Turbulent 30 years for family since IRA took away mother

EIGHT of Jean McConville’s children, from twins aged six and 16, were in the house in the dismal, trouble-torn Divis area of west Belfast when their mother was abducted in early December 1972.

The eldest sister, 19-year-old Anne was in hospital, the eldest brother Robert, 17, interned.

The eight in the house on that fateful night, Arthur, Helen, Agnes, Michael, Thomas, Suzanne, James and Billy, gathered at Louth County Hospital yesterday. Anne is dead, while Robert, while not at the hospital, was down at Shelling Hill for the removal of the remains.