The home of the Ulster Rangers supporters club (Fb) is on the Shankill below Tennent Street. The club has plenty to celebrate this spring, as Rangers are Scottish league champions this year, for the 55th time in club history – see F*ck Your Ten In A Row | We’re Back | Respect Heritage Culture.
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Street artist Emic (web | tw) was commissioned by Up! Culture And Arts (and SASH and the Shankill Somme Association) to produce a series of large portraits – based on photographs from the time – of soldiers from the Shankill who fought in WWI, including brothers William and James McKendry, and Richard Mussen, son of the Richard Mussen whose funeral cortège is painted as a mural lower down the Shankill. The portraits were placed in the Shankill and West Kirk graveyards (the West Kirk photographs include poppies). On March 16th, the photographs were lit up and an ‘Angel Of Mons’ was projected onto the Spectrum Centre (Up! Fb).
Video from the Somme Association set to The Bloody Road To The Somme.
Also from the Shankill graveyard: Reflections On The Somme | Somme Memorial; and from the graveyard: Queen Of Ireland, Empress Of India | Interment | The Great War
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This is the latest iteration of the “Build Homes Now” mural in Northumberland Street, with an update to the central panel. Previously it was a space for visitors to sign their names in support but now it is a quote from (presumably) someone living in temporary accommodation: “When you’re in a hostel for so long, it starts to feel like a jail. It’s just so irritating and frustrating.”
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The new Bobby Sands mural is not the only recent addition in Twinbrook. Almond – the middle of the estate – has a ‘before and after’ of the pandemic: on the left, locals sit out in the street watching children play; on the right, frontline personnel.
For the ‘Victory To The IRA’ graffiti on the left, see Who.
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“Almond Drive [Twinbrook] supports front line workers.” “Victory to the NHS” in the fight against coronavirus and Covid-19, rather than “Victory to the Provos“.
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In 2019, images of Bobby Sands before his (second and final) arrest and imprisonment were rediscovered in the collection of French photographer Gérard Harlay. Sands was serving as a flag-bearer in an August 1976 march from the Busy Bee to Dunville Park to protest the withdrawal of political status. (For some of Harlay’s images, see Bobby Sands Trust.) This new mural in his home area of Twinbrook copies one of the images (though presents him as carrying a Tricolour rather than a harp) along with protesters protesting for “Public transport for Twinbrook now” and “Social housing for Twinbrook now”.
See also: Comóradh 40 Staılc Ocraıs
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Celtic manager Neil Lennon resigned in February after the team fell 18 points short of first place in the Scottish Premiership and an historic “ten in a row” League titles. The team in first place, Rangers, clinched the title (with 6 games left to play) on March 7th – their 55th League title. This celebratory banner and flag are on the Shankill.
“Greater Shankill community congratulates the world’s most successful football club.” “‘There are probably one or two people out there enjoying it, maybe one or two people have a wee fly kick. I would suggest to them to have a right good kick just now because we will not be where we are for long.’ – Ally McCoist, March 2012.”
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On Sunday March 22nd, 1981, forty years ago this week, Raymond McCreesh and Patsy O’Hara joined Bobby Sands and Francis Hughes on hunger strike in Long Kesh/HMP Maze. They would be joined by 19 more prisoners before the strike ended with ten of the 23 meeting their deaths. On March 31st, 1974, Michael Gaughan went on hunger strike in Parkhurst, along with four others, including Frank Stagg. Gaughan died in June as a result of forced feeding; Stagg would die on a later strike, in February 1976.
The board is on the site of the former Andersonstown RUC barracks.
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“DUP Out” – another expression of discontent at how Brexit is affecting Northern Ireland and the DUP’s role in the negotiations. See previously: Arlene Must Go. For the mural, see Welcome To The Shankill Road.
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‘Men Of Iron’ is the name of a 1922 William Conor painting, showing shipyard workers in the shadow of a great ship (you can see it at ArtUK). The painter himself was rendered in bronze (by sculptor Holger Lönze) and stands on the Shankill at the corner with Northumberland Street.
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Extramural Activity 