Milltown Cemetery attack

Milltown Cemetery attack
Part of The Troubles
The funerals, minutes before the attack
Location	Milltown Cemetery, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Coordinates	54°35′0″N 5°58′38″W / 54.58333°N 5.97722°W / 54.58333; -5.97722
Date	16 March 1988
Weapons	RGD-5 hand grenades Browning Hi-Power 9mm semi-automatic pistol Ruger Speed-Six .357 magnum revolver
Deaths	3
Injured	60+
Perpetrator	Michael Stone

The Milltown Cemetery attack (also known as the Milltown Cemetery killings or Milltown massacre^[1]) took place on 16 March 1988 at Milltown Cemetery in Belfast, Northern Ireland. During the large funeral of three Provisional IRA members killed in Gibraltar, an Ulster Defence Association (UDA) member, Michael Stone, attacked the mourners with hand grenades and pistols. He had learned there would be no police or armed IRA members at the cemetery. As Stone then ran towards the nearby motorway, a large crowd chased him and he continued shooting and throwing grenades. Some of the crowd caught Stone and beat him, but he was rescued by the police and arrested. Three people were killed and more than 60 wounded.

The "unprecedented, one-man attack"^[2] was filmed by television news crews and caused shock around the world.^[3] Three days later, two British Army corporals drove into the funeral procession of one of the Milltown victims. The non-uniformed soldiers were dragged from their car by an angry crowd, beaten and then shot dead by the IRA, in what became known as the corporals killings.