--- title: Northern Ireland's 1972 Bloody Sunday: See Video of How It Started description: An exclusive clip from the upcoming episode of CNN's 'The Seventies' shows how the historic clash began canonical: https://time.com/3973054/northern-ireland-bloody-sunday-video/ author: Lily Rothman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-07-27T15:35:56.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T09:36:44.658Z article:section: History og:title: Northern Ireland's 1972 Bloody Sunday: See Video of How It Started og:description: Watch an exclusive clip from the upcoming episode of CNN's 'The Seventies' og:url: https://time.com/3973054/northern-ireland-bloody-sunday-video/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde772a0e40afdb1b/69885c8d35ba6f60e9c0e5b6/screen-shot-2015-07-27-at-10-30-18-am.png?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: CNN's The Seventies og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Northern Ireland's 1972 Bloody Sunday: See Video of How It Started twitter:description: Watch an exclusive clip from the upcoming episode of CNN's 'The Seventies' twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde772a0e40afdb1b/69885c8d35ba6f60e9c0e5b6/screen-shot-2015-07-27-at-10-30-18-am.png?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # See How Northern Ireland's Bloody Sunday Turned Violent  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Jul 27, 2015 3:35 PM UTC  CNN's The Seventies  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Jul 27, 2015 3:35 PM UTC In late January of 1972, the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland took a risk: he banned all protest demonstrations. Parades had been the starting points of several clashes during the long conflict over Britain’s role in the region, and it seemed like ending them couldn’t hurt—at first. “There were some suggestions that the I.R.A., for its part, might try a new tactic by organizing illegal parades of Catholics to test the ban and the government’s will,” TIME [reported](http://time.com/vault/issue/1972-01-31/page/38/). “The result might well mean more bloody clashes between the warring sects, the need for still more British troops to maintain order, and more trouble for a land that has trouble enough.” As shown in this exclusive clip from the next episode of[ CNN’s _The Seventies_](http://www.cnn.com/shows/the-seventies), which airs on Thursday at 9 p.m. E.T., the prediction that the parade ban would not put an end to violence quickly proved correct. In fact, the violence that followed shortly after the ban was one of the best-known incidents of the period: Bloody Sunday. On Jan. 30, 1972, a Catholic protest over the imprisonment of I.R.A. suspects turned violent, as TIME reported the following week: --- > “” --- **_Read more from 1972, here in the TIME Vault:_** [The Bitter Road from Bloody Sunday](http://time.com/vault/issue/1972-02-14/page/20/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3973054/northern-ireland-bloody-sunday-video/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3973054/northern-ireland-bloody-sunday-video/"},"headline":"See How Northern Ireland's Bloody Sunday Turned Violent","datePublished":"2015-07-27T15:35:56.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T09:36:44.658Z","description":"An exclusive clip from the upcoming episode of CNN's 'The Seventies' shows how the historic clash began","url":"https://time.com/3973054/northern-ireland-bloody-sunday-video/","keywords":["conflict","Northern Ireland"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde772a0e40afdb1b/69885c8d35ba6f60e9c0e5b6/screen-shot-2015-07-27-at-10-30-18-am.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Lily Rothman","jobTitle":"Rothman is managing editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde772a0e40afdb1b/69885c8d35ba6f60e9c0e5b6/screen-shot-2015-07-27-at-10-30-18-am.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"CNN's The Seventies","caption":"","creditText":"CNN's The Seventies","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/conflict/","name":"conflict"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3973054/northern-ireland-bloody-sunday-video/","name":"See How Northern Ireland's Bloody Sunday Turned Violent"}}]}] ```