William "Frenchie" Marchant (9 August 1947 – 28 April 1987) was a Northern Irish loyalist and a high-ranking volunteer in the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF). He was on a Garda list of suspects in the 1974 Dublin car bombings, and was allegedly the leader of the Belfast UVF unit known as "Freddie and the Dreamers" which hijacked and stole the three cars which were used in the bombings. Nine days after the bombings he was arrested and interned at the Maze Prison in relation to the bombings. When questioned by detectives regarding the latter he refused to answer. He was never brought to trial due to lack of evidence. Marchant held the rank of major in the UVF's A Company, 1st Battalion Belfast Brigade. He was shot to death by a Provisional IRA volunteer from a passing car as he stood outside "The Eagle" chip shop below the offices where the UVF Brigade Staff had their headquarters on the Shankill Road. Dublin car bombings Marchant was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland in about 1948. He grew up in the Ulster loyalist Shankill Road neighbourhood and was brought up as a Protestant. Some time prior to 1974, he joined the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF), an illegal loyalist paramilitary organisation. He held the rank of major in its A Company, 1st Battalion Belfast Brigade. Marchant's nickname was "Frenchie". Two units from the UVF's Belfast and Mid-Ulster Brigades exploded three no-warning car bombs in Dublin's city centre on 17 May 1974, the third day of the Ulster Workers Council Strike. This was a general strike in Northern Ireland called by hard-line unionists, who opposed the Sunningdale Agreement and the Northern Ireland Assembly which had proposed their sharing political power with nationalists and planned a role for the Republic of Ireland in the governance of Northern Ireland. The explosions occurred almost simultaneously during evening rush hour resulting in the deaths of 26 people, mostly young women; close to 300 people were injured, many maimed and scarred for life. According to former British soldier and psychological warfare operative Colin Wallace, the bombings had been organised by Billy Hanna, the Mid-Ulster Brigade's commander at the time. The three cars used in the attacks had been stolen and hijacked that morning in Belfast by a UVF unit known as "Freddie and the Dreamers" (named after the 1960s English pop group) allegedly led by Marchant, and then, according