Late 1960s

In the late 1960's, the prison population in Northern Ireland was below 700. Belfast was the male remand and sentenced prison. Armagh Prison held remand and sentenced females and also contained the closed Borstal Unit.

Millisle was the open Borstal and a small adult First Offender Unit for short term prisoners was situated at Castledillon, near Armagh. All of these establishments have been replaced.

The onset of the period of civil unrest, commonly referred to as 'the troubles', produced an upsurge in the prison population. This grew steadily until 1979 when it reached a peak of 3,000 (sentenced and remand prisoners). Since then, the population has steadily fallen to around 1200 prisoners.