Norah Bradford: Widow of UUP MP murdered by IRA is catalyst for new book which reveals why so many border Protestant farms lie abandoned

Her husband Rev Robert Bradford, a former Methodist Minister, was shot dead by two IRA men while he held a constituency clinic at Finaghy Community Centre in 1981.

The Border Cleansing: Unveiling Stories of Courage and Resilience during the Troubles came into being after the launch of her own life story, When Time is Taken, in 2021.

In the wake of her book, she and the publisher, Ballymena man Maurice Wylie, were invited to south Armagh to meet a number of victims of IRA terrorism.

Mr Wylie said: "They asked us if we would tell their stories too and obviously we could not say no. So we promised we would and the only condition was that we would tell exactly what happened – with nothing fluffy about it."

The resulting book is divided into two sections - the full unedited stories of 12 border families targeted by the IRA, and a further section analysing the 500 murders carried out along the full length of the border.

"During the Troubles, many people were driven out, moved out or emigrated, but the stories recounted in this book are from the ones who chose to stay and love this land, even when their fathers, mothers,brothers and sisters were killed and their livelihoods wiped out, because they were forced to sell or just abandon their farms," Mrs Bradford wrote in the foreword.

"Numerous farms along the border sit empty of life and livestock, overgrown by weeds; personal possessions have been left behind, and pictures still hang on the walls. Those who lived there, who called it their home, have vanished from the area because of terrorism and they may still have an uncertain future….These people are taking the risk of baring their souls in order to reveal the truth about what happened, told in their own words, without censorship from any government or person who would seek to rewrite history."

She added: “I ask you to not forget them."

Mr Wylie says the book reveals much material never told until now, such as what took place before, during and after the Kingsmill massacre; new information on the Darkley Massacre; the 26 member IRA unit told to stand down in Cork as they were about to kidnap three Protestants from Co Armagh; A Stormont MLA who oversaw the Enniskillen bombing and the terrorists who were stopped and let go off in the shadow of the Mournes.

The book is launched on Wednesday 8 November at the Seagoe Hotel in Portadown at 7:30pm, hosted by broadcaster George Jones and his band, Heart & Soul.

Speakers include Norah Bradford, Kingsmills survivor Alan Black, former Newry and Armagh MLA Danny Kennedy, Sammy Heenan - who looked into the eyes of his father's killer and Edith Kenny, a survivor of the Mountain Lodge Massacre.