Bloody Sunday ( 1921 ) Bloody Sunday or Belfast ' s Bloody Sunday was a day of violence in Belfast , Northern Ireland , on 10 July 1921 , during the Irish War of Independence . Over a four - day period , 22 people were killed , 16 of them on 10 July itself . Another 70 people were badly wounded and 200 houses were destroyed . Background . Belfast saw almost 500 people die in political violence in the period 1920 – 1922 . The violence in the city broke out in the summer of 1920 , when — in response to the Irish Republican Army ( IRA ) shooting dead a Royal Irish Constabulary ( RIC ) detective in nearby Lisburn — 7 , 000 Catholics were driven from their jobs in the Belfast shipyards and over 50 people were killed in rioting between Catholics and Protestants . However , violence in Belfast waned until the following summer of 1921 . At the time , Irish Republican and British authorities were negotiating a Truce to end the war , but fighting flared up in Belfast . On 10 June , the IRA ambushed three RIC constables on the Falls Road , fatally wounding one . Over the following three days , 14 people lost their lives and 14 were wounded in fighting in the city ; including three Catholics who were taken from their homes and killed by uniformed police . Low level attacks continued in the city over the next month until another major outbreak of violence that led to " Bloody Sunday " . The events of July 1921 . On 8 July , the RIC attempted to enter the mainly Catholic and republican area around Union Street and Stanhope Street . However , they were confronted by about 15 IRA volunteers in a firefight that lasted over three hours . On 9 July a truce to suspend the war was agreed in Dublin between Sinn Féin and the British administration , to come into effect at noon on 11 July . Also on 9 July , the IRA ambushed an armoured police truck on Raglan Street , killing one RIC man , injuring two more and destroying their armoured car . Around 14 IRA men took part in the operation . They had been alerted to the police presence by local residents banging dustbin lids to warn the IRA of the RIC patrol . This sparked an outbreak of ferocious fighting between Catholics and Protestants in west Belfast on the following day , Sunday 10 July , in which 16 civilians ( 11 Catholics and 5 Protestants ) lost their lives and 161 houses were destroyed . Of the houses destroyed , 150 were Catholic . Protestants , " fearful of absorption into a Green , Catholic Ireland and suspicious of betrayal by British parliament , and blindly angered by the presence of heresy and treason in their midst , struck . . . at the Catholic community " while " vengeful Catholics struck back with counter - terror " . Gun battles raged all day along the sectarian ' boundary ' between the Falls and Shankill Road s and rival gunmen used rifles , machine guns and hand grenade s in the clashes . Gunmen were seen firing from windows , rooftops and street corners . A " loyalist mob , several thousand strong " attempted to storm the Catholic Falls Road , carrying petrol and other flammable materials . The " New York Times " characterised the fighting as " a three - fold fight between Sinn Féin and Unionist snipers and Crown forces " . It added , " In the extent of material damage to property , Sunday ' s rioting can be compared to the Dublin Rising in 1916 " . Another four people died over the following two days . While the IRA was involved in the violence , it did not control the actions of the Catholic community . An IRA officer reported that " the Catholic mob is almost beyond control " . The violence occurred only one day before the truce between the IRA and British forces formally ended the war – though in the north the official truce did not end the fighting . IRA members later recalled , " The Truce was not observed by either side in the north " . The leader of the Belfast IRA ' s Active Service Unit , Roger McCorley , stated that the truce in Belfast " lasted six hours only " . At the time the day was referred to as " Belfast ' s Bloody Sunday " . However the title of " Bloody Sunday " , is now more commonly given in Ireland to events in Dublin in November 1920 or Derry in January 1972 . Aftermath . A strict curfew was enforced in Belfast after the violence , to try to ensure the Orange Order ' s Twelfth of July marches passed off peacefully . Directly after the violence , on 11 July , the Commandant of the IRA ' s 2nd Northern Division , Eoin O ' Duffy , was sent to Belfast by the organisation ' s leadership in Dublin to liase with the British authorities there and try to maintain the Truce . He said , " I found the city in a veritable state of war . The peal of rifles could be heard on all sides , frenzied mobs at every street corner . . . and ambulances carrying the dead and dying to hospitals " . He organised IRA patrols to try to restore order in Catholic areas and announced that IRA action would cease except in self - defence . However , this temporary ceasefire only lasted until the end of August . The violence of the period in Belfast was cyclical , and the events of July 1921 were followed by a lull until a three - day period starting on 29 August , when another 20 lives were lost in the west and north of the city . The conflict in Belfast between the IRA and Crown forces and between Catholics and Protestants continued until the following summer , when the northern IRA was left isolated by the outbreak of the Irish Civil War in the south and weakened by the rigorous enforcement of internment in Northern Ireland .