Above is a recent mural by Damian Walker in the New Lodge, in support of republican prisoners in Maghaberry, showing a single shirtless prisoner with a flower (? – see the close-up below) surrounded by three baton-wielding officers. Sponsored the 32-County Sovereignty Movement (web).
Replaces: Damn Your Concessions, England
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X02186 X02185
Rory Donnelly is a former Cliftonville player, from Belfast, currently signed to Welsh club Swansea and playing internationally (U-21) for Northern Ireland. As shown here, Donnelly’s hands (like the rest of him – he is 6′ 2″) are long and slender; the problem with the depiction is rather that it appears to show a thumb where his little finger should be – the photograph on which the mural is based (see the last image in this BBC gallery) shows that in fact he is holding down his little finger (with his thumb behind his palm), thus leaving three digits raised in celebration of a hat trick against Dungannon Swifts.
The Paddy Barnes mural to the left was featured previously in Oh! Paddy Boy.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X02163 ardoyne bone marrow community football club boxing ireland commonwealth medal gold silver bronze
“In loving memory: Andrew “BA” Haddock. You still live on in the hearts and minds of the family and friends you left behind. Missed by all your family and friends in Ballysillan.” The board above to a local lad who died young sits next to rock-wall seating and a sculpture on Tyndale Drive in Ballysillan.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X02167 Death notice Died March 31 2013 service April 10 Roselawn Crematorium Donations in lieu, if desired, to Action Mental Health manchester united red devils JB baracus A team
During the day these undead come out and show themselves to passers-by on York Road. At night, the shutters roll up and the taxi office comes to life.
By artist MRi.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X02171 angel skull ghost handlebar mustache
Highland Fusiliers John McCaig (17), Joseph McCaig (18), and Dougald McCaughey (23) were lured by the IRA from a city-centre pub to their deaths in Ligoniel in 1971 (WP). The memorial above is at the top of Ballysillan – a wide shot and close-up of the plaque are shown below.
A smaller stone is at the White Brae/Squire’s Hill site – shown below along with a wide shot of the area. The stone is frequently vandalised (BelTel | BBC | STV | BBC).
Update: 2018 video of a ceremony at the Ballysillan site.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014/2023 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X02134 X02135 X02136
X14241 X14242
X02137 X02138
this memorial has been placed here by public subscription to honour the memory of three young scottish soldiers of the royal highland fusiliers who were murdered by republican terrorists on march 10th 1971 at white brae Ligoniel less than a mile from this place proudly remembered and never forgotten the souls of the righteous are in the hands of god there shall no evil happen to them they are in peace
“On March 10th 1971 at this place three young Scottish Soldiers of the Royal Highland Fusiliers were murdered by republican terrorists. Fusilier John McCaig aged 17, Fusilier Joseph McCaig aged 18, Fusilier Dougald McCaughey aged 22. Always in our hearts. Never forgotten.“
The fairy-tale covering painted over an LVF “North Belfast Rat Pack” mural is fading away to reveal the previous work. For the original LVF mural, see D01199.
The graffiti on the wall (see the third image, below, of the whole wall) – Welcome to LVF Land – has itself been scored out. There is also anti-LVF graffiti in the street.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X02131 X02130 X02132 X02195 loyalist volunteer force lead the way tinkerbell hooded gunman
Pro-Palestine board outside the north Belfast Sınn Féın office on the Antrim Road showing a bloody hand-print and the face of a crying child: “Stad leıs an ghéarleanúınt – ag tacú le cearta na Palaıstíne” : “Stop the persecution – supporting Palestinian rights”. The close-up of the hand and face, below, is taken from an English-language version of the board in Beechmount Street. The third image is of the same board at the Glen Road/Andersonstown Road junction.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014 Seosamh Mac Coılle
gaza X02094 X02170 X02250
The aspect of Cave Hill commonly known as Napoleon’s Nose is shown sheltering the people of Newington, surrounded by heroes and emblems of the past – Bobby Sands, Wolfe Tone, and in the centre, Winifred Carney. This republican mural is both internally directed (at Newington and the New Lodge) and externally, being on the main Antrim Road (Oceanic avenue, on the side of the Sınn Féın office) which is a main artery between the city and points north.
