Tyrone farmer who participated in key event of the early civil rights movement

Joe Campbell, who has died aged 92, was a farmer from the Brantry in Co Tyrone who played a key part in the development of the civil rights movement in the North.

He, Stormont MP Austin Currie and neighbour Patsy Gildernew occupied a house in Caledon in June 1968 in protest at sectarian bias in the allocation of housing. Police evicted them, an event which was publicised and after which the civil rights movement began to gain momentum.

Campbell was one of several people whose campaigning in east Tyrone laid the basis for that movement. He was a member of Brantry Republican Club, established as republicans moved from “armed struggle” to social issues. The Caledon occupation was sparked when Dungannon Rural Council allocated a house to a single Protestant woman, secretary to a unionist MP, at a time when many Catholics lived in appalling conditions.

Campbell was a single man with a relatively large farm and thus not directly affected, and he knew his stance could bring him into danger. But his sense of justice was offended.

He was also a founding member of Brantry GAA club, and encouraged opening up the club hall to the wider community, and not just Catholics.

Army service

Joseph Patrick Campbell was born in July 1923, the only son of James Campbell, a farmer, and Winifred (née Bothwell), from Glasgow. The Campbell family had a long tradition of service in the British forces.

He was educated in Kilkeel and with the Christian Brothers in Dungannon, and then at St Patrick’s Boys’ Academy in the town, but he left school in his mid-teens to work on the family farm. From an early age he read widely in Irish history, politics and mythology.

He is survived by his sister Una, nieces and nephews. He was predeceased by his sisters Maureen and Theresa.