A phoenix in the colours of the Irish tricolour.
Shaw’s Road, west Belfast.
With “INLA” on the shutters of the off-licence next door.
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00200
Phoenix
Area Affiliation
The First Six
Portraits of Bobby Sands, Francis Hughes, Raymond McCreesh, Patsy O’Hara, Joe McDonnell, and Martin Hurson (or possibly Brendan McLoughlin). Whiterock Road (at Carnmore Place), Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00199
Smash H Block
The names of four hunger strikers – Bobby Sands RIP, Patsy O’Hara RIP, Raymond McCreesh, and Franky Hughes RIP – with an “H” made of barbed wire and two Irish tricolours.
Falls Road (at Fallswater St), Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00198
Westland Street, 1981
The previous street-level graffiti on Westland Street, Derry — for which see 1973’s PIRA Provos — is shown here being repainted with a series of three panels: a tricolour and starry plough, hands in chains, and H-block.
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Copyright © 1981 Peter Moloney
M00187 M00186
I’ll Wear No Convicts Uniform
Republican prisoners, one with a raised fist: “I’ll wear no convicts uniform, nor meekly serve my time, that Britain might make Ireland’s fight 800 years of crime.” It appears from the fist in the top of the gable that a larger version was initially attempted but then scaled back. The figures are based on a 1981 poster urging the restoration of political status for republican prisoners.
According to Bill Rolston, this is the first mural painted in Belfast, in the spring of 1981. For a history of (republican) proto-murals and murals, see Visual History 02.
Whiterock Road, west Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00184 M00185
Out Of The Flames
Sunburst and tricolour flags with a phoenix(?) rising out of the flames.
Trench Road, Gobnascale, Derry.
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00183
Murdered By The Crown
“Hunger strikers murdered by the crown”, “Out of the ashes arose the Provisionals”, with a primitive phoenix, sunburst flag, and tricolour.
Blucher Street/Lisfannon Park, Bogside, Derry
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Copyright © 1981 Peter Moloney
M00182
Resistance
More panels from Rossville Street, Derry, this time showing volunteers firing over a phoenix, a lark in barbed wire, a volunteer kneeling by a fire and a tricolour on a flagpole, and an Armalite rifle with the words “A weapon of the provisionals”.
For the rest of this wall (out of shot on the right), see Murdered By Paratroopers and Éıre Nua.
Rossville Street, Derry
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Copyright © 1981 Peter Moloney
M00164 M00162
Bobby Jackson Mural
King Billy at the Battle Of The Boyne in 1690 and the Relief Of Derry in 1689. This is the “original” mural in its second location (scare-quotes around “original” because the mural was touched up annually).
This (second) location is still in The Fountain (as was the original location), but there is some confusion about the exact location in relation to the original location – they might be very close together. Please get in touch if you can describe this location in relation to the first.
For 1975 images of the mural in its first location, see Bobby Jackson Mural. And for an overall history, see The Jackson Murals.
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Copyright © 1981 Peter Moloney
M00065 M00064
In Honour
In the first two of these three images from (somewhere on) the Andersonstown Road, nine hunger-strikers are named — Bobby Sands M.P., Joe McDonnell, Francis Hughes, Kevin Lynch, Kieran Doherty T.D., Ray McCreesh, Martin Hurson, Patsy O’Hara, and Tom McElwee — while in the third, Michael Devine’s name has been added and the bottom of the wall painted black. “Smash H-Block” is on the right; “Victory to the prisoners” is on the building on the other side of the road.
Andersonstown, west Belfast
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Copyright © 1981 LC
M00158 M