In A Foreign Land

The [Sergeant] Lindsay Mooney Memorial Flute Band was formed in 1973 after the St. Patrick’s day death of Lindsay Mooney, a UDA member killed by the premature explosion of a bomb near Lifford, County Donegal (Sutton). The band dissolved in 1993 but commemorative nights are still held (NI World). It has presumably re-formed, as there are videos on youtube of the band parading in 2021 and in 2022 and they will march for the 50th anniversary of the band later this year (2023) (youtube).

The board above is in the Lincoln Court area of Londonderry, from where Mooney and the band both hailed. “To those of us who criticise, to those who cannot see, just remember in a foreign land fell a better man than me.”

The Ballad Of Lindsay Mooney: youtube | lyrics

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Copyright © 2023 Paddy Duffy
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All Or Nothing!!

Clare Crockett gave up her acting career (IMDb) to become a Servant Sister. She is pictured in the info board along with the five postulants who died with her during a 2016 earthquake in Playa Prieta, Ecuador. A web site has been established in her memory and a movie made about her life; there have been calls to make her a saint (Irish News).

Painted by UV Arts (tw) in Derry’s Brandywell, where she originally came from (BelTel).

“Sr Clare Crockett was born in Derry 14th November 1982. The daughter of Gerard and Margaret Crockett. During a Holy Week Retreat in Spain in the year 2000 she experienced the intensity of the Lord’s Death and Resurrection that led to a deep conversion of her life. Sr Clare entered the Servant Sisters of the House of the Mother 11th August 2001. She went to found a new community in Jacksonville, Florida in October 2006. Sr Clare took Perpetual vows 8th September 2010. In 2014, Sr Clare undertook the mission in Ecuador. She died in an Earthquake, protecting her pupils 16th April 2016. She was buried in Derry 2nd May 2016.”

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Copyright © 2024 Paddy Duffy
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Iraqnica

Picasso painted Guernica to protest the Nazi bombing of the Basque capital of Gernika (at the request of Franco’s forces) on April 26, 1937, during the Spanish Civil War, which resulted in hundreds of deaths. Its reproduction in Derry in 2007 was to protest the Iraq war; it is entitled Iraqnica. Modern-looking aeroplanes, one dropping bombs, have been added at the top of the image. The original is black and white and grey but here has been coloured in a palette that matches the colour of the wall.

Painted by Jim Keys, Stephen Gargan, and Jim Collins in Glenfada Park, Derry

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Copyright © 2007 Paddy Duffy
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The Rioter (The Saturday Matinee)

This mural is popularly known as ‘Saturday Matinee’ because young people in Derry would spend Saturdays (and many other days) rioting against the British Army, which had been deployed in August 1969 after the Battle Of The Bogside. The official title is The Rioter and it is the eighth mural from the Bogside Artists in The People’s Gallery. The original photograph on which the mural is based is by Clive Limpkin.

Glenfada Park, Bogside, Derry

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Copyright © 2007 Paddy Duffy
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Operation Motorman

22,000 British soldiers were involved in retaking the “no-go” areas of Derry and Belfast in Operation Motorman, in July 1972. This is the seventh mural from the Bogside Artists in what would become The People’s Gallery.

The plaque on the left is “dedicated to the memory of Patrick Shiels Óglaıgh Na hÉıreann 1878-1957. Erected by the republican movement 11th April 2007 to mark his 50th anniversary. I measc laochra na nGael go raıbh sé”. Paddy Shiels took part in the Easter Rising and was later Derry OC. See BMH testimony #676 by Liam Brady.

Rossville St, Derry

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Copyright © 2007 Paddy Duffy
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The Runner

‘The Runner’ is the final mural painted by the Bogside Artists in the series that would in 2007 be collectively given the name The People’s Gallery (the John Hume mural would be added in 2008). The mural shows youths running from CS gas in Creggan. There are portraits of Manus Deery (see his Bogside plaques) and (obscured) Charles Love in the bottom left; the plaque to Love in the centre is retained.

Fahan Street, Bogside, Derry

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Copyright © 2007 Paddy Duffy
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