William Hull (born 1912, date of death unknown) was a loyalist activist in Northern Ireland. Hull was a leading figure in political, paramilitary and trade union circles during the early years of the Troubles. He is most remembered for being the leader of the Loyalist Association of Workers, a loyalist trade union-styled movement that briefly enjoyed a mass membership before fading. Early years A native of Belfast, Hull came from the Shankill Road, a staunchly loyalist and working class area in the west of the city. Hull was well known for his heavy build, and he was said to weigh as much as twenty stone. He was a member of the Orange Order. Hull worked at the Harland and Wolff engine shop in Belfast, and became the convenor of shop stewards there. A supporter of working class and trade union politics, Hull became a member of the Northern Ireland Labour Party in 1948. He maintained his membership of the party until the early 1970s, when he resigned in protest at the Northern Ireland policy of the Harold Wilson government and the British Labour Party. Loyalist activism Hull was also active in loyalist paramilitarism and around 1970 he helped to establish the Workers' Committee for the Defence of the Constitution (WCDC), a loyalist trade union of which he was joint leader along with Hugh Petrie of Short Brothers. In February 1971, he led a march of 9,000 shipyard workers to demand the introduction of internment in the aftermath of the 1971 Scottish soldiers' killings. Hull's march was one of the major factors in the resignation of James Chichester-Clark as Prime Minister of Northern Ireland. In 1971 he founded the Loyalist Association of Workers (LAW), which campaigned against the abolition of the Parliament of Northern Ireland and which replaced the earlier WCDC. He felt that the LAW could harness the "power of the [loyalist] grass roots", which he felt had been taken for granted by unionist politicians up to that point. The group, which combined an interest in working class issues with an anti-Catholic agenda and support for inequality, has been characterised by David McKittrick as presenting a syncretic form of "sectarian socialism". Hull warned of the results of a British abandonment of Northern Ireland: "If we're sold down the drain, there wouldn't be a civil war. There would be armed rebellion against the government of Britain." The group claimed as many