Lost Volunteers

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03431 2016-05-02 Somme Memorial+

The main part of a Red Hand Commando mural was replaced recently with a board commemorating the action and deaths of the British Army’s 36th (Ulster) Division in World War I’s Battle Of The Somme, of which Captain Wilfrid Spender wrote, “I am not an Ulsterman but yesterday, the 1st July, as I followed their amazing attack, I felt that I would rather be an Ulsterman than anything else in the world. My pen cannot describe adequately the hundreds of heroic acts that I witnessed … The Ulster Volunteer Force, from which the division was made, has won a name which equals any in history.”

As shown in the three additional images, part of the old mural (and its plaques) remains on the right, “In memory of all loyalists who gave their lives in defence of Ulster – Lest we forget.”

For images of the launch (on 2016-03-08) see Belfast Live.

03430 2016-05-02 Somme Lost Volunteers+

03429 2016-05-02 Lost Volunteers+

03428 2016-05-02 Lost Volunteers plaque+

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The Original Belfast

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03426 2016-05-01 Original Belfast+

“Since 455 AD” is the claim of this historical board at the bottom of the modern Shankill Road, 455 being the date of a church of St. Patrick (which was taken over by the Church of Ireland in the plantation and eventually became St. Matthew’s). Whether this makes it older than Belfast depends on how one determines that a place was occupied. The were settlements in the area during the Bronze Age, though the village of Belfast (at the junction of the Lagan and the Farset) might date only to the 600s. For Belfast, see Tours In Ulster (at archive.org) and the WP page on the History of Belfast. Shankill: Newsletter | WP | PlacenamesNI

03427 2016-05-01 Original Belfast w+

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The Silent Unseen

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03420 2016-05-01 Sosabowski top+

Stanislaw Sosabowski — who appears in the apex of this new mural in east Belfast — survived the first World War (fighting for Austria-Hungary), the occupation of Poland in 1939, and escaped from a prisoner-of-war camp before crossing Europe and taking command, in Britain, of the 1st Polish Paras. The unit fought in Operation Market Garden at the Battle Of Arnhem. (WP | Polish Heritage Society for a booklet of text and images)

His memoirs have been published as Freely I Served and interviews about his service were collected for a film called A Debt Of Dishonour (youtube) – the title comes from the fact that Sosabowski was blamed for the failure of the Operation, perhaps as a bargaining tactic in negotiations between Britain, Russia, and Poland.

Across the middle of the mural are airmen from the 303 Polish Squadron, which was celebrated in a Shankill mural last year: Love Demands Sacrifice. In the foreground is a modern British paratrooper in field gear.

For images of the launch last week, see WWIIPolesNI.

See a recent post at (the blog) We In Coming Days May Be for a report on the East Belfast electoral constituency. Here is a report on Polish Residents In Belfast from the Belfast Interface Project. Attacks on Poles in east Belfast reached a peak in the first few months of 2014; see previously Romanian Housebreakers Beware and e.g. this Telegraph article. See also: Multiculturalism Is Genocide | Never Actually Existed | Belfast You’re Melting My Head

03418 2016-05-01 Sosabowski+

03419 2016-05-01 Sosabowski rope+

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The Corrs

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03424 2016-05-01 Corr Sisters d+

Nell (l) and Elizabeth (r) Corr from 107 Ormeau Road joined Cumann Na mBan in 1915 and travelled to Dublin in 1916 (with Nora Connolly, Ina Connolly, Bridie Farrell, Lizie Allen, Kathleen Murphy, and another girl called O’Neill (Treason Felony)) to serve as messengers in the preparations for April’s Easter Rising. They were in Liberty Hall (shown in the detail above) on the morning of the rising before heading north. Brother George, on the other hand, died at the Somme as a soldier in the Australian infantry, while another brother, Charles, fought in WWI with the Canadian Expeditionary Force. They are pictured on the left-hand side of the mural. (BBC | BBC video) There are two images of the work in-progress at the bottom of the post.

Elizabeth’s account of Easter Sunday and Monday is available at the Bureau Of Military History.

03468 2016-05-15 Corrs complete centre+

03469 2016-05-15 Corrs complete w+

03422 2016-05-01 Corr Sisters+

03423 2016-05-01 Corr Sisters r+

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X03424 X03468 X03469 X03422 X03423 X03425 Essex Grove Mickey Doherty the irishwomen’s council 206 great brunswick st. join the volunteer movement and become members of the above organisation first aid and ambulance classes reserve corps of trained nurses drill and rifle practices contribute to our equipment fund which has already bought rifles for the volunteers oglaigh na heireann public meeting large concert hall we serve neither king nor kaiser but ireland canadian armed forces

Hold Your Head Up High

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03417 2016-04-27 96 Hillsborough+

On April 15th, 1989, 96 Liverpool football fans were crushed to death against steel fencing around the pitch at Hillsborough stadium in Sheffield. On Tuesday (April 26th), an inquest found the police “grossly negligent” and that the fans were “unlawfully killed”. It also refuted allegations that fans had entered the ground illegally, and were drunk and unruly, and a variety of other claims made in The Sun and The Times about bad behaviour during the event. (Guardian | WP)

According to the Irish News, the simple tribute on Black Mountain of the number 96 is a collaboration by West Against Racism Network (WARN) and the West Belfast Liverpool Supporters Club. The materials were borrowed from Gael Force Art.

See also the Slıabh Dubh Visual History page.

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Loose-Talk Costs Lives

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03387 2016-04-26 Loose Talk+

After a larger version of the poster on boards (Belfast Live | Belfast Telegraph) was taken down, the wall beneath  — a mural to (now-released) Basque activist Arnaldo Otegi, featured previously in Free Otegi — has been plastered with these flyer-sized versions of an old (possibly 1970s) Provisional IRA poster warning the republican community about information-gathering by the security forces: “Loose-talk costs lives. In taxis, on the phone, at footbal[l] matches, at home with friends, anywhere! Whatever you say – say nothing.”

For a link to the 1975 Seamus Heaney poem “Whatever you say, say nothing” and a video of Colum Sands singing his song of the same name, see You Know Where.

Update: the flyers were removed on Wednesday 27th around lunchtime.

03386 2016-04-26 Loose Talk Wall+

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No More, Again

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03412 2016-04-25 No More d+

A boy in blue and girl in green, from opposite communities in east Belfast, shake hands against the backdrop of the Harland & Wolff cranes. The poem “No More” in the middle of the mural is by community worker Jim Wilson, whose grandson Dylan is shown on the left. A smaller version of this mural, without the poem, is in Short Strand’s Edgar Street – see No More.

No more bombing, no more murder
No more killing of our sons
No more standing at the grave side
Having to bury our loved ones

No more waking up every hour
Hoping our children, they come home
No more maimed or wounded people
Who have suffered all alone

No more minutes to leave a building
No more fear of just parked cars
No more looking over our shoulders
No more killing in our bars

No more hatred from our children
No more. No more. No more!

03411 2016-04-25 No More+

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The Artist Formerly Known As Prince

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03385 2016-04-24 Prince Symbol+

Prince Rogers Nelson, better to the world as “Prince” and from 1993 to 2000 as the “love symbol” shown above, died last Thursday (April 21) in his home town of Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Previously: Belfast street artists pay tribute to David Bowie, who died in January: Stardust | Oh You Pretty Thing

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