation responsible for the British Army in and around Northern Ireland. It was established in 1922 and disbanded, replaced by a brigade-level Army Reserve formation, 38 (Irish) Brigade, in 2009. History Ireland was ...

, for an area including

Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...

and the eastern side of the province, but excluding the South Armagh border region. From September 1970, it was commanded by (then)

Brigadier Brigadier is a military rank, the seniority of which depends on the country. In some countries, it is a senior rank above colonel, equivalent to a brigadier general or commodore, typically commanding a brigade of several thousand soldiers. In ...

Frank Kitson General Sir Frank Edward Kitson, (born 15 December 1926) is a retired British Army officer and writer on military subjects, notably low intensity operations. He rose to be Commander-in-Chief UK Land Forces from 1982 to 1985 and was Aide-de-C ...

. On 7 October 1996 the

Provisional Irish Republican Army The Irish Republican Army (IRA; ), also known as the Provisional Irish Republican Army, and informally as the Provos, was an Irish republican paramilitary organisation that sought to end British rule in Northern Ireland, facilitate Irish reun ...

penetrated the heavily fortified base to detonate two car bombs. The first detonated at 15:35 GMT followed by the second around ten minutes later close to the base's medical facilities where victims were gathering. Warrant Officer James Bradwell (43) was killed and 21 soldiers and 10 civilians were injured. This bombing was the first major attack on a military base in Northern Ireland since the ending of the IRA's ceasefire with the

1996 Docklands bombing The London Docklands bombing (also known as the South Quay bombing or erroneously referred to as the Canary Wharf bombing) occurred on 9 February 1996, when the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) detonated a powerful truck bomb in South Q ...

. The 39 Infantry Brigade took on some units from 3 Brigade when that brigade was disbanded on 1 September 2004. The HQ 8 Infantry Brigade based in

Shackleton Barracks Shackleton Barracks is a former British military installation at Ballykelly in Northern Ireland. History The site formerly known as RAF Ballykelly was handed over to the British Army as Shackleton Barracks on 2 June 1971. Battalion HQ and HQ Co ...

Ballykelly, County Londonderry Ballykelly () is a village and townland in County Londonderry, Northern Ireland. It lies west of Limavady on the main Derry to Limavady A2 road (Northern Ireland), A2 road and is east of Derry. It is designated as a Large Village and in 2011 ...

was disbanded and handed over responsibility to HQ 39 Infantry Brigade at Thiepval Barracks on 1 September 2006. On 1 August 2007, the Brigade was amalgamated with 107 (Ulster) Brigade when the new non-deployable brigade HQ, the 38 (Irish) Brigade, was formed in the province. The barracks remain home to 38th (Irish) Brigade.

Notes

Bibliography

* {{cite book , last=Potter , first=John , title=A testimony to courage : the regimental history of the Ulster Defence Regiment , publisher=Leo Cooper , location=London , year=2001 , isbn=978-0-85052-819-0 , oclc=854583867 Installations of the British Army Military history of County Antrim Barracks in Northern Ireland Lisburn Ulster Defence Regiment The Troubles (Northern Ireland) Military units and formations of the Cold War Military history of Northern Ireland 1940 establishments in Northern Ireland