The new panels shown here re-re-image the side-wall of the mural on the left (see For Valour), which was dedicated to the Royal Irish Rifles of the Great War. We now see hooded UVF gunmen from the 1st East Antrim battalion, and an interesting quote from Edward Carson.
In September, 1914, six weeks after the Great War had begun, Edward Carson wrote to the Ulster Volunteers entreating “those who have not already responded” to “my call for Defenders of the Empire” to “enlist at once for the Ulster Division in Lord Kitchener’s Army”, fighting alongside “our fellow Britishers”: “Quit yourselves like men and comply with your country’s demand”. The impulse for the display of force shown here is the other, original, motivation for the paramilitary force, which Carson describes as “to defend our citizenship in the United Kingdom” (Strachan & Nally).
The Larches, Carrickfergus
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