With echoes of guy folks and coast infamous attempt to blow up England’s Houses of Parliament in 1605, the bomb that targeted attendees at the British Conservative Party Conference at the Grand Hotel in Brighton was one of the most audacious terrorist attacks on British soil in history.
The attack was orchestrated by the Provisional Irish Republican Army or the IRA and it was carried out in the early hours of the 18th of October 1984. In a manner also reminiscent to the gun powder plot, the bomb that actually been planted sometime earlier left with a long delay timer and ruined number 629 three weeks prior to the conference.
The main targets were Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and her cabinet members. Famous for functioning on very little sleep, Mrs. Thatcher was actually awake working on a conference speech when the bomb exploded at 2:54 a.m. She had in fact left the bathroom a couple of minutes before the bomb leaped through it but while she, her husband, Denis and the rest of her government ministers escaped injury, five others were killed including the MP Sir Anthony Berry. Also killed were Roberta Wakeham, Eric Taylor, Jeanne Shattock and Muriel Maclean the wife of Donald Maclean was sleeping in the room in which the bomb exploded so Donald was among those seriously wounded as where the prominent politician Norman Tibet and his wife Margaret who was left permanent disabled.
Thirty four people were taken to hospital but leaving up to our infamous Iron Lady image, Margaret Thatcher simply changed her clothes and spent the remainder of the night in Lewes Police College.
One of the luckiest victims was Harvey Thomas, a senior adviser to Mrs. Thatcher who was on the floor above the bomb when it exploded, blown up through the roof he then fell three floors and was left hanging above a five story dropped for two and half hours before being rescued. He suffered only injuries.
At 9:30 a.m. the next morning, the Conference went ahead as planned despite the exact number of dead and wounded being unclear Mrs. Thatcher addressed the whole in saying that is the scale of the average in which we are able to share and the fact that we are gathered here now shocked but composed and determined is a sign not only that this attack has failed but that all attempts to destroy democracy by terrorism will fail.
The next day, the IRA delivered an honest response including with the words, “Today we are unlucky but remember we only have to be lucky once. You won’t have to be lucky always, if island peace, can never no more war.”
After the conference, Mrs. Thatcher went to the Royal Sussex County Hospital to visit the injured. Two years later, 35-year-old Patrick Magee, a long time member of the IRA was found guilty of planting and detonating the bomb and five counts of murder. He was sentenced for life but was released in 1999 under the Good Friday Agreement. A significant landmark in the northern island peace process and in a remarkable display of reconciliation and forgiveness in 2004, Magee, Jo Berry, the daughter of Sir Anthony of and Harvey Thomas joined together to mark the 20th anniversary of the bombing and to talk publicly about what they all learned from each other.
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