Four images of a new mural of the “Rathcoole Elite” unit (1st Batt., B. Coy) of the Red Hand Commando, complete with four masked men each bearing weapons. Founded in 1970, “To this day our principles remain the same: to protect the loyalist community, to retain our Britishness.”
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2016 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03398 X03399 X03397 X03396 derrycoole way it is not for glory or for riches that we fight but for our people lamh dearg abu
“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
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2016 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03426 X03427 the parish of belfast was originally called signifies old church seanchill crown linen industrial
Two pieces by the Booze Houndz — Inkie, RichT, and 45RPM — on the Cupar Way “peace” line, done when they were in town for Culture Night last September.
Previously by the Houndz: Art Lab
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03201 X03200 wicked witch poison mushroom five dice
This notice is on the outside of the Belvoir Bar in east Belfast: “Property of east Belfast Ulster Volunteer Force – Not for sale” alongside a plaque to “fallen comrades” Robert Bennett, Roy Walker, Joseph Long, James Cordner, and Robert Seymour. It seems that the bar has been shuttered since 2011 (Belfast Telegraph | Irish Times).
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2020 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03367 X06980 newtownards rd
Voters went to the polls today in elections for the Northern Ireland Assembly. The ‘People Before’ candidate (and a current Belfast city councillor), Gerry Carroll, hopes to pick up some transfers from strategic voters on the Shankill.
Also from the current election season: Slippery Road.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2016 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03809 ulster unionist progressive unionist hutchinson nesbitt your choice your first minister
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
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2016 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03420 X03418 X03419 Dee Craig cichociemni silent unseen first polish independent parachute brigade ballymac emma pengelly sammy douglas
Here’s the left-hand end of the repainted ‘Freedom Corner’ on the Newtownards Road. It celebrates the Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF), formed in 1973 as a cover-name for the UDA’s paramilitary activities. The mural features the red fist on a six-pointed star, a balaclava’ed volunteer with an assault rifle and (on the right) a pistol above a scroll which reads: “For as long as one hundred of us remain alive we shall never in anyway consent to submit to the Irish for it’s not for glory, honour or riches we fight but for freedom alone which no man loses but with his life – U.D.A./U.F.F”
From left to right: For Freedom Alone | As Long As 100 Of Us Remain Alive | Loyalist East Belfast | The Strangest Victory In All History | Ulster’s Past Defenders | Nationality is included in Loyalist East Belfast | Ulster’s Present Defenders | Freedom Corner
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2018 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03358 X04871
The flyers above (on an electrical box in east Belfast) have been damaged not by time and the weather but by deliberate human efforts to remove them, one by scoring and the other by peeling. The sentiment expressed – that adapting oneself and the community to the influx of foreign nationals — or at least its public expression, is thus controversial in the area.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2016 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03365 X03366 skull and crossbones
The shutters are down on the Mill Diner on the upper Crumlin Road. Proprietor Tommy McAuley was shot by the UVF in 1987 in retaliation for the Enniskillen bombing. His case was examined by the Historical Enquiries Team (HET) who reported (in 2011) that the police did not question suspects identified by witnesses and the family lobbied the ombudsman to reopen the case (U.tv). In 2014 they did not have any success (North Belfast News) but the case was reopened in 2015 (BMG).
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2016 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03348 luncheon club lost lives 2895
A Union Flag and St Andrew’s Saltire tucked away in Montrose Street, Belfast, cul-de-sac.
Click image to enlarge
Copyright © 2016 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X05373
Extramural Activity 