This King William III board is a new addition to the boards shown in We Have What We Hold.
Lower Rockview Street, the Village, south Belfast.
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Prince Of Orange
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Glass Of Thrones
Titanic Studios in the Titanic Quarter of Belfast provided one of the primary filming locations for the hit HBO series Game Of Thrones. The series ended in 2019 but its influence lives on in a series of free-standing stained-glass “windows” on “Maritime Mile” (web), the tourist attractions around the Titanic museum.
Shown in today’s post are (from top to bottom) the Stark, Iron Throne, Targaryen, and White Walkers windows.
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Our Identity
The Ulster Unionist Council organised the signing of the Covenant in September, 1912, and in January 1913 voted to bring together the militias that had been formed in various places into an Ulster Volunteer Force. One of these was a South Belfast battalion that had formed in 1912 (History Ireland). Hence, both “1912” and “1913” are given as dates for the creation of the battalion. When the Volunteers were integrated into the Ulster Division for the Great War, the South Belfast Volunteers joined the 10th battalion of the Royal Irish Rifles.
Of course, the boards above and immediately below concerning the 1912/1913 Ulster Volunteers serve double duty alongside the three other boards shown here which concern the modern UVF and the current protests against Brexit/NI Protocol/Windsor Framework.
The advertising hoarding has been informally re-purposed by the UVF for several years, and its de-commercialisation is now complete with the addition of this printed board.
“Loyalist Village says No! to an Irish Sea border.” “The prevention of the erosion of our identity , our culture and our heritage. We will preserve this no matter the cost. We will not be the generation to fail Ulster.”
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Royal Irish Rifles
After WWI, the Royal Irish Rifles became the Royal Ulster Rifles (and later became part of the Royal Irish Rangers). This board prioritises WWI as the Rifles were part of the 36th Division. The hero of WWI portrayed in the central panel is William McFadzean, awarded the VC for falling on two live grenades in the trenches on July 1st, 1916. McFadzean is familiar from many previous murals both individually and in the company of other VC winners; for his family home in Cregagh, see Rubicon.
Alongside McFadzean, the hero of WWII is Blair “Paddy” Mayne, who was only briefly in the Ulster Rifles before making his name in the Parachute Unit (later, and better, known as the SAS). His many medals of honour are shown in an old Newtownards mural though he was denied the VC.
Ballysillan Road, north Belfast.
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My Irish People
“Centenary Scripts: “The future lies in the hand of my Irish people themselves. May this historic gathering be the prelude of the day in which the Irish people, north and south, under one parliament or two, as those parliaments may decide, shall work together in common love for Ireland upon the sure foundation of mutual justice and respect. King George V.”
After the Northern Ireland parliament was opened, the debate continued as to whether Ireland would yet have a single parliament with Dominion status. The idea that Ireland, in whole or in part, would leave the empire was unimaginable to Britain – hence “my Irish people”.
“Mutual justice and respect”, it turned out, was generally in short supply. Unionists claimed they had accepted Home Rule (for Northern Ireland) as a sacrifice, preferring to be included in the empire parliament at Westminster, though one doubts the sincerity of this claim given their stance in the subsequent negotiations, which made clear that sharing power with nationalists and republicans would be intolerable. Thus, the sentiment that the future of Ireland lay in the hands of Irish people was understood to have limits.
A united Ireland was desired by nationalists and republicans, but as the negotiations continued throughout 1921 and into 1922 we can perhaps see republicans cut their losses – i.e. Northern Ireland – and instead drive towards independence for the Irish Free State. Departure from the empire and the fixity of partition quickly (in a matter of years, though it formally took a few decades) became a reality for Southern Ireland/Irish Free State/(Republic of) Ireland.
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Locked Vault
Here is a gallery of images from the now locked-up and boarded-up (and over-grown) Vault building, formerly the Belfast Met, awaiting demolition and redevelopment as housing. The images below move from left to right beginning with a piece that has not been featured before (outlines of human figures, with hearts on their chests); for the others, see Vault Guard Cat | Show Some Love | Build Communities | Vaulty Towers | In Bloom | Bizarre Bazaar .
See also: The Vault Is Empty | Do You Own A Giant Building?
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Essence And Space
This is the new Sam Rockett mural in the Woodvale, replacing the mural seen in Murdered By Cowards. The old mural just featured Rockett, who died in August, 2000, in the feud between the UVF and lower Shankill UDA. This new mural also features the “ethnic cleansing” of Torrens in 2004.
Torrens sits between Cliftonville, Ardoyne, and the lower Oldpark, and was one of the many historically mixed areas in north Belfast that, with the Troubles, became increasingly segregated and separated from neighbouring areas by “peace” lines. Jarman (1996) provides eye-witness testimony of the dispute in Torrens in 1996 which saw Catholic families leave the area. Its proximity to Ardoyne (and Cliftonville), however, meant that over the next few years the houses were gradually abandoned by Protestants, culminating in 2004 when ten of the remaining Protestant families moved out of the area, alleging persistent intimidation and employing the term term “ethnic cleansing” – a term the poem to the right of the mural uses three times.
The area was eventually redeveloped from 2008-2012, with the Wyndham Street “peace” line coming down and Elmgrove Street being opened to the Oldpark Road.
The line in the poem “the resistance formed a steady band” is unclear – it might refer to loyalists being bussed into Torrens in 1996 (see the testimonies in Jarman); if it refers to B Company it would make a connection to Rockett. As it is, the connection between the two elements of the mural (if any is intended) seems to be that Rockett was from the lower Oldpark, near Torrens.
Sources:
John Darby, Intimidation In Housing, 1974. At CAIN.
Neil Jarman, On The Edge, 1996, which also covers the exodus from nearby Cliftonpark Avenue. At CAIN.
1996 AP footage on youtube
2004: BelTel | BBC | Guardian | Republican News | An Phoblacht
“In the name of Ireland’s cruel game/Oh, land that once sang freedom’s song/Now marred by ethnic cleansing’s wrong.//Echoes of anguish haunt the Protestants of Torrens,/Ethnically cleansed, a sinister goal,/Their weapon honed, to exact a toll.//Families robbed of essence and space,/fuelled by hated, to erase their trace.//Against the darkness, spirits sincere,/Hand in hand across the land,/the resistance formed a steady band.//Ethnic cleansing’s horrors unveiled at last,/Hearts of courage, unbreakable souls,/Truths unfurled, their power untold,/A captured scene of the evil deeds done.”
The mural was completed for the anniversary of Rockett’s death on August 23rd. The source for the central image (of furniture being loaded into a lorry) is unknown.
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Every Generation Needs Regeneration
These BUILD (web) boards highlight areas of waste ground in the Shankill area: “Every generation needs regeneration” (above) is next to waste ground on the Shankill Road/Boundary Street; “our children deserve more than dereliction” (below) is next to waste ground in Tennent Street; the third site (with skip) is in Townsend Street/Dayton Street; the fourth (with the tarp) is on Peter’s Hill below the new Drummer Boy mural (see Shankill Drummer and The Little Drummer Boy).
Previously: an unused site on the Shankill above Lanark Way in #BuildShankill | bottom of Tennent Street see Our Children Deserve More.
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The Little Drummer Boy
Members of Bannside Drumming Club (Fb) and Shankill Road Defenders (Fb) were on hand for the official launch of the Drummer Boy mural at the entrance to the Shankill on Peter’s Hill.
Stacey Graham from Alternatives (Fb) introduced DUP councillor (for Court) Ian McLaughlin, who said that the mural — painted by Glen Molloy (ig, pictured below) — would create “a welcoming, positive atmosphere here at the gateway to the Shankill area”.
For images of the mural in progress, see Shankill Drummer.
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Shankill Drummer
Tomorrow (August 30th, at 12:30) there will be a family fun-day and the launch of a new mural of a colourful drummer boy. The mural is on Peter’s Hill; it takes the place of the “Original Belfast” murals (2009 and 2020) and before that a UDA emblem (M02480).
Painted by Glen Molloy (ig) with support from SAFE Shankill (see Woodvale OK), Alternatives (web), Executive Office, Communities In Transition.
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Extramural Activity 