The history of the Troubles in Northern Ireland is often told through a masculine lens—masked men in berets, street-fighting youths, and male political leaders. However, the 1970s marked a radical shift in the gender dynamics of Irish republicanism. For the first time in the history of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), women moved from being “auxiliaries” who hid weapons and provided safe houses to being front-line volunteers, snipers, and bombers.
The story of female IRA fighters in the 1970s is one of transition, controversy, and a unique intersection of militant nationalism and burgeoning feminist consciousness.
From Cumann na mBan to the IRA
In the early years of the Troubles (1969–1971), women mostly operated within Cumann na mBan, the independent women’s paramilitary organization that had existed since the early 20th century. During this era, their roles were traditional: scouting, intelligence gathering, transporting weapons under prams, and acting as “human shields” to block British soldiers during raids.
However, as the conflict escalated after “Bloody Sunday” in 1972, the younger generation of republican women grew frustrated. They didn’t want to just bake bread for men on the run or hold coats while their brothers fired the shots. They demanded full membership in the Provisional IRA (PIRA). By 1973, the PIRA leadership, recognizing the strategic advantage of having female volunteers who were less likely to be suspected by the British Army, formally integrated women into their units.
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The “Green Book” and Equality in the Ranks
The PIRA’s training manual, known as the “Green Book,” didn’t initially differentiate between men and women, but the reality on the ground changed quickly. Female recruits underwent the same rigorous training in the hills of Donegal or the border counties—learning how to strip and clean an Armalite rifle, how to construct improvised explosive devices (IEDs), and how to survive interrogation.
The motivation for these women was rarely purely feminist. Most were products of their environment: they had seen their homes raided, their fathers interned without trial, or their neighbors killed by paratroopers. For many, joining the IRA was a reactive, defensive response to what they perceived as an occupying force. As one female volunteer famously remarked, “A bullet doesn’t care who pulls the trigger.”
Notable Figures and Operations
The 1970s saw several women rise to national and international prominence for their roles in the armed struggle.
The Price Sisters
Dolours and Marian Price are perhaps the most famous female IRA members of the era. Born into a deeply republican family in Belfast, they were part of the first PIRA “active service unit” (ASU) sent to attack the British mainland. In 1973, they were involved in the bombing of the Old Bailey in London. After their capture, they embarked on a 200-day hunger strike, demanding to be moved to a prison in Northern Ireland. They were force-fed by the British authorities, an experience that Dolours later described as “institutional rape,” and became powerful symbols of republican resistance.
Rose Dugdale
In a bizarre twist of the conflict, Bridget Rose Dugdale, an English heiress and former debutante with a PhD in Economics, joined the IRA in the early 70s. Her radicalization in London led her to participate in one of the most audacious IRA operations of the decade: the 1974 helicopter bombing of a police station in Strabane and the theft of nearly $20 million worth of paintings from Russborough House. She was the embodiment of the internationalist, leftist element that began to seep into the IRA during the 70s.
Mairéad Farrell
While Farrell’s death in Gibraltar occurred in 1988, her career began in the 1970s. Arrested in 1976 for attempting to bomb a hotel, she refused to wear a prison uniform, initiating the “clean protest” and later the “no-wash protest” in Armagh Gaol. She was a key figure in articulating the link between the liberation of Ireland and the liberation of women, famously stating that women could not be free until the country was free.
The Tactical Advantage of Gender
The British Army was initially ill-equipped to deal with female combatants. In the early 70s, gender norms dictated that soldiers were often hesitant to search women. IRA women used this to their advantage, concealing handguns in handbags or “playing the part” of a young mother or a doting girlfriend to bypass checkpoints.
However, as the conflict ground on, this “chivalry” vanished. The British Army introduced “Greenfinches”—female members of the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR)—specifically to search women. The introduction of female searchers signaled that the state officially recognized women as a legitimate military threat.
Life in Armagh Gaol
The struggle did not end at the point of arrest. For female fighters, the prison experience in the 1970s was a second front of the war. While the male prisoners in the H-Blocks (Long Kesh) were fighting for political status, the women in Armagh Gaol were doing the same.
In 1980, while the men were on hunger strike, several women in Armagh, led by Mairéad Farrell, joined them. Their protest was unique because it included a “dirt strike” where they refused to use the toilets or wash, living in cells smeared with excrement. This was a harrowing rejection of the “feminine” role of cleanliness and order, used as a weapon against the prison system.
The Feminist Paradox
The relationship between the IRA and the feminist movement in the 1970s was fraught with tension. On one hand, women were achieving a level of equality within the IRA that they didn’t have in civilian life. They were commanders, explosives experts, and strategists.
On the other hand, the IRA remained a deeply traditional, Catholic, and patriarchal organization at its core. The leadership was almost entirely male, and the “liberation” they sought was primarily national, not social. Many feminists outside the movement criticized republican women for supporting a violent organization that they believed ultimately reinforced masculine power structures.
Conversely, IRA women often felt that “middle-class” feminism from Dublin or London didn’t understand the reality of living in a war zone. For them, the right to not have their doors kicked in by soldiers was more pressing than the right to equal pay.
