27 Facts About Andy Tyrie

Andy Tyrie took the place of Tommy Herron in 1973 when the latter was killed, and led the organisation until March 1988 when an attempt on his life forced him to resign from his command.

Andy Tyrie was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, one of the seven children of an ex-soldier and a part-time seamstress.

Andy Tyrie was brought up in a two-bedroomed house in the Shankill Road.

Andy Tyrie was educated at the local Brown Square school and found work as a gardener with Belfast City Council.

Andy Tyrie's family lived in both Ballymurphy and New Barnsley, but were forced out of both heavily Catholic areas in 1969.

Andy Tyrie's surname is an ancient Scottish clan name; his ancestors migrated from Scotland to Ireland in the early days of the Ulster Plantation.

Andy Tyrie soon fell in behind John McKeague, initially following him in the Ulster Protestant Volunteers, before joining his Shankill Defence Association upon its foundation in 1969.

Andy Tyrie's power base within the SDA grew and he was a relatively high-profile figure on the Shankill when it was absorbed by the UDA in 1971.

Andy Tyrie oversaw this aspect of the strike and was seen as one of the central figures, while the profile of the UDA grew as a result.

Andy Tyrie had been a central figure in the strike and as such had close contact with many within the unionist establishment.

Andy Tyrie arranged an alliance with the Vanguard Progressive Unionist Party but when the Ulster Unionist Party and the Democratic Unionist Party declined to join this grand alliance of loyalism Tyrie became even more resolved to pursue a political path for the UDA without mainstream unionism.

Andy Tyrie was close to William Craig and had supported his calls to "liquidate the enemy" in 1972, although as Craig's political relevance diminished Andy Tyrie's desire for a politicised UDA increased.

Andy Tyrie underlined his split from unionism in 1982 by writing a play, This Is It, in which he savagely attacked Ian Paisley and his "Third Force"'s dabbling in paramilitarism.

Andy Tyrie sought to move the UDA towards more political activity and appointed Sammy Duddy, who had a reputation as a thinker within the movement, as his personal representative.

Andy Tyrie supported a more professional approach from the UDA and sought to establish more professional training for members, an initiative in which he met stern resistance from other UDA leaders who feared that such a programme would bring about a new elite to threaten their own positions.

Andy Tyrie finally got his way in the mid-1980s with a series of residential programmes for young active UDA members.

Andy Tyrie had previously written in a UDA publication in the late 1970s that an independent Northern Ireland could "take its rightful place in the world and not be seen as a country with a death-wish", after becoming disillusioned with what he saw as the British government's lack of commitment to Northern Ireland.

Andy Tyrie shunned the limelight and as a consequence he appointed McMichael as official spokesman for, and thus the public face of, the UDA.

However, McMichael's assassination by the IRA in December 1987 and his replacement in the party by the less well-known Ray Smallwoods placed some doubts upon the political strategy that Andy Tyrie had long advocated.

Furthermore, resentment among UDA hardliners had been growing and they came to feel that Andy Tyrie's leadership was too much about politics and not enough about military action.

Andy Tyrie was criticised for what his internal opponents felt was a tendency towards cronyism, with the late 1980s seeing responsibility and position being given to internally unpopular figures like Jackie McDonald and Eddie Sayers, seemingly because they were personally close to Andy Tyrie.

Andy Tyrie was driving the "scout" [lead] car as the weapons were being transported in a small convoy of vehicles; the guns which were stored in the boots of his associates' cars were then seized in what was the latest in a series of setbacks that had dogged the UDA as a paramilitary group in the late 1980s.

Andy Tyrie himself felt that the attack was carried out by potential successors within the UDA but, whichever explanation was true, it demonstrated that Andy Tyrie was no longer secure in his position and had become a target within loyalism as UDA leader.

Five days after the attack Andy Tyrie announced his resignation as leader of the UDA and was placed on 'retirement' by the organisation.

Andy Tyrie established his own business in County Down after leaving active duty with the UDA.

Since quitting as UDA leader Andy Tyrie has largely been outside active loyalism, although he has been brought back from time to time as the main voice of the old UDA.

Andy Tyrie would go on to become an enthusiastic supporter of the UDP in their campaign in favour of the Good Friday Agreement, claiming that it vindicated the strategy employed by John McMichael and himself.