Scores of nearby shops suffered blast damage and hundreds of windows were shattered. Both mass murder attempts came only hours after a booby-trap bomb concealed in a lift shaft in Divis flats claimed the lives of two soldiers. The two dead soldiers, both members of the Gloucestershire Regiment have been named as Private Christopher Patrick Brady (21) from Plymouth, and Private Geoffrey Alan Breakwell (20), of Brierly, Staffordshire. Two other soldiers injured in the incident were still in a serious condition.
The vacant house in which the signalling equipment was found appeared to have been used as a base for the operation to break into Mountjoy.
Wednesday July 18th 1973 Shillington to give up Chief Constable’s job Sir Graham Shillington is to retire as Chief Constable at the end of October and the Police Authority is to advertise for a successor. In a personal memorandum to the force, Sir Graham, who is 62, made it clear that his resignation had not been influenced in any way by political events or Wednesday July 18th 1973 political pressures, but solely by personal choice. His Soldiers injured in gun attack departure will bring some additional reorganisation at Two soldiers received gunshot wounds when their pa- the top of the RUC. trol was fired on at the junction of the Whiterock-Springfield Roads. They were able to return to duty after treat- Wednesday July 18th 1973 ment. Bomb gang in attack number four A bomb damaged Strabane Labour Exchange - for the Wednesday July 18th 1973 fourth time in fourteen months. Three masked men, Top Provo is arrested in Dublin armed with sub-machineguns and a rifle, left a plastic One of the five leading Provisionals who held a defiant bag containing the bomb in the main entrance. The Press conference in Dublin has been arrested and ex- staff of about 70, most of them girls and work men who pected to appear in the Special Criminal Court. The man who manages the Provisionals magazine, An Phoblacht was arrested at his home in Ballymin. Wednesday July 18th 1973 Soldier injured at border A soldier injured in a mine explosion on the border near Clogher was flown by helicopter to a Belfast hospital. He was one of a foot patrol south east of Clogher on the Tyrone side of the border with Monaghan when he was caught by the explosion. The other members of the patrol were uninjured. Wednesday July 18th 1973 Police foil Mountjoy escape bid Dublin police foiled what is believed to have been an attempt to free IRA leader, Joe Cahill from Mountjoy Prison. Garda Paul Firth saw six men throwing ropes at the perimeter wall of the jail, touching on the wing where Cahill is held. The men escaped in a van. In an adjoining terrace house in Glengarrife Parade detectives found signalling equipment thought to have been used to communicate with prisoners in the jail. Gardai converged in strength on Mountjoy when the alarm was raised.
RIGHT - Gerry Adams, the most wanted man in the North who has now been captured by the military.