Mary Smyth

Mary Smyth 70 years, Oldpark Avenue, north Belfast, killed along with her grandson Michael Scott when a bomb exploded outside their home in the early hours of 12 February 1978. The house caught fired and both victims were burned to death. Mrs Smyth’s son was also in the house at the time but was unable to reach his mother because of the intensity of the fire. Mrs Smyth’s son was arrested by the RUC and forensic tests carried out on his hands and pyjamas. The insinuation being he was making a bomb in his mother’s home at 4am on a Sunday morning when the device exploded prematurely.

It was some time before the RUC finally admitted the attack was carried out by unionist/loyalist paramilitaries, believed to be the UVF who placed a bomb against the front door of the house with the intention of killing everyone inside. 

Mrs Smyth also had a son, Brendan Smyth, shot dead by the British Army in Ardoyne in 1973.