The writing – D coy, 2nd batt, Belfast Brigade [IRA] – has been added where the volunteer’s legs used to be – see the Peter Moloney Collection for the original. A small plaque has been added at the top. Otherwise, the mural remains as before, with a hooded volunteer raising an assault rifle in front of a sunburst and Tricolour, with a row of barbed wire and the four provinces named in Irish.
Falls Road, west Belfast, now the site of the Garden Of Remembrance
Bobby Sands’s prison diary (web) ends, on March 17th, 1981, with the words “Tıocfaıdh lá éıgın nuaır a bheıdh an fonn saoırse seo le taıspeáınt ag daoıne go léır na hÉıreann – ansın tchífıdh muıd éırí na gealaí.” [A day will come when this desire for freedom will be exhibited by all the people of Ireland – then we will see the rising of the moon].
The phrase “the rising of the moon” comes from the poem/song of the same name composed by fifteen-year-old John Casey in 1865 about the 1798 Rebellion. “Full bitter was their fate” but the desire for freedom was not extinguished with them: “… e’en still are beating/Hearts in manhood’s burning noon/Who would follow in their footsteps/At the rising of the moon.”
In this mural, just off Lenadoon Avenue, a larger-than-life prisoner stands in silhouette, with first defiantly raised, over the watch-towers of Long Kesh.
“Chífıdh muıd éırí na gealaí” – “chífıdh” and “tchífıdh” are variant spellings.
This mural shows nine hooded republican volunteers employing an assortment of weapons – rifles, RPG launcher, drogue bomb, machine gun – against a rising sun. “We will have our day.” The trio in the bottom right corner are familiar from other murals, such as this one in Strabane.
Words from Padraıg Mac Pıaraıs’s poem Mıse Éıre are included alongside the portraits of the seven signatories to the 1916 Proclamation. It includes the line “Great is my glory, I who bore brave Cú Chulaınn” and Cú Chulaınn is pictured on the right, in the death pose made famous by Oliver Sheppard in a statue installed in the GPO in 1935 – see Cú Chulaınn’s Visual History page.
Mıse Éıre: Sıne mé ná an Chaılleach Bhéarra. Mór mo ghlóır: Mé a rug Cú Chulaınn cróga. Mór mo náır: Mo chlann féın a dhíol a máthaır. [Mór mo phıan: Bıthnaımhde do mo shíorchıapadh.] [Mór mo bhrón: D’éag an dream ınar chuıreas dóchas.] Mıse Éıre: Uaıgní mé ná an Chaılleach Bhéarra.
Painted by Mo Chara Kelly in Norglen Gardens, west Belfast
This pair of murals was painted by Mo Chara Kelly at the top of Springhill in 1987 after his release from prison. Both are inspired by the work of Jim Fitzpatrick. The central figure of the Rí Nuadha [King Nuada] mural above and immediately below comes from a painting of Fitzpatrick‘s called ‘Nuada Journeys To The Underworld’ while the background has a Fitzpatrick style and colour-scheme.
Of the myth of Nuada, Mo Chara said, “I had never heard the story of King Nuada before. Then I read the story. Wow! What a yarn! Nuada Of The Silver Arm is one of my favourite stories. As one of the Tuatha Dé Danann you had to be whole and physically perfect to hold the kingship. Nuada lost an arm in the first battle of Moy Tura and so he lost his kingship. He went into the other world, to middle earth, fought through trials and tribulations until Dıan Cécht made a silver arm for Nuada and he was restored to the kingship for another twenty years. But the moral of the story to me was that, no matter what happens, get up again and fight back. No matter how bad the situation you are in, you get back up and fight again. Do not let people isolate you. Get up and fight again. It was very inspiring!” (Painting My Community/An Pobal A Phéınteáıl – English-language version available for free.)
The Loch gCál/Loughgall mural likewise draws on Fitzpatrick for the landscape behind the Celtic cross and funeral guard in memory of the eight IRA volunteers from the East Tyrone brigade who were killed in an SAS ambush during an attack on an RUC base in May, 1987 (WP).
The names of the eight volunteers are given here in Irish and (partially) in the old script:
“I ndıl cuimh[n]e de [= ar] Óglach Pádraıg Ó Ceallaıġ [Patrick Kelly], Óglach Séamus Ó Donn[ġ]aıle [Seamus Donnelly], Óglach Deaglán Mac Aırt [Declan Arthurs], Óglach Séamus Laıghneach [Jim Lynagh], Óglach Gearóıd Ó Ceallacháın [Gerry O’Callaghan], Óglach Pádraıg Mac Cearnaıgh [Pádraıg McKearney], Óglach Antóın Ó Garmaıle [Ó Gormghaıle | Tony Gormley], Óglach Eoghan Ó Ceallaıġ [Eugene Kelly]
an ochtar óglach de óglaigh na hÉireann a dúnmharú ag Loch gCál ar an ochtú lá Bealtaine 1987.” [the eight volunteers from the Irish Volunteers [IRA] who were murdered at Loughgall on the eighth day of May, 1987]
The town (Loughgall) and the four provinces are also named in Irish. An Easter lily is at the centre of the Celtic cross in the middle of the image, above a lark in barbed wire and a gal gréıne/sunburst.
This mural celebrates the IRA (“Óglaigh Na hÉıreann” at the top) from 1919 (the army of the independent Dáıl Éıreann) to the “present” day of 1982. In the centre, a lark flies against a Tricolour, with the word “Saoırse” (“freedom”) beneath.
This is a repainted version of the original, which was one of several murals in Beechmount and the Rock streets that were paint-bombed by “marauding Coldstream Guards” (according to AP/RN of 1982-04-29) – for the damaged mural, see the Peter Moloney Collection. The “1919” date would be changed to “1916”.
Paddy Duffy Collection 