Henry McDonald (writer)

Henry Patrick McDonald (6 July 1965 – 19 February 2023) was a Northern Irish journalist and author. He was a correspondent for The Guardian and Observer,^[1] and from 2021 was the political editor of The News Letter, one of Northern Ireland's national daily newspapers, based in Belfast.

Henry Patrick McDonald was born in a Catholic enclave of central Belfast in 1965, and was a student at St Malachy's College.^[2] He briefly attended Edinburgh University before gaining a degree from Queen's University Belfast.^[2]

In his youth, McDonald involved in the Workers' Party, a left-wing party that emerged from Sinn Féin in the early 1970s and was associated with the Official IRA.^[2] He travelled to the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) with the youth wing of SFWP in the early 1980s.^[3]

After taking a journalism course at Dublin City University, McDonald began his professional writing career in 1989 at the Belfast newspaper The Irish News.^[2] He wrote extensively about the Troubles and related issues, with a particular focus on paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland, like the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) and Irish National Liberation Army (INLA). He wrote a book on the INLA, INLA – Deadly Divisions, which he co-authored with his cousin, Jack Holland. The book was first published in 1994.^[2]

McDonald also wrote on Ulster loyalist paramilitary groups and co-authored books on the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and UDA with Jim Cusack.^[4] He also wrote a biography of Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) leader David Trimble, a personal biography Colours: Ireland – From Bombs to Boom, and, in 2017, Martin McGuinness: A Life Remembered.^[5] He was, for a period, a security correspondent for the BBC in Belfast.^[2]

In 1997, McDonald became the Ireland correspondent for The Observer, and assumed the role for The Guardian in 2007. He was based out of the paper's London office from 2018 to 2020.^[2] He then returned to Belfast, where he wrote for The Sunday Times, and worked as the political editor of The News Letter, headquartered in Belfast.^[2]

McDonald's first novel, The Swinging Detective, was published in 2017,^[6] and his second, Two Souls, was published by Merrion Press in 2019.^[7] A third novel, called Thy Will Be Done, was forthcoming at the time of his death.^[2]

McDonald was a supporter of Irish League football club Cliftonville and English Premier League club Everton. He married Claire Breen in 1996, and they had three children before divorcing.^[2] He also spent 12 years in a relationship with author June Caldwell,^[8] living some of that time in Dublin where he taught journalism and feature writing at the Dublin Business School and the Irish Writers Centre.^[9] At the time of his death, he was in a relationship with Charlotte Blease.^[2]

In 2018, McDonald was diagnosed with cancer and an unspecified heart condition.^[2] He died at a hospital in Belfast on 19 February 2023, at the age of 57.^[10]

• McDonald, Henry; Holland, Jack (1994). INLA – Deadly divisions. Dublin: Torc. ISBN 189814205X.
• McDonald, Henry (2017). Martin McGuinness: A Life Remembered. Belfast: Blackstaff Press. ISBN 9781780731681.
• Cusack, Jim; McDonald, Henry (2008). UVF: The Endgame. Dublin: Poolbeg Press. ISBN 9781842233269.
• McDonald, Henry (1 September 2005). Colours: Ireland – From Bombs to Boom. Mainstream Publishing. ISBN 1845960254.

• McDonald, Henry (2 November 2017). The Swinging Detective. London: Gibson Square Books. ISBN 9781783341160.
• McDonald, Henry (20 August 2019). Two Souls: A Novel. Newbridge, County Kildare: Merrion Press. ISBN 9781785372575.

• The Guardian | Henry McDonald