Big Think

Memories of '69

Memories of 69The Falls area of west Belfast was a very different place in 1969. Then there was a multitude of small back to back red brick houses in row after row of narrow streets. Like many other parts of Belfast they had been constructed in the shadow of the Linen Mills. They housed the workers who slaved under the worst of conditions for the most meagre of wages.Most of those who worked in the Mills were women and children, mostly girls. They started work at 6.30 each morning and worked until 6 pm each night. On Saturday they worked until 12 noon.The quality of life was very bad. Wages were low, disease was widespread, the diet was very poor and the death rate was high. The growth of the city in the 19th century had witnessed an explosion of population with many Catholics traveling in from rural areas, some as far away as the west of Ireland, seeking employment. They were generally to be found employed in the unskilled jobs as navies and general labourers or working in the foundries.But Belfast was a unionist dominated city. And this meant that when it came to naming the streets in which the workers lived the planners turned to the British Empire for inspiration. Consequently, names like Sevastopol or Odessa from the Crimea War found their way onto the Falls Road. Balkan Street, Balaclava Street were there also. And in and around Clonard names drawn from the Indian sub continent like Bombay and Kashmir found their place.The summer of 1969 was a very tense period. The Unionist regime at Stormont was resisting any meaningful reforms. Ian Paisley was leading counter demonstrations to Civil Rights marches. And several Catholics, Samuel Devenny in Derry, Francis McCloskey in Dungiven and Patrick Corry in Fermanagh had already died as a result of injuries received in beatings from the RUC.Civil rights marches had been banned from town centres for over a year and beaten off the streets. But in Derry the Apprentice Boys, one of the marching orders, were to march through the City centre and along the walls looking down into the Bogside. At the edge of the Bogside, young nationalists clashed with loyalists, and the RUC launched baton charges. Fighting side by side with the loyalists, the RUC brought up armoured cars and, for the first time in Ireland, CS gas. For forty-eight hours the mainly teenage defenders of the Bogside used stones, bottles and petrol bombs against the constant baton charges of hundreds of RUC and loyalists. Exploiting high rise flats with great effect, they lobbed petrol bombs at their attackers and succeeded in keeping them at bay. In Belfast tension was at fever pitch. There was an emergency meeting of the Civil Rights Association on August 13th which I attended. From it came an appeal for solidarity demonstrations across the north against the events in Derry.I went from that meeting to one in Divis Flats which I chaired. It was agreed we would march to the RUC barracks at Hasting Street and then to Springfield Road. As we assembled in front of Divis Flats our mood was defiant. We sang ‘We shall overcome’ amid chants of ‘SS/RUC’ and carried placards saying ‘The people of the Falls support the people of Derry’. The RUC attacked the march and this led to heavy rioting in Divis Street.On the late evening of the 14th I remember leaving Springhill for to the Falls. There the situation was one of bedlam. A loyalist mob, including many members of the B Specials, armed with rifles, revolvers and sub-machine guns had gathered on the Shankill Road and moved along the streets leading to the Falls. They petrol bombed Catholic houses that lay on their route, beating up their occupants and shooting at fleeing residents. This loyalist mob invaded the Falls, and as it reached the Falls Road itself, it started to attack St Comgall's school. The IRA opened fire and a loyalist gunman was killed. Now the RUC, coming in behind the loyalist civilians and B Specials, opened up with heavy calibre Browning machine-guns from Shorland armoured cars. They directed their firing into the narrow streets and into Divis flats itself, where they killed a nine-year-old boy Patrick Rooney and a young local man, Herbert McCabe, home on leave from the British army. Within a remarkably short space of time, the streets off the Falls Road, and the Falls itself, had been turned into a war zone. The IRA's armed intervention throughout Belfast was an extremely limited one. The real defence of the area was conducted by young people with petrol bombs and stones and bricks, though the IRA actions in the Falls and in Ardoyne were crucially important in halting the loyalist mobs at decisive times. However, Bombay Street, Dover Street, and Percy Street were burned out and fighting continued all night in Conway Street. And in Ardoyne scores of homes were attacked and many destroyed in Hooker Street and Brookfield Street. As dawn arose on the morning of 15 August, it did so over a scene of absolute devastation. Six people were dead, five Catholics and one Protestant; about I5O had been wounded by gunfire and hundreds of Catholic homes had been gutted. The Unionist Regime had also responded by introducing internment and 24 men from across the north had been arrested – all nationalists or republicans. A pall of smoke rose over the Falls. The old familiar streetscape was shattered. The environment that I grew up in was gone. The self¬-contained, enclosed village atmosphere of the area and its peaceful sense of security had been brutally torn apart, leaving our close¬knit community battered and bleeding The everyday world in which we lived our childhood had been destroyed. None of us knew what it presaged for the years ahead but we did know that things had changed utterly.

August 10, 2009, 5:38 AM

WRITE ON MA!

WRITE ON MA!This blog wandered into Saint Mary's University College on the Falls Road and through the main exhibitions. All of them are brilliant. That aspect of the Féile goes back to almost the first Féile an Phobail twenty one years ago. Paintings, art work, photographic exhibitions, sculptures, quilts. Every Féile has had unique and very striking examples of the visual arts. Robert Ballagh, a long standing friend of Féile exhibited his remarkable work here. So did Jim Fitzpatrick and many, many others. Some of the exhibitions are of times past. A good example of that this year is the exhibition about Belfast dockers. And there is Gerry Collins Bombay Street photos. And work by irish women artists.There is also an exhibition by the families of the eleven people killed in Ballymurphy between the 9th and the 11th of August 1971 when the British government introduced internment.These families are looking for:• An Independent international investigation examining all of the circumstances surrounding all of the deaths• The British government to issue a statement of innocence and a public apology.This blog will return to this campaign at some other time but if you are interested in contacting 'The 1971 Ballymurphy Massacre Committee' email andree.murphy@relativesforjustice.comTheir exhibition drew me in to looking at the photographs of the victims and other artefacts from that time. My attention was taken by a handwritten statement. The writing looked vaguely familiar. It was my mothers! It was a complaint which she had handwritten against the British Army a few days after internment.We lived at 11 Divismore Park at that time. The house had been targeted by the British Army constantly. Indeed they used to run their heavily armoured Saladin and Saracen cars against the walls of the house. A combination of that and the bad design and structure meant that the house was demolished and there is a shop where once we used to live.I remember when I was a child; perhaps 7 or 8 accompanying her as she lobbied local political representatives for a house. Since she and my father married they and our growing family had lived with other family members or in a private rented tenement. A number of other families shared this slum with us.Eventually she succeeded in getting allocated a house in Ballymurphy and she and my Granny went there one day to view the site. I was with them and I recall as we walked across the building site one of the workmen showing her where her new home would be. In August 9th 1971 I watched the Paratroopers raid our home. I was in Springhill Avenue. My father and one of my younger brothers were among the several hundred men from across the north arrested that morning. I hadn't slept at home since 1969, except for the odd night.All of this came back to me as I read her statement. It is here for your perusal. My mother's matter-of-fact account of the behaviour of the British Army says it better than anything I could write about what she and other women put up with.The damage to the house was so bad during that internment raid that my mother moved out - never to return again. She's dead now but she often used to say that 11 Divismore Park was the place in which she was happiest.

August 6, 2009, 7:28 AM

Fair Play

Joe McDonnell's grandson Caolan presents the McDonnell/Doherty Cup to Captain Gary Lennon of Sarsfields3 Lúnasa 2009FAIR PLAY.On Saturday afternoon this blog travelled to Saint Teresa’s Club in Belfast to watch the play offs in the Joe McDonnell – Kieran Doherty Football Tournament. Joe and Kieran who died on hungerstrike in the H Blocks in 1981 were Saint Teresa’s men. The very fine playing facility on the Glen Road bears their names, Pairc Mhic Dhomnaill Uí Dhocairtigh. Each year the club organises a very competitive days sport for Under 16 players in their memory. Fair play to the organisers, the referees and most especially the players and mentors. Joe and Kieran would have enjoyed the day out. They were good Gaels. Joe, a wee bit older and a wee bit smaller than Kieran was a good sportsman, resourceful in a skirmish and inclined to play on the referee’s blind side. But always for the devilment of it. He was not a cynical player. In football or anything else. Doc was a big guy. Six foot three inches tall. Maybe in another era he could have been county material. He won a minor medal with Saint Teresa’s and although the struggle interrupted his sporting life Kieran stayed fit, energetic and athletic.I thought of Doc and Joe as I sat with my back to the Black Mountain. The city of Belfast stretched before us away off to the middle distance and the Craigantlet Hills. To our left the Cavehill looked down its nose at Belfast Lough and to our right lightly shrouded in rain in the far distance, the Mournes swept down to the sea. Impervious to all this, Saint Teresa’s and Naomh Pol Under 16s battled it out in the final of one competition and Eoin Roe’s and the Paddies (Sarsfields) in the other. Eoin Roe’s are a Tír Eoghan club and they play good football but the Paddies were better on the day. Saint Teresa’s were victorious as well. Seven clubs in all participated. The Pearse’s turned up with their Under 16 hurlers but they couldn’t get a game. Communications, communications, communications!! But fair play to the stalwarts who keep this very fine club going. It was terrific to see such a fine squad of young hurlers ready to do battle for their team.I got to do some of the presentations afterwards. Caolan McDonald, Joe’s grandson did the rest. And a fine job he did as well.Between them all and all the other young athletes who turned up at the Feile an Phobal Carnival opening on Sunday morning, methinks the future of the gaelic games is secure in Aontroim. Our camógs, hurlers and footballers are the sleeping giants of the GAA. Our senior footballers have shown what is possible. Fair play to them. They did us and our county proud.Joe and Kieran would be pleased about that as well.I went to the Féile Carnival from the commemoration at Doc’s house and the vigil on Andytown Road on Sunday morning. At the commemoration Big Bobby regaled us with tales of daring do and other bits of loose talk laced with gems of political clarity and words of great wisdom.Then Mrs Doherty sang for us. A song about her son. I thought of the last time I saw Kieran. In the prison hospital in the H Blocks of Long Kesh. By this time he was the TD for Cavan Monaghan. It was the 29 July 1981. Kieran died on August 2. ‘I'm not a criminal.' He said. 'For too long our people have been broken. The Free Staters, the church, the SDLP. We won't be broken. We'll get our five demands. If I'm dead ... well, the others will have them. I don't want to die, but that's up to the Brits. They think they can break us. Well they can't.' He grinned self-consciously: Tiocfaidh ar lá.' We shook hands before I left, an old internee's hand-shake, firm and strong.'Thanks for coming in, I'm glad we had that wee yarn. Tell everyone, all the lads, I was asking for them and ... ' He continued to grip my hand. 'Don't worry, we'll get our five demands. We'll break That¬cher. Lean ar aghaidh.Talking later to Kieran’s father Alfie, his eyes brimming with unshed tears, in the quiet cells in the H-Blocks of Long Kesh, I felt a raw hatred for the injustice which created this crisis. I am glad to say that I still feel the same today 28 years after Kieran’s death. And I am humbled that I knew him and Joe who died on July 8 1981, and the other hungerstrikers. Fair play to them all. And to their families.

August 3, 2009, 11:23 AM

An Open Letter to Drew Nelson

July 31st 09An Open letter to Drew NelsonRegular Readers will remember that this blog wrote recently about Orangeism and the need for dialogue to resolve contentious orange marches. At the 12th July celebrations Drew Nelson the Grand Secretary of the Orange Order rejected any talks with Sinn Féin.But this blog is not for giving up on our orange brothers and sisters. I penned an open letter to him which the Belfast Telegraph carried this morning - Friday.I addressed the issue of ‘respect’ which Drew raised and pointed out that ‘respect, if it is to be meaningful, must be mutual. If the Orange Order seeks ‘respect’ from others, then it in turn must respect the views of those who differ from them, and address their concerns in a peaceful and dignified way.’Nowhere is this more necessary than in respect of those ‘parades through or fringing sensitive areas, where little or no respect has been shown to local residents. The annual insistence on contracting Loyalist paramilitary or ‘kick the pope’ bands, the appearance of UDA, UVF and YCF flags and bannerettes and the refusal to countenance alternative non-contentious routes, is hardly indicative of a manifestation of respect or Christian forbearance.Mutual respect could also be demonstrated if the Orange Order and indeed all the Loyal Orders could agree to a process of meaningful dialogue with the political representatives of the Nationalist community. This should not present a difficulty for the leadership of the Orange Order whose members have over the years held discussions in Belfast and beyond with myself and other Republicans.’I reminded Drew that the Orange Order declares itself to be ‘Christ-centred, Bible-based and Church grounded’ and in 1998 it agreed with the heads of the main Protestant Churches that you ‘cannot refuse to talk to anyone made in the image of God’. How do these declarations reconcile with your continued refusal to meet with Sinn Féin?Drew Nelson accused me of glorifying IRA killings and demanded an apology, in particular for those 273 orange members killed by the IRA. In my open letter I tell him that I have never glorified IRA killings and I again ‘expressed my sincere regrets for the deaths and injuries caused by republicans. This includes members of loyal institutions.’But I posed a number of questions to him. The 12th resolutions state that 335 members of the order were killed. Who killed the remaining 62? ‘Was it a direct or indirect result of membership of Loyalist paramilitaries? Were some brethren killed by members of the British Crown Forces, the same Crown who you reaffirm your devotion and loyalty to every 12th? How many nationalists were slain by Orangemen in Loyalist paramilitary groups? Or in the British Crown Forces? I draw his attention to some examples of paramilitarism with the Order, for example, one Belfast lodge, that is renowned for its UVF connections, is the ‘Old Boyne Island Heroes’ LOL 633. Their bannerette listed 6 UVF lodge members who were killed in the recent conflict. Six years ago this same Lodge took part in the contentious Whiterock parade along the Springfield Road. One of those taking part was Eddie McIlwaine, adorned with Orange sash who was sentenced to 8 years for his part in the Shankill Butcher’s campaign of terror.There is a reference in the Bible which seems very appropriate at this point which says: “Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote of thy brother’s eye”. Matthew 7:3-5 (King James Version)I said all of this not to make dialogue more difficult but to emphasis the need for all of us to set aside our differences in the interests of finding solutions.The reality is the political and social and financial costs and risks presented by parades disputes are too great to ignore. ‘The Orange Order and Orangeism is a part of who we are as a nation. Irish republicans want a dialogue with the Orange in order that we can each understand and appreciate the position of the other.’This blog and Irish republicans accept the right of the Order to parade and to promote its sense of orangeism. ‘But this has to be on the basis of equality and mutual respect and tolerance. The overwhelming majority of orange parades take place without rancour or dispute. But there are a small number which each year give cause for concern.’ And in my letter I again ask Drew Nelson and his colleagues to engage in dialogue with ‘local residents and with Sinn Féin and let us together seek to resolve these in a common sense and respectful manner. Our door is open.’Note:For those who are interested the six names on the Orange banner belonging to ‘Old Boyne Island Heroes’ LOL 633 are:• Aubrey Reid was killed in a premature explosion while on ‘active service’ for the UVF;• Noel Shaw was killed in an internal UVF feud;• John Bingham, a UVF commander was shot dead in 1986; He received an Orange funeral with members of his lodge flanking his coffin wearing traditional regalia.• Brian Robinson a UVF and lodge member was shot dead on 2/9/1989 by a British Army undercover team, just after he shot dead a catholic resident of Ardoyne, Patrick McKenna. He also received an Orange funeral.• Bobby ‘Basher’ Bates, also a UVF and lodge member, who was part of the Shankill Butchers gang which savagely killed many Catholics. He was shot dead by a fellow Loyalist in a revenge attack.• And finally, Colin Craig, another UVF and lodge member, was shot dead by the INLA in 1994. He initially featured on the bannerette but was removed when it was alleged that he was an informer.

July 31, 2009, 5:05 AM

NOW IS THE TIME FOR REPUBLICAN POLITICS

July 27th 09Now is the time for Republican politics.Sinn Féin’s campaign to progress Irish reunification has struck a few nerves. Not since the early days of the peace process has such an alliance of disparate political elements found common cause to attack the party, republicans in general and me féin in particular.The SDLP and DUP and UUP and Fianna Fáil and some so-called dissidents and others in the media have condemned Sinn Féin for daring to raise the right of the people of Ireland to re-unification and independence.So, Sinn Féin is wrong to engage with the Irish diaspora and to win their support for a new phase of activism. The fact that Irish America and the diaspora have played such a positive role in the past seems lost on the detractors.The need to engage with British public opinion is dismissed. Our intention to build a campaign in Ireland, including local conferences, is also rubbished.And why raise this issue now we are asked? We are rebuked by some who say that this issue should not be raised in the midst of an economic crisis – we are told it’s not the right time. But then when would be the right time? The reality is that partition created two conservative states on the island of Ireland. Look at the history of discrimination and inequality and repression and poverty in the northern state! Look at the recent Ryan report and the manner in which successive Irish governments abdicated any responsibility for the welfare of children and young people to abusive systems in the southern state!The social, political and economic impact of partition has been profound and despite the progress of recent times partition continues to cast a shadow over our affairs. So now is exactly the right time to have the debate about Irish reunification. Now is exactly the right time to move the effort to achieve Irish unity up a gear, to move it up the political agenda, and to persuade others, especially unionists, that Irish reunification is in the interests of all of the people of this island, including them.So this blog is pleased that the old guard of revisionism has re-emerged. They could always be relied upon to overstate their case. So too with their predictions that Sinn Féin is in decline. Or that the party is heading into a split. Wishful thinking! Sinn Féin certainly faces challenges. But that is what struggle is about and the party is debating the issues involved in an open and thorough way. I am absolutely confident that we will conclude that debate over the summer and face into what will be a winter of discontent in the wider political systems on this island, in a united and intelligent way. The resignations of a small number of Sinn Féin councillors has also been seized upon by our detractors in a futile attempt to promote their flawed analysis. Sure these resignations are disappointing. But that’s politics. Those involved have their own reasons for resigning, mainly sited in local issues. That is their choice – the wrong choice in my view but that’s the way it goes and it’s hardly the end of Sinn Féin. This activist has no intention of resigning. There is much to be done. As citizens face greater economic punishment at the hands of an incompetent Dublin government and as rejectionists in the north gear up for more negativity our duty is face the future with confidence and to stand up for decent politics, fairness and equality. And a reunited Ireland. That is what leadership is about. The time for republican politics is now.

July 27, 2009, 12:19 PM