“No surrender to Covid-19”. Two banners from Donegall Road in support of “our brave NHS”: above, the 1st South Belfast Linfield Supporters Club (Fb) and below, the Rangers Supporters Club in Barrington Gardens (Barrington Street).
For the Covenant and Somme boards, see Out Of The Rubble.
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Copyright © 2020 Sabine Troendle
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Public Health England last Friday issued guidelines for reusing personal protective equipment (PPE) when stocks of fresh gowns, goggles, gloves, and masks run out. In response to concerns from local health workers, First Minister Arlene Foster has given assurances that the policy will not be adopted here (iTV | BelTel) but the on-going coronavirus pandemic means that the search for PPE continues. A quarter million gowns were transferred from Northern Ireland to England this week without any firm date for their being returned in kind (BelTel). The Orange Order, on the other hand, was able to make a contribution of masks and aprons via lodges both north and south (NewsLetter | Irish News). Mural perhaps based on this banner. The image below shows the mural at the time of its official launch on April 18th; it was added to the following week.
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Copyright © 2020 Sabine Troendle
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Artist Glen Molloy (Fb) has painted a portrait of Jesus Of Nazareth next to the Cupar Way “peace line” in the style of Shepard Fairey’s Obama ‘Hope’ poster (also the inspiration for De Craig’s Achieve! in east Belfast). Irish News report on the mural.
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Copyright © 2020 Sabine Troendle
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Here are selection of pandemic-related images, many expressing support for the NHS, from Belfast, that were not the subject of individual posts. The first and last of these are from CNR west Belfast (“God bless our NHS” is outside St Paul’s in Cavendish St and the tarp below Charlie Hughes is from the RNU) while the hand-made sheet is in PUL west Belfast (Denmark St) – an indication of the cross-community support for health-care and other “key” workers. The graffiti (“Coronavirus kings”) is on the Dublin Road.
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This is only one of about 20 similar plaques erected in 2016 by Belfast City council to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the blitz of Belfast in 1941. (For images of others, see The Second World War In NI.) This is the one in Ohio Street, on the side of the Woodvale Community Centre. During the blitz, more than 900 people died, 1,500 people were injured, and half of the houses in Belfast were destroyed (WP).
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Copyright © 2020 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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The “cowards” in this case are the members of the UDA who killed Rockett in front of his girlfriend and 18 month old child in an attack on her house in the lower Oldpark, during the feud between the UVF and UDA, sparked by Johnny Adair’s “loyalist day of culture” and removal of the UVF from the lower Shankill.
In response to the purge (and attacks on the Rex bar), the UVF killed Jackie Coulter (UDA) and Bobby Mahood (formerly of the UVF). Rockett was killed by the UDA in retaliation for Coulter’s death; 1,000 people attended Rockett’s funeral (Irish Times). The feud continued until mid-December (Mirror).
“In proud and loving memory of Vol. Samuel Rockett, ‘B’ Coy. 1st Belfast battalion, Young Citizens Volunteers. Murdered by cowards 23rd August 2000. ‘At the going down of the sun and in the morning we will remember him.'”
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Copyright © 2020 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Plans for the Highfield estate were drawn up and approved in 1945, converting a green-field site in the foothills of Black Mountain between the Ballygomartin, West Circular and Springfield roads. The first houses were completed in 1948 (Belfast Forum.) The community hall sits at the centre of the estate. UDA bomb-maker Michael Wright died there in a premature explosion in 1980 (Sutton) and there used to be a UFF mural on the side. This was replaced in 2000 (C01505) and again in 2006(?) (M04512) with the current mural (entitled “Whiterock Festival” after the cross-community event sponsored by the City Council’s ‘Good Relations’ fund (one | two) showing Highfield kids having fun with music provided by a DJ, band, and the Whiterock Flute Band (Fb) drum.
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Copyright © 2020 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Photographs of a dozen atrocities are included on the right of this Derwent Street mural, ranging in time from the 1970 gun-battle around the nearby St Matthew’s church in 1970, in which Jimmy McCurrie and Bobby Neill were killed, to the October 1993 IRA bombing of Frizzell’s fish shop on the Shankill Road, in which Leanne Murray (shown on the left) was one of ten people, two of them children, to die. The others incidents portrayed are Bloody Friday, Darkley, Coleraine, Abercorn, Balmoral, Claudy, La Mon, Kingsmill, and Teebane.
This new computer-generated mural replaces the painted East Belfast Remembers, which had peeled away to a great extent.
“The slaughter of the innocent by the blood soaked hands of Sinn Fein/IRA never to be forgotten. The dead cannot cry out for justice. It is a duty of the living to do so for them. Is this the equality Sinn Fein/IRA asks for? No economic targets, no legitimate targets, no enquiries, no truth, no justice. Hold dear the memory of all the innocents murdered in our country in support of the Sinn Fein electorate. This memory extends to those not mentioned here who were murdered going about their daily lives at work, at prayer and in remembrance. Nothing was sacred in the futile question for a united Ireland.”
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Copyright © 2020 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Local artist Paul Morrison (web | Fb) was asked to paint a shrine for Corpus Christi church in Westrock/Springhill. As his main subject he chose Mother Teresa, who lived and worked in the area with four nuns from 1971 to 1973 before being put out (allegedly) by the Catholic church. Morrison also painted portraits of the sixteen victims of the Ballymurphy and Springhill/Westrock massacres of 1972, including the one of John Dougal, shown below, as well as clerics Noel Fitzpatrick (from St John’s) and Hugh Mullan (from Corpus Christi itself).
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Copyright © 2020 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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… while a dog may look away from a queen, and she from it. Ornaments to a Woodvale back garden, where giant poppies grow.
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Copyright © 2020 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Extramural Activity 