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Princess Margaret was allegedly banned from holidaying in Ireland in the 1960s due to fears the visit would re-energise the IRA Declassified British government documents.
Margaret, deceased Queen Elizabeth IIThe proposal was to spend Easter in April 1968 with her family at Burr Castle in County Offaly, where Margaret’s father-in-law, the Earl of Ross, lived.
According to declassified documents from the UK National Archives, the British Embassy first learned of Margaret’s planned visit to Ireland in January 1968. The Sunday Times.
The Irish Embassy noted that Margaret had encountered problems when she visited Ireland in 1965 and wanted to avoid fanning republican sentiment with Margaret’s visit, which coincided with the 52nd anniversary of Ireland’s 1916 Easter Rising.
The declassified documents show that the Irish Embassy said: “The IRA took advantage of the opportunity to create unrest and protested with various hooligan acts against the presence of members of the Irish royal family on Irish soil.”
“In the years that followed, we saw the UK-Irish relationship steadily strengthen.
“Apart from IRA … The extremists have been fairly quiet.
“This is largely due to the Irish government’s successful policy of allowing the group to ‘die out’, which we have cooperated with by not carrying out a naval visit.”
PA Carter, a diplomat in Dublin, noted that the vast majority of Irish people would welcome a visit from the royal family, but he acknowledged that radical republicans would feel “obliged” to cause trouble, “if only to justify their existence”.
“The Ambassador is very sympathetic to Princess Margaret’s natural desire to enjoy a quiet family holiday in Ireland,” Carter wrote in response to the briefing letter.
“However, for political reasons he had to feel that, on balance, he had to draw a conclusion that was unfavorable to the visit.”
Although British officials noted that ultra-republicanism had been “dormant” during the 1960s, the IRA resurfaced with the Battle of the Bogside in Derry in August 1969 and the outbreak of the Troubles in Northern Ireland.
Ten years later, Lord Mountbatten, King Charles III’s uncle was assassinated by the IRA while on holiday in County Sligo.
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After Mountbatten’s death, Princess Margaret allegedly told Chicago Mayor Jane Byrne that “the Irish are pigs” during a visit to the United States, but Margaret’s spokesman denied that she made such a statement.
Three years later, Princess Margaret cancelled a planned trip to the United States after Prince Charles’ one-day visit to New York sparked mass demonstrations.
The New York Times Reported At the time, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher wanted to “avoid giving American IRA supporters another opportunity to gain widespread publicity for their beliefs.”
There have been a number of high-profile visits to Ireland by members of the royal family in recent years, most notably Queen Elizabeth II’s historic visit to Ireland in 2011, becoming the first monarch to do so since King George V in 1911.
* Originally published in 2023, updated in August 2024.
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