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The Birmingham pub bombings were two pub bombings by the Provisional IRA in Birmingham, England on November 21, 1974 which killed 21 people. The devices were placed in two central Birmingham pubs: the Mulberry Bush, at the foot of the Rotunda, and the Tavern in the Town, a basement pub on New Street.
At 8:14pm a man with an Irish accent telephoned a Birmingham newspaper and said that there was a bomb in the 17 story Rotunda office block housing the Mulberry Bush pub. At 20:25 that bomb exploded and at 20:27 another in the Tavern in the Town pub exploded. A third device, outside of a bank on Hagley Road, failed to detonate. The attacks collectively were the most injurious terrorist blasts in mainland Britain; 21 people were killed (ten at the Mulberry Bush and eleven at the Tavern in the Town) and 182 people were injured.
The Provisional IRA denied being responsible for the attacks two days after them but subsequent statements by its members confirmed the connection.
The bombings were in revenge for a ban on a local funeral for James McDade, an IRA member who was killed a week earlier when the bomb he was placing in Coventry city center detonated prematurely.
The Birmingham Six were accused of carrying out the attack, convicted and subsequently had their convictions overturned.
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