Modern UVF volunteers in balaclavas stand with heads bowed on either side of the Ulster Tower in Thiepval, standing among orange lilies and red poppies.
On the left the 10th Scottish Rifles (AWM) commence a raid, below the emblem of the Ulster Volunteer Force, and on the right, the Royal Fusiliers appear to march off to war in a press photograph (Flickr), below the emblem of the 36th (Ulster) Division.
In Grange Drive, Ballyclare, on the same as wall, and using part of the frame from, a previous UDA board: Young Guns.
Rudyard Kipling’s 1912 poem ‘Ulster’ (Kipling Society) predicts destruction for Protestants under Home Rule and calls for violent resistance, even if it means sacrificing one’s own life: “Believe, we dare not boast/Believe, we do not fear/We stand to pay the cost/In all that men hold dear”.
As is well known, the Ulster Volunteers were founded and smuggled in weapons, but before they could be used, the Great War began and the Volunteers signed up for Kitchener’s Army – the flag on the left includes the battles in which the Central Antrim Regiment of the Royal Irish Rifles (as part of the 36th Division) participated, fighting “For King and Empire”.
The graveside mourner on the right, the 1st East Antrim Battalion UVF, and all of the smaller panels on the right, belong to the Troubles era. There is no information about Jim Curran in 1975; the image of Curran’s funeral appears to be AI-generated.
The UVF mural overlooking the entrance to Mount Vernon has been repainted after Storm Darragh back in December (2024) knocked down part of the wall it was painted on (see Taken By Storm) and the remainder of the wall was subsequently knocked down (see Prepared For Space, Ready For Wall).
There were local voices against the repainting of the mural (Sunday World) but after the wall (which is owned by the Housing Executive) was rebuilt, scaffolding went up at the end of March (BelTel) and painting began in June.
The mural will be officially launched at the Twelfth celebrations. The repainting has been criticised by the father of one UVF victim (BelTel). One (very) small mercy is that neither of the gunmen – from the North Belfast UVF – is directly confronting the viewer (including the drivers coming off the M2 at Fortwilliam.
Images of the completed mural are from June 26th; the in-progress images are as dated below.
For Easter 2025, an “Óglaıgh Na hÉıreann roll of honour 1981” board was added to the wall at the top of Bingnian Drive in Andersonstown, with the names of the ten who died in the second hunger strike. “Óglaıgh Na hÉıreann” here obscures the difference between the IRA and the INLA (O’Hara, Lynch, Devine), and between the Provisional IRA and the anti-Agreement IRA factions. It’s not clear to what extent the (2009 onward) ONH is currently operating, after a split in 2024 (BelTel 2024 | BelTel 2025).
For the RNU piece on the left (in the wide shot) see The Rising Of The Moon. Like the piece on the right, it features Kieran Doherty and Joe McDonnell, two of hunger strikers who were local to the area. For background information, see the board formerly on the wall: To Whom Do We Owe Our Allegiance Today?
“West Tyrone Brigade, Óglaıgh Na hÉıreann. Vol. Charles Breslin, Vol, David Devine, Vol. Michael Devine”. The three were killed on February 23rd, 1985, in a hail of 100-200 SAS bullets, as they returned arms for an aborted mission to a dump near the Fountain area of Strabane; their families were later (2002) awarded compensation. (An Phoblacht | WP | UTv)
The board shown above is in the Fountain Street memorial garden, which centrally features a stone-wall enclosure to the trio. Individual stones have also been added to the garden, to Danny McCauley (TPQ | An Phoblacht), Tobias Molloy (An Phoblacht), and Eugene Devlin (An Phoblacht) (shown below). The local SF cumann is named after Molloy/Devlin/McCauley (Fb).
