Kathleen Thompson

During the early hours of November 6 1971 200 members of the Royal Green Jackets, a regiment of the British Army, moved into Creggan to search a house in Rathlin Drive, with instructions to arrest any males there. As they were leaving the area, empty handed, a soldier opened fire, shooting dead Kathleen Thompson, a 47-year-old mother of six children who was standing in her back garden at 129 Rathlin Drive. She was killed instantly by a single shot in the chest.

 

1971
Creggan, Derry
State Violence

54.9903562, -7.3450616

The woman whose house had just been searched later said that she had heard an officer telling the soldiers to "get ready to shoot when you get outside" as they were leaving her house.  The army claimed that two shots were fired at them, and that they had replied with eight shots, one of which killed Kathleen Thompson. Civilian witnesses claim that no shots were fired at the army. Patrick Thompson, Kathleen's husband, said: "There was no exchange of shots at the time, and the only people in the street were soldiers who were shooting CS gas."

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