Emma Groves (1920 – 2 April 2007) was a human rights activist, a leading campaigner for banning the use of plastic bullets, and a co-founder of the United Campaign Against Plastic Bullets in Northern Ireland.She began her campaign after she was blinded from being struck in the face by a rubber bullet in 1971.

At 9 a.m. on 4 November 1971, aged 51, she was standing at her living room window during British Army searches on her neighbours' houses. As a mark of defiance, Emma turned on her record player and placed the ballad "Four Green Fields" on her record player and turned up the volume.

As she turned back to the window, a soldier, at a distance of about eight yards, shot a rubber bullet through the window hitting her in the face. As a result, she lost her sight in both eyes. A doctor at the hospital who was removing Emma's eyes approached Mother Teresa of Calcutta, who was visiting Belfast at the time, to break the news to Emma that her eyesight was gone.

Neighbours claimed that it could be heard over radio British Army communications of "I hope we killed the cunt".

No soldier was ever charged on thr incident however Emma was awarded £35,000 in compensation from the British Government, which she refused, as she wanted justice.

Groves campaigned for thirty years for the banning of plastic bullets. Groves and Clara Reilly founded the United Campaign Against Plastic Bullets after the killing of John Downes in August 1984. The aim of the organisation was to bring together the families bereaved or injured by rubber and plastic bullets. They also compiled information on the statistics relating to usage of plastic bullets in Northern Ireland. In 1976, rubber bullets were replaced by plastic bullets. Up until that time they had caused the death of 12-year-old Francis Rowntree and the wounding of a further seventy.

In October 1976, Brian Stewart, 13 years old, was killed in Belfast by a plastic bullet after being shot by a British soldier during a street riot. Paul Whitters, aged 15, from Derry, died in April 1981 as the result of a bullet to the head fired by an RUC policeman. In Belfast, a 12-year-old, Carol Ann Kelly, was fatally shot on her way home with a plastic bullet after buying milk, in May 1981. It was at this point that Groves decided to do something and to have those "deadly bullets banned". In 1982, she learned that the bullets were manufactured by an American company. So she went to the US along with her daughter and an 18-year-old youth from Derry who had "lost an eye and had his face disfigured". She managed to arrange a meeting in New York with the manager of the company who manufactured them. After their talk she said "the company stopped producing the bullets."

In April 1982, an 11-year-old, Stephen McConomy, died from being shot with a plastic bullet by a soldier from the Royal Anglian Regiment. Commenting on this, Groves said, "When you start killing the children, you inflict the deepest wound of all on a country." With other members of the United Campaign she spoke of her experience at public meetings throughout Ireland. They then decided to take their campaign abroad. They were invited to the Netherlands, Belgium, Norway, Italy, Sweden and Germany. Groves went to the US twice.

John Downes was shot dead during a street disturbance. Groves, in an interview with Silvia Calamati recorded in Belfast in August 1990, said,

"In all these years the only member of the security forces to be brought to trial was Nigel Hegarty, the police officer who killed John Downes. During the course of the trial evidence was presented in the form of photographs and a video showing the sequence of the killing. They were the same images that thousands of people had seen on TV that tragic 12 August 1984 … Hegarty was acquitted and reinstated in the ranks of the police. Shortly afterwards he was promoted"

Groves concluded her interview by saying, "The victims of plastic bullets are always offered large sums of money as compensation. I have always refused this money as have other family members of the victims. We do not want money. What we do want is justice."

Emma Groves died in 2007.

by Mayomick

11 comments

  1. >”I hope we killed the cunt”

    Like many thought about Thatcher.

  2. Bastards, bastards, bastards.

    Strong woman. RIP.

  3. And they wonder why we don’t wear their Poppy’s.

  4. And then two months later the Paratroopers murdered 14 on Bloody Sunday

  6. Thanks for sharing. The murder of Irish children by the security forces is almost airbrushed from history.

  7. So, we’re all still voting for Sinn Fein to get the Brits out?

    Which parties are looking to get the UK to reverse their protection of Paratroopers?

  8. Just goes the show the short sightedness of the British government, I believe the Para’s were fresh from fighting a violent insurgency in Oman then sent them to basically a peacekeeping mission in NI, where the main job was to keep the Protestants and Catholics from tearing each other apart but just inflamed the situation. For instance in Crossmaglen where the population was almost 100 percent catholic they had the Scots guards there who were for the most part friendly with the local population, then they rotated the Para’s in who immediately started beating and harassing the locals. I remember one story where locals were just drinking in the pub, Para’s burst in battered everyone in the bar and just left, which leaves nothing to the imagination as to why Armagh became the zenith of IRA activity and arguably the most effective Brigade of the IRA.

  9. whats the statute of limitations on negligent discharge of a firearm-shit, attempted murder?

    time for reparations.

    And class action suits in The Hague.

  11. None of this should ever be forgotten. They’re quite happy to whitewash all of this in the UK. Every time one of these old bastards dies there’s some arsehole in the paper saying they were unfairly hounded for doing their job or whatever. Pricks.

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