“Ag aontú Caıtlıceach, Protastúnach agus Easaontóırí.” – “Uniting Catholic, Protestant, and Dissenter.” In An Argument On Behalf Of The Catholics Of Ireland (1791), Wolfe Tone of the United Irishmen wrote, “To subvert the tyranny of our execrable government, to break the connection with England, the never-failing source of all our political evils, and to assert the independence of my country, these were my objects. To unite the whole people of Ireland, to abolish the memory of past dissensions, and to substitute the common name of Irishman, in place of the denominations of Protestant, Catholic and Dissenter, these were my means.”
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X02458
The local New Lodge GAA club Cumman An Phıarsaıgh is named in honour of Patrick Pearse, executed after the 1916 rising. The club’s new mural features footballers contesting a ball and Pearse’s image appears at the centre of a celtic cross along with part of his 1912 poem Mıse Éıre in the bottom corner (shown below in a close-up). Painted by Lucas Quigley and Michael Doherty. Replaces New Lodge 2000.
Mıse Éıre: Sıne mé na an Chaılleach Bhéarra.
Mór mo ghlóır: Mé a rug Cú Chulaınn croga.
Mór mo náır: Mo chlann féın a dhíol a máthaır.
[Mór mo phıan: Bıthnaımhde do mo shíorchıapadh.
Mór mo bhrón: D’éag an dream ınar chuıreas dóchas.]
Mıse Éıre: Uaıgní mé ná an Chaılleach Bhéarra.
I am Ireland: I am older than the old woman of Beare.
Great my glory: I who bore Cuchulainn, the brave.
Great my shame: My own children who sold their mother.
[Great my pain: My irreconcilable enemy who harasses me continually.
Great my sorrow: That crowd, in whom I placed my trust, died.]
I am Ireland: I am lonelier than the old woman of Beare.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014 Seosamh Mac Coılle
1951 X02091 X02092 New Lodge Road
Bobby Sands’s poem The Rhythm Of Time, published in 1981 as part of Prison Poems, is printed in full along with images of Long Kesh and other prisons in which republican prisoners were held.
The work was launched 2014-08-10, to coincide with the anniversary of the introduction of interment in 1971 (see e.g. this BBC news report).
Ardoyne Avenue, north Belfast
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2014 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X02082 1954 h-block palestinian flag starry plough dedicated to all past and present principled ex-prisoners maidstone maghaberry crumlin magilligan armagh women’s rooney toal
There’s an inner thing in every man, Do you know this thing my friend? It has withstood the blows of a million years, And will do so to the end.
It was born when time did not exist, And it grew up out of life, It cut down evil’s strangling vines, Like a slashing searing knife.
It lit fires when fires were not, And burnt the mind of man, Tempering leadened hearts to steel, From the time that time began.
It wept by the waters of Babylon, And when all men were a loss, It screeched in writhing And it hung bleeding from the Cross.
It died in Rome by lion and sword, And in defiant cruel array, When the deathly word was ‘Spartacus’ Along the Appian Way.
It marched with Wat the Tyler’s poor, And frightened lord and king, And it was emblazoned in their deathly stare, As e’er a living thing.
It smiled in holy innocence, Before conquistadors of old, So meek and tame and unaware, Of the deathly power of gold.
It burst forth through pitiful Paris streets, And stormed the old Bastille, And marched upon the serpent’s head, And crushed it ‘neath its heel.
It died in blood on Buffalo Plains, And starved by moons of rain, Its heart was buried in Wounded Knee, But it will come to rise again.
It screamed aloud by Kerry lakes, As it was knelt upon the ground, And it died in great defiance, As they coldly shot it down.
It is found in every light of hope, It knows no bounds nor space It has risen in red and black and white, It is there in every race.
It lies in the hearts of heroes dead, It screams in tyrants’ eyes, It has reached the peak of mountains high, It comes searing ‘cross the skies.
It lights the dark of this prison cell, It thunders forth its might, It is ‘the undauntable thought’, my friend, That thought that says ‘I’m right!’
Seosamh Mac Coille Collection 