other – N Ireland

NI Beyond 100

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Our History In The Making – NI Beyond 100 is a NI Office programme collecting stories showcasing Northern Ireland “on the world stage”. It has lent its brand to the Ballycarry centenary boards shown in today’s post, which have black-and-white photographs on the left (beginning with “Home to Ballycarry – General Sir James Stuart Steele visits his birthplace”) and colour photographs on the right (beginning with children visiting the Steele monument).

A ‘Stand With Ukraine’ flag and Ulster Banner fly above the walls; a bonfire is being hastily erected in the background.

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 765)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f14, 1/250, ISO 400, full size 3444 x 2196

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1000 x 873)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/558, ISO 20, full size 3464 x 3024

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 776)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/2525, ISO 20, full size 4032 x 2608

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 686)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f8, 1/200, ISO 100, full size 5040 x 2880
X10630 X10632 X10629 X10631

Ballykinlar Internment Camp

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Ballykinlar barracks in County Down was originally Abercorn barracks, used by the British to intern IRA prisoners during the War Of Independence, and the use continued under the new Northern Irish government (WP); the camp held about 2,000 prisoners (McGuffin, ch. 5). The prisoners attempted to maintain their military structure and perform drills; they created a currency using cardboard discs (images can be seen at Old Currency Exchange) – and, as a way to keep up morale, worked on “autograph books” in which prisoners would write dedications and verses for one another and occasionally draw pictures. The pages shown here are from books currently exhibited in Monaghan County Museum; Offaly Archives has digitised an autograph book; a few more images from a book in the Kilmainham collection can be seen at the BBC.

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 856)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/17, ISO 64, full size 4032 x 2876

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 900)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/17, ISO 40, full size 4032 x 3024

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 900)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/14, ISO 100, full size 4032 x 3024

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 900)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/17, ISO 80, full size 4032 x 3024

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 900)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/17, ISO 80, full size 4032 x 3024
X10190 X10189 X10188 X10187 X10186

Whitehead Temperance

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Benjamin West painted The Battle Of The Boyne in 1778 and his composition – with William moving from left to right on a white horse and Marshal Schomberg dying in the bottom-right corner – has become the standard representation in loyalist culture, perhaps due to versions of it appearing on the covers of songbooks for the Orange Order and the Apprentice Boys soon after (Belinda Loftus 1982 Images In Conflict). It appears here on the wall of Whitehead Orange Hall, along with a board connecting service by Irish soldiers in British forces in WWI and Afghanistan (see previously: Time Changes in east Belfast).

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 922)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/15, ISO 80, full size 3589 x 2759

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 900)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/15, ISO 64, full size 4032 x 3024

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 900)
Copyright © 2022 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/15, ISO 64, full size 4032 x 3024
X08958 X08955 X08956 [X08957]

Fair Head

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

Glentaisie Drive – site of this mural by Friz (web | tw | ig) – is named for Glentaisie, the glen – one of the nine Glens Of Antrim, at the foot of which lies Ballycastle – and Glentaisie is named for Taise Taobhgheal (Taise the bright-cheeked), daughter of King Donn of Rathlin island, renowned for her beauty, and who lived in the glen with her husband Congal, who had to kill the Norwegian king Nabghdon to prevent her being carried off (Archaeology Ireland). Or so they say. She also inspired the name “Fair Head” for the local cliffs. Or so they say.

In later years (1565), Sorley Boy MacDonnell was taken prisoner by the O’Neill’s after a battle in Glentaisie (WP).

Click and click again to enlarge (to 800 x 1200)
Copyright © 2021 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f6.3, 1/329, ISO 100, full size 3744 x 5616

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 945)
Copyright © 2021 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f7.1, 1/250, ISO 100, full size 4752 x 3744
X08630 X08631

Quicker Than The Human Eye

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

A blur of a hurler (or camóg) by Dublin artist Aches (web | tw) in Ballycastle, where the local GAA club is Mac Uilín/MacQuillan’s (web).

Previously by Aches in Belfast: Disruption | A Closer Look | Headaches

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1200 x 900)
Copyright © 2021 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.8, 1/120, ISO 50, full size 4032 x 3024
X08553

If Our Shores Are Threatened

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

“If our shores are threatened/We will take up arms/To defend our loyal cause/Our culture and our heritage/Our freedoms and our laws.” Moygashel’s own (William) Wesley Somerville, a member of both the UVF and UDR, was killed by a bomb prematurely exploding as he placed it on the minibus of the Miami Showband in July of 1975. Three members of the band died, one of them Protestant, along with volunteers Somerville and Harris Boyle from Portadown (WP). “He died for Ulster” (on the plaque).

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1600 x 1200)
Copyright © 2021 squire93@hotmail.com
text: Moygashel Park when injustice becomes law resistance becomes duty mid-ulster brigade
X07879

We Are The People

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment

“The Glorious Revolution for civil and religious liberty.” King James II of England – a Catholic convert – had a son in 1688 that replaced his (Protestant) daughter Mary as first in line for the English throne. In order to prevent a Catholic succession, William of Orange, Protestant ruler of Holland and Mary’s cousin and husband set sail in October with 40,000 men in 463 ships (WP). He is shown in this new board in Main Street, Markethill leading his troops across the Boyne in Ireland. His success in deposing James would become known as the “Glorious Revolution.”

There are three Biblical references inside the band:
Psalm 60 v.4 “Thou hast given a banner to them that fear thee, that it may be displayed because of the truth”;
Isaiah 13 v.2 “Lift ye up a banner upon the high mountain, exalt the voice unto them, shake the hand, that they may go into the gates of the nobles”;
Psalm 95 v.7 “For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.” 
and a possible signature “RGm”

Click and click again to enlarge (to 1800 x 1654)
Copyright © 2020 squire93@hotmail.com
Camera Settings: f6.1, 1/60, ISO 200, full size 3760 x 3456

Click and click again to enlarge (to 2000 x 1500)
Copyright © 2020 squire93@hotmail.com
Camera Settings: f3.2, 1/60, ISO 200, full size 4608 x 3456
X07702 X07703

Reflections

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment
A bird in one hand, wood and stone in the other. Work by emic (ig | tw | web) in Crossgar, Co Down.
Click to enlarge (to 1900 x 1388)
Copyright © 2018 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f3.5, 1/80, ISO 80, full size 4896 x 3576
Click to enlarge (to 2000 x 1565)
Copyright © 2018 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f3.7, 1/100, ISO 80, full size 4692 x 3672
text: X06445 X06444

The Gravel Walks

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment
03931-2016-11-04-seamus-heaney-grave
Poet Seamus Heaney died on this day 2013 and the gravestone erected in St Mary’s, Ballaghy, on the same day the following year. The epitaph is “Walk on air against your better judgement” from the poem ‘The Gravel Walks” in The Spirit Level.
Click and click again to enlarge (to full size)
Copyright © 2016 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.9, 1/33, ISO 100, full size 2322 x 4128
text: X03931 1939-2013

Cousins

Extramural ActivityLeave a comment
03932-2016-11-04-hughes-mcelwee-grave
Cousins Francis Hughes (Ó hÁodha) and Thomas McElwee (Mac Giolla Bhuídhe) were the second and ninth of the 1981 hunger strikers to die. They share a grave in St. Mary’s churchyard in their hometown of Bellaghy, Co. London-/Derry. The image above shows their gravestone “erected by the people of Co. Derry and Co. Antrim”.
Click and click again to enlarge (to 3300 x 1856)
Copyright © 2016 Extramural Activity
Camera Settings: f1.9, 1/33, ISO 64, full size 4128 x 2322
text: X03932 i measc laochra na nGael go raibh a nanamacha oglaigh na heireann IRA