Friday, May 16, 2008
Moane’s Cross and the end of history
We quite frequently drive along the mountain road between Fivemiletown and Rosslea. Last time we were along that road a car was stopped beside the memorial at Moane’s Cross to two IRA men: Feargal O’Hanlon and Sean South, who died after an attack on Brookeborough RUC station on the 1st January 1957. An elderly couple seemed to be laying flowers at the place. I wondered if they were friends or relatives of those who had died there all those years ago in the IRA border campaign.
Mary McAleese has suggested that the end of Ireland’s centuries long political conflict is at hand. This in many ways echoes comments by Bertie Ahern whilst he was in Washington. Of course these sentiments are not confined to RoI politicians or to nationalists and also seem to have some echoes in Dr. Paisley’s latest remarks. I do feel, however, that this is a very difficult conclusion to draw when one considers the history of this island and indeed the history of other conflicts in the world.
The conflicts here have been “solved” with tedious frequency. Ireland has been “pacified” whether by force or by politics on many occasions. By turns Elizabeth I, James I/VI, Cromwell and Gladstone used “pacification” of various forms and the list of rebellions includes so many dates: 1641, 1798, 1916 etc. I would suggest that the nature of our conflict here is somewhat similar to ethnic conflicts, although as with many so called ethnic conflicts, there are no actual ethnic differences, merely cultural ones. The problem is with totally differing political aspirations and that is unlikely to change any time soon.
Looking to other places in the world there are frequent examples of conflicts supposedly solved years ago, which recurred. How many expected the orgy of violence visited on the Balkans? Remember also that the Balkan conflict was “solved” by the creation of Yugoslavia after it had helped precipitate the First World War (of course the above is utterly simplified but there is some truth therein). The horrors of Rwanda were unexpected but had causes and (much milder) precedents in the history of that region.
So maybe we have some form of permanent peace and all subsequent quarrels about Northern Ireland will be solved peacefully. However, this sounds a little like the pronouncement of “The End of History” after the end of the Cold War.
Whilst I agree with Mick that at the moment there (thankfully) seems little likelihood that the dissident terrorists will manage to return us to major violence; I am brought back to that elderly couple at Moane’s Cross with whom I started. I sometimes wonder if the terrorist attacks we are seeing now are a little like the IRA border campaign. At the time I am sure the RUC and the government in Stormont were delighted with how relatively easily they defeated that campaign. Little did they know that massively more violence (initiated let us remember by loyalists) was then less than a decade away.
Turgon @ 10:26 PM
...and don’t forget this in honour of Henry Joy McCracken, a great Ulster Protestant who had only the best interests of his people at heart and understood too well the sectarianism which unionism used to exploit those same people.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzBQ3gyLHd4&feature=related
and while we’re on Antrim men, here is the original that inspired Séan South:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Slu23kGEw48
Enjoy.
Posted by on May 18, 2008 @ 01:42 PM“Henry Joy McCracken (31 August 1767 – 17 July 1798) was a cotton manufacturer and industrialist, Presbyterian, radical Irishman ..”
A young businessman in the years before the Union. Surely not an exploiter, Rory ...
It’s interesting to note that these radical/New Light Presbyterians in Ulster often found themselves on the opposite side of the political divide to their Old Light colleagues, Episcopalians and Catholics.
Posted by on May 18, 2008 @ 02:17 PMI don’t mean to be pedantic, but unionism is an ahistorical term for the era of Henry Joy. I understand what Rory means, but we should note that there is a danger in such language as it runs together Irish history, and tends to eliminate other forces that shaped it, especially class politics. It also risks neglecting the way sectarianism has been used and exploited across the political divide (including people like Daniel O’Connell who took arms against the United Irishmen), while underestimating the extent to which sectarianism is unfortunately not simply something that was conjured from nothing by the British or Irish elite, and cannot be presumed to be something that can just as easily be magicked away if the elite chose to.
As for Nevin’s point, in the late C18th the bourgeoisie was the main revolutionary class, much less exploitative than the aristocracy.
Posted by on May 18, 2008 @ 02:44 PMGaribaldy
Interesting but arent you missing the point? Why worry when you can simplify it down to themuns and us and sing some good songs about brave men murdering people? Sectarianism hasnt just been exploited - its almost become the religion /creed byu which many of our contry men and women define themselves. “I am one of us and not one of them”.
Posted by on May 19, 2008 @ 12:27 AM“Thanks Turgon - watched them all and with all due respect - not much fun… the Irish have got all the best tunes !!!”
You’re just grumpy cos Cardiff lost- the lads in Portsmouth LOL will be happy tonight
Firstly...er aren’t WE Irish too? Certainly our senile first Minister thinks so.
Secondly, the best Irish ballad is “ My Lovely Horse"- so moving and typically maudlin for the tourishsts
“The Green Grassy Slopes of the Boyne” has a bit of oomph, even if it gets the formation of the Orange order 105 years too soon in the chorus. “The Orange Lily” is my own favourite with it’s reference to “Erin’s Loyal Lily”. “The Aghalee Heroes” and “South Down Militia” have a certain swagger about them. Turgon will be familiar with “The Sprigs of Kilrea”
“Lilibullero” is of course the song that historians claim lost James 3 Kingdoms, such was its popularity. Even Dustin the Turkey won’t match that.
Posted by on May 19, 2008 @ 09:06 AMDarth
“Firstly...er aren’t WE Irish too?” I wish you lot would make your mind up......I’ll have a look at those tonight.
Did u know that Cardiff’s goalie in the 1927 final was an ex IRA pal of Sean Lemass?? and that 2 of the players went on to play for Linfield and win Welsh, Irish and English FA cup medals ? I’m a soccer expert now......Posted by on May 19, 2008 @ 12:24 PMIndeed Dewi- the goalie was sent out of ireland by his parents after the Great war because they wisely disapproved of the company he was keeping- didn’t know he was actually in the IRA though..
Portsmouth’s 1939 team also included ex-Belfast Celtic great Jimmy McAlinden, who later managed Distillery. The moral clearly is - Ulstermen win you trophies ( I don’t think we can really count Tony Capaldi, even though he has some tenuous connection)
And don’t forget that classic “The Ould orange Flute” when you’re on youtube.
Posted by on May 19, 2008 @ 03:27 PMhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Farquharson
There you go - and ain’t this cool:
Posted by on May 19, 2008 @ 03:58 PMOh see the fleet-foot host of men
Who speed with faces wan
From farm-stead and from fisher’s cot
Along the banks of Bann.They come with vengeance in their eye
Too late, too late are they
For Roddy MacCorley goes to die
On the Bridge of Toome this dayThey just don’t write ‘em like that any more.
Posted by on May 19, 2008 @ 07:05 PMhttp://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=IVlbenGJ8u0
Good stuff Darth !
Posted by on May 19, 2008 @ 08:34 PMAntiChrist, thanks for the reminder of one of the old tunes I love the most. I went to YouTube to see if there was any old footage of the Ciarán Bourke, Ronnie Drew, Luke Kelly version, and I stumbled on this clip of Ciarán Bourke’s last ever television appearance, reciting “Lament for Brendan Behan” and singing ‘the auld Triangle.” For those who would enjoy, enjoy --
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=SgoCwCyhh-Q
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 12:06 AMSuperb Susan.
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 01:47 AMDewi, SSoG is tripe, musically. Don’t waste your time with it. Try this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uggbzBtGbJw
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 03:21 AMSusan, what do you think of the old Mayo chat-up line: “How would you like to be buried with our people?”? Where did all the folk and ballad singers go? Wehoe!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuAJTOEFtNk
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 07:54 AM“They just don’t write ‘em like that any more.”
Very true, Antichrist, but then, on the bright side, they don’t hang ‘em on the Bridge of Toome either.
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 08:04 AMDewi
the wiki entry on Farquharson apparently confirms that he was a sympathiser and not a member of the IRA- which was my recollection of a recent discussion with a leading local football statistician about him. The two Ulstermen on the team were transferred from Crusaders if I remember correctly. I think one was “Sticky” Sloan.Hope you enjoyed the Ould orange Flute, even though the Clancy brothers are a wee bit reedy and tweedy to give it the leather. Still, I hope you’re cycling to work singing the praises of “the ould cause that gave us our freedom religion and laws”, before that oh so poignant crescendo “ As the flames licked around it they heard a strange noise- Twas the ould flute stil playing the Protestant boys”
Who says the Devil has all the best music?
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 08:54 AMNevin, it is going to take a shotgun to clear that “horse it into ye” number out of my head, how could you?
One of the worst chat-up lines I recall was in New York, from a wee émigré from Dingle’s own Castlegregory. He was one of those “small but perfectly formed” specimens just about your height if they are standing and you are sitting on a bar stool. To be honest with you he was so small and scrubbed-looking I thought he was asking me for directions, or something equally harmless. Therefore—or thusly, as it were—when I missed the line the first time, and the second, and the third, I smiled encouraginly each time, asking “sorry?” as he repeated it louder and louder.
Finally, in exasperation he half-shouted it into my ear—my good ear—and the barman, an Armagh man, later wheezingly told me he thought I was going to burst into tears as the meaning slowly sunk in. I wish I knew how to do justice to the open throttle effect of the full-bore West Kerry accent as it hurtles towards the goal, but the line was “A tall tree is easily climbed when its felled,” and though I didn’t go home with him he won in a way as I’ve never forgotten him or the line. Though I’ve tried. :o)
Rory, having now had a chance i see it was you that brought “Roddy Mccorley’ into the thread. Maith thú.
Dewi, I’m looking forward to seeing some of your clips. We couldn’t close this thread without a bit of sean nós, and here’s a good one, from Carna’s, in Connemara’s, finest
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=3AFRCWg_kOc
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 09:54 AM“a wee émigré from Dingle’s own Castlegregory”
Was he one of the Castlegregory Campbells who now sits in Stormont? ;)
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 10:54 AMA personal favourite of mine, a true rebel song. Was a fave of both my grandads too. Both fought the Tan war, but were on oppoiste sides in the civil war.
“Right proudly high over Dublin Town they hung out the flag of war
‘Twas better to die ‘neath an Irish sky than at Sulva or Sud El Bar
And from the plains of Royal Meath strong men came hurrying through
While Britannia’s Huns, with their long range guns sailed in through the foggy dewAh, back through the glen I rode again and my heart with grief was sore
For I parted then with valiant men whom I never shall see more
But to and fro in my dreams I go and I’d kneel and pray for you,
For slavery fled, O glorious dead, When you fell in the foggy dew.”Hard to beat IMHO. Brilliant version by Sinead O’Connor and that mighty rebel band, The Chieftains ;)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13MQFCfCYdQ
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 11:43 AMNevin,
‘If you read A T Q Stewart’s “The Narrow Ground” you’d begin to ask what precautionary strategies are in place to see us safely through 2016.’
Eh ? I’d be more concerned about getting safely (i.e the Assembly not collapsing) through 2009.
‘They certainly weren’t in place in the lead up to 1966. ‘
Ireland in 1966 was a different country from the Ireland of today . Irish ‘nationalism’ has matured in the Republic and even Irish Republicans in Northern Ireland have accepted what they never accepted before i.e NI remains part of the UK as long as the majority of people within NI so wish.
Sammy is right -the war is over-. There will always be a few ‘dissidents’ on both sides but by 2016 if they’re not extinct they’ll not be reproducing their kind.
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 01:16 PM“Sammy is right -the war is over-.”
I suppose it was over in 1925 and in 1962, Greenflag ...
A T Q Stewart might be able to illustrate the dangers of ignoring historical precedent anytime the constitutional question arises, especially for those who live in earlier ‘hotspots’ like Derry, Portadown and Belfast.
Examples of ‘reproduction’ can be found on YouTube but you’ll probably avert your gaze from them too ... [eg google with loyalist republican rfb bands]
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 02:51 PMhttp://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=zlpkmqxGmt4
Susan - let’s keep up to date will ya !!!
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 07:58 PMDonnacha - u r a bit bloodthirsty - what’s a halbert anyway?
Turgon, Darth - I’ve been singing that Black Man’s dream all week in the office - they think I’ve finally flipped.
My favourite anyway:
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=ORifieiZiP4&feature=related
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 08:09 PM-
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 08:20 PM
Prionsa Eoghan
“Don’t let yoursel be barracked into apologising for anything at all. These volunteers are worth remembering, they were fighting and dying for a worthy cause not an apartheid Unionist hegemony.”
Terrorist thugs who came from the Republic of Ireland to Northern Ireland to try to murder Northern Irish village policemen.
Whose ‘worthy cause’ involved claiming that their little armed gang was in fact the legitimate government and army of the island of Ireland, and accordingly claiming a mandate for mass murder.
‘Worth remembering’, indeed…
Posted by on May 20, 2008 @ 08:38 PM
