The UFF mural shown above – with a red fist on a yellow six-pointed star, surrounded by a garland – is in the Lincoln Court area of Londonderry.
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Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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The Garland Of Victory
When Urban Love Goes Wrong
A Belfast Love Story by Leo Boyd (Tumblr | Belfast Print Workshop and see previously: Big Men Wail Hammers | Oh You Pretty Thing): “I love this city but doesn’t love me back”, says our heroine, standing in front of Belfast City Hall!
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Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03254 garfield st
We Must Share The Responsibility
UDA commander John McMichael was also secretary of the New Ulster Political Research Group (NUPRG), a think tank of the UDA/UFF. The group argued for an independent Northern Ireland (based in part on beliefs about a separate Ulster ethnic identity – see the Visual History page on Cú Chulainn) in two documents, 1979’s Beyond the Religious Divide and 1987’s Common Sense (available at CAIN), promoting the philosophy of ‘Ulster nationalism’, depicted here by the free-floating Northern Ireland. McMichael ran unsuccessfully for the Belfast South seat after the murder of Robert Bradford (see To Bathe The Sharp Sword Of My Word In Heaven).
“As John McMichael stated before his untimely death, we must share the responsibility for finding a settlement and share the responsibility of maintaining good government. He left us hope.”
Here’s a link to an image (from @conflictNI) of McMichael at the launch of Common Sense in 1987.
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Copyright © 2013 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03247 X01585 [X01583] [X01584] [X01586] [X01587] lemberg st
Belfast Calling
The mural on the shutters of Belfast Underground Records (Web | Fb) reproduces the cover of the album London Calling by The Clash. Vinyl records, and, since September 2015, a radio station with live streaming from the booth!
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Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03196 queen st
The Mainspring
Seán Mac Dıarmada was born in Leitrim, left for Glasgow at age 15, and after two years returned to Belfast in 1905 and – according to the new mural above – spoke from the back of a coal lorry in Clonard Street, outside the Clonard branch of the Ancient Order Of Hibernians. Mac Dıarmada was for a short time an AOH member, before moving on to the Irish Republican Brotherhood and Irish Volunteers, which led to his participation in the 1916 Easter Rising and execution on May 12th of that year.
The title of today’s post is historian F.X. Martin’s assessment of Mac Dıarmada, quoted in a pamphlet on Mac Dıarmada from the National Library Of Ireland. The NLI made many letters from and to Mac Dıarmada available in 2016. (See also this Irish Times write-up).
Previously: A 2013 Mac Dıarmada mural in Ardoyne and a 2009 small board, also in Ardoyne.
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Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03275 clonard st quigley’s coal merchants séan executed by the british for his role
Over A Barrel
Here is a snapshot from the protest camp at Twaddell Avenue, established in July 2013, which remains in place at the junction with the Crumlin Road. The most recent newspaper mention of the protest appears to be this December 29th report in the Newsletter.
For more, including the “civil rights” board behind the barrel, see Twaddell Protest Camp | Civil Rights Camp | Supporters Club | Let Them Home.
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Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Don’t Ever Give Up!
Positive thinking in a suicide-prevention poster from the Republican Network for Unity (RNU) in Ardoyne: Place your hand over your heart, can you feel it? This is called purpose! Your’re [sic] alive for a reason! … Don’t ever give up
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Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03273 berwick rd
He Sowed That We Might Reap
The Derry branch of the 1916 Societies (Fb) is named after Sean Dolan, an IRA volunteer interned at the outbreak of WWII on the prison ship Al Rawdah (WP | saoırse32) before being moved to Crumlin Road gaol. He was released on grounds of ill health shortly before dying in 1941 at age 28 in Derry. The title of today’s post comes from Dolan’s gravestone, which is in Ardmore (findagrave).
It was the 1916 Societies that hoisted an Irish tricolour from the roof of Stormont in June 2015 (BBC).
The wide shot below shows the 1916 board next to a Fıanna roll of honour and an IRSP O’Hara-McCreesh hunger-strikers memorial (see Socialist Volunteers).
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Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Free Wee Rab
This graffiti is in the Ligoniel area of north Belfast: “UFF – Free Wee Rab”. If you know who Wee Rab is or how he is being constrained, please e-mail or comment!
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Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
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Derryrhoea
Here is the latest political comment from TLO (we assume): DUP member and former Minister for Culture, Arts, and Leisure Gregory Campbell – MLA for East Londonderry– is shown suffering from “Derryrhoea”. In the upper posters, his hair is orange and tongue red, while in the lower poster he appears to be seeing and thinking feces. Campbell has been twicebarred from speaking in the Assembly in the last 15 months.
Previously by TLO: Demonizing Paisley, Three Studies Of Ian Paisley, and Ian Jong-un, Wee Angel, Taking The Hump
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Copyright © 2015 Seosamh Mac Coılle
X03251 hill st
Extramural Activity 