Ulster Tower

This pair of boards in Irvine Crescent, Enniskillen, is notable for their construction out of pieces of board that have been cut/carved before being layered onto a background board.

They both present the Ulster Volunteers/YCV of 1912 and WWI – in the first, two soldiers are placed alongside the Ulster Tower at Thiepval, France.

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Copyright © 2015 Peter Moloney
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Our Unforgotten Comrades

“In memory of the unforgotten comrades who died on hungerstrike in the H-Blocks for the cause of Irish freedom. Síochá[ı]n Dé orthu. [Our] revenge will be the laughter of our children – Bobby Sands”.

Michael Gaughan and Frank Stagg, who died in English prisons in the 1970s, are included below the ten deceased 1981 hunger-strikers.

Main Street/Galloon Gardens, Newtownbutler

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Copyright © 2015 Peter Moloney
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The Belfast Blitz

In the “Belfast Blitz” of April and May 1941, during WWII, 900 people died and half the homes in Belfast were destroyed or damaged (WP). In the apex of this mural, a Nazi bomber sets buildings alight; in the main panel, people, including a milkman, walk among the bombed-out buildings, while others (bottom right) test out a piano that has been moved. 

On the side-wall to the right is a painted frame surrounding a manufactured plaque with the names of locals who died in the blitz.

By JMK (Jonny McKerr – Fb) in Hogarth Street, Tiger’s Bay, north Belfast. Both the lamp-post and the electrical box have been painted into the mural.

McKerr also did a piece in the area of images from WWI – see The Home Front.

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Copyright © 2015 Peter Moloney
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The Home Front

The central image of soldiers at the battle of the Somme is surrounded by images of various occupations: shipyard workers and miners (perhaps), along with images of women welding, carrying coke, and nursing. It’s not clear what the “fair wartime wage” refers to: there was a general strike at the shipyards in 1919 (The Great Unrest | Workers’ Liberty). 

The nurse is apparently the Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna of Russia (WP). The image of a person carrying a sack of coke is from the Imperial War Museum’s collection.

The lower wall is intended to be full, but painting has ceased indefinitely.

Artist Jonny McKerr (Fb) also did a similarly-styled piece on The Belfast Blitz.

Edlingham Street, Tiger’s Bay, north Belfast

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Copyright © 2015 Peter Moloney
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John Bunting

“John Bunting MI5 tout”. This Tiger’s Bay placard is an indicator of the continued tensions within the North Belfast UDA that first came to public attention in December 2013. John Bunting was arrested in September (2014) and charged with the attempted murder of John Borland and Andre Shoukri, from the opposing faction.

(See Split for links to articles from 2013; for the latest, see Belfast Daily and Belfast Live.)

Mervue Street, north Belfast

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Copyright © 2015 Peter Moloney
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Yeomna Qadm

“Viva Palestine”. This pro-Palestine mural features sky-jacker Leila Khaled (also seen in in Hugo Street) and the emblem of the Popular Front For The Liberation Of Palestine (WP). The Arabic on the right is an equivalent of “Tıocfaıdh ár lá” on the left.

See also: The same elements used in another mural Oppression Breeds ResistanceThe Popular Front in Northumberland Street | “Viva Palestine” in Ardoyne and on Black Mountain/Slıabh Dubh

AMCOMRI Street, off Beechmount Avenue/Ascaıll Ard na bhFeá, west Belfast.

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Copyright © 2015 Peter Moloney
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Cogús

“End internment by remand – End forced strip searches – End controlled movement”.

Fists are raised in defiance of the police state (both PSNI/NIPS and Gardaí/IPS). Cogús (meaning “conscience”) is the division of the Republican Network for Unity (Fb) concerned with political prisoners.

Beechmount Avenue, west Belfast

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Copyright © 2015 Peter Moloney
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Collusion Untried

This Beechmount Avenue board reproduces five pages from the 2007 O’Loan report detailing the various ways in which the security services colluded with (mostly loyalist) paramilitaries; below the pages are a list of victims’ websites and the titles of two “books of interest”.

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Copyright © 2015 Peter Moloney
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