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Below are links to a dataset of information on deaths related to the Northern Ireland conflict (1969-2001). The information was compiled by Michael McKeown and was contributed by him to the CAIN Archive. In June 2009 Michael McKeown took the decision to make the dataset freely available via the CAIN site. While users are free to download the dataset for research purposes, the database remains copyright © of the McKeown family.

"The following study represents both the revisiting and continuation of a task which had occupied me for over twenty years. The concluded work highlights complexities and ambiguities in the patterns of the violence in Northern Ireland over the past three decades which are often obscured by the polar interpretations offered by partizan commentaries. For that reason I believe it should be inserted into the public arena for further consideration and possibly as a methodological model for further enquiry."
Michael McKeown (2001).

The CAIN project is grateful to Michael McKeown for supplying the information. Users should note that the design and content of the database were undertaken by Michael McKeown and CAIN had no input into the decision about which deaths were recorded and how they were categorised.

This section was prepared and made available as part of the AHRC-funded project on victims, survivors and commemoration.

For background information on the dataset, and an explanation of variables included, please read the following paper which accompanies the dataset:

McKeown, Michael. (2001; revised 2009). Post-Mortem: An examination of the patterns of politically associated violence in Northern Ireland during the years 1969-2001 as reflected in the fatality figures for those years, (June 2009), [PDF; 279KB]. Web: CAIN.
<http://cain.ulster.ac.uk/victims/mckeown/mckeown01.pdf>

The dataset of deaths is being made available in two formats, a Microsoft Access Database and a Microsoft Excel Spreadsheet:

• McKeown, Michael. (2009). Database of Deaths Associated with Violence in Northern Ireland, 1969-2001, (Version 1.1; dated 4 Feb 2013), [Microsoft Access Database; 1800KB]. Web: CAIN.
  
  
• McKeown, Michael. (2009). Spreadsheet of Deaths Associated with Violence in Northern Ireland, 1969-2001, (Version 1.1; dated 4 Feb 2013), Microsoft Excel Spreadsheet; 1296KB]. Web: CAIN.

Users should note that there are differences between the data in the version of the database and spreadsheet above, and the earlier versions which were analysed by Michael McKeown and formed the basis for his earlier papers.

Users should also note that there may be changes to the data in the future. Any new versions of the data will be available from the above links.

Publications by Michael McKeown on deaths from the conflict:

• McKeown, Michael. (2001; revised 2009). Post-Mortem: An examination of the patterns of politically associated violence in Northern Ireland during the years 1969-2001 as reflected in the fatality figures for those years, (June 2009), [PDF; 279KB]. CAIN: <http://cain.ulster.ac.uk/mckeown/mckeown01.pdf>
• McKeown, Michael. (1989). Two Seven Six Three: An Analysis of Fatalities Attributable to Civil Disturbances in Northern Ireland in the Twenty Years between July 13, 1969 and July 12, 1989, [PDF; KB]. Dublin: Murlough Press.
• McKeown, Michael. (1985). De Mortuis: A study of 2400 fatalities arising from political disturbances in Northern Ireland between July 1969 and July 1984, (November 1985). Belgium: Irish Information Partnership.
• McKeown, Michael. (1977). 'Considerations on the Statistics of Violence'. Fortnight, Issue No.151, July 1977, 5, 4-5, [PDF; 39KB].
• McKeown, Michael. (1972). The First Five Hundred. Three Irelands Or One?: Two Essays on Aspects of the Northern Ireland Problem, [PDF; 3999KB]. Belfast: Irish News.
  

Other (known) publications by Michael McKeown:

• McKeown, Michael. (1986). The Greening of a Nationalist. Dublin: Murlough Press.
• McKeown, Michael. (1980). The Crane Bag. Dublin: Blackwater Press.
• McKeown, Michael. (1974). 'Internment: The Record of Three Years', Supplement to Hibernia, Friday August 9 1974, pVII-?.
• McKeown, Michael. (1973). 'Civil Unrest: Secondary Schools' Survey'. The Northern Teacher, 11, (1): 39-42.

See also:

• The Index of Deaths, by Malcolm Sutton

Michael McKeown was born and brought up close to the Ardoyne district of North Belfast. After graduating from Queen's University of Belfast, he commenced his teaching career in the midlands of England.

When he returned from England to take a teaching post in Belfast he became actively involved in Nationalist politics and in teacher trade unionism. He was a founder member of National Unity and the National Democratic Party and unsuccessfully contested the Clifton constituency for that party in the 1969 Stormont parliamentary election. He has written widely on Northern Ireland affairs and was for many years the Northern correspondent of the Dublin magazine Hibemia. In 1977-78 he edited the Belfast-based journal Fortnight. He made an oral submission to the New lreland Forum in 1983 and served as a consultant to the Forum in the compilation of data about the level of violence in Northern Ireland. In 1985 he prepared the report 'De Mortuis' which was published by the Irish Information Partnership. De Mortuis contained a statistical analysis of the fatalities caused by the civil disturbances in Northern Ireland between 1969 and 1984.

In his professional career as a teacher, Michael McKeown worked at secondary, adult and university levels. He left Belfast in 1978 to become the head of the Education Department in Carysfort College of Education in Dublin. For many years he was on the Central Executive Committee of the Irish National Teachers Organization. He published articles of an educational interest in a number of journals including Christus Rex, The Furrow, An Múinteoir Naisiúnta, The Tablet, The Cranebag and The Northern Teacher.

Michael McKeown finished teaching in 1998 and spent his retirement in Dublin. He died on 27 January 2021.

Anyone with a query about the dataset can contact Kieran McKeown (Michael's son) at the following email address:

Alternatively users can contact the CAIN Director.

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