“Let’s make the difference – stand up for your community – join the IRNC”, “Show support to all Irish republican prisoners – join the IRPC”. These are new IRNC and IRPC (Fb) boards on Northumberland Street (Visual History), west Belfast. See previously on Northumberland Street: IRPC prisoner Niall Lehd | Join The IRNC
The hooded gunman at the New Mossley playground – seen previously in Welcome To New Mossley Play Area – has been upgraded with a golden UVF emblem (shown last, below), and has been joined by two new pieces: the printed board above and the low wall below. The 3rd battalion also includes Rathcoole, Mount Vernon, and Tiger’s Bay.
After a long spring and summer of inaction, a new tribute to UDA assassin Stevie “Top Gun” McKeag has been put in place in the lower Shankill, replacing the flat-capped version of 2016.
In Tolstoy’s War And Peace, the prince Andrei Bolkonsky at one early point remarks, “It is not given to people judge what’s right or wrong. People have eternally been mistaken and will be mistaken, and in nothing more so than in what they consider right and wrong.” But after he is wounded at the Battle Of Austerlitz in 1805 and again in 1812 at the Battle Of Borodino, he loses his admiration for the blood-thirsty Napoleon and for war in general, and comes to think that events are a function of many individual decisions.
Stevie McKeag, hit-man for the UDA’s second battalion (west Belfast) ‘C company’, killed at least a dozen Catholics between 1990 and 1998 (WP). The version presented on the left-hand side-wall (just below) begins, “It is not given to people to judge what’s right or wrong. People have internally been mistaken and will be mistaken …” which seems to be contradictory, and then continues “… and in nothing more than in what they consider right and wrong” which is difficult to parse so as to give the intended meaning.
The mirrored hooded gunmen on either side of the quote come from an old mural in the estate – see UDU-UFF-UDA.
The smiling McKeag is here shown in the main panel wearing a green beret (as is the anonymous volunteer in the side-wall) and commando jumper (with shoulder patches) as though he were a “military commander” in the Commandos or Royal Marines of the British Army. The UDU, the poppies, and the graveside mourners in the right-hand side-wall are used to put McKeag’s actions in the context of resistance to Home Rule and the British Army’s role in the Great War.
For the composition of the main panel, as well as its use of boards on top of the background, compare with the UDA piece in the Woodvale. The translation into English of the UDA’s, UFF’s, and UYM’s Latin mottos – [Quis separabit] / None shall separate us | Feriens tego / Striking I defend | Terrae Filius / Son Of The Soil – is unusual, as is the bouquet of flowers behind the poppy.
For more, including the mourning soldiers, see the entry at Extramural Activity.
“Land of the free because of the brave”. “Remember with pride”. “Those we love don’t go away/They walk beside us every day”. “Dedicated to our fallen comrade”.
April 25th, 2024: The boards were taken off, revealing an older version that stood 2010-2015.
[In the middle circle there were, over the years, a series of printed portraits of McKeag (and one painted version). For the version from 2014, see M11119; see also the image 2011, which links back to other versions from 2010, 2009, 2008, and 2007).]
May 3rd, 2024: Scaffolding in front of the wall
This layer of paint (and plaster?) was also taken off, to reveal the remains of the original King Rat mural on the wall – see X15041 in the Seosamh Mac Coille collection.
Here are some more UVF boards (in addition to those seen in 2022’s Bowtown UVF) that have been added along the length of Abbot Drive. Both “East Belfast” and “North Down” rival factions are included.
The “Lest we forget” board in the final image has been seen before, but has been moved to the location shown after being in the memorial garden.
Here is a gallery of the smaller boards in the Whitehill area of Bangor – other specific pieces can be found in The Elite and Long To Reign Over Us.
The area is a UVF stronghold but split between the North Down and East Belfast battalions – see Welcome To Bowtown and North Down UVF. The very bottom of the estate is UDA – “RUFF touts” is on the border-line, Skipperstone Road.
Two flute bands are mentioned: Pride Of Whitehill (Fb) and Bangor Protestant Boys (Fb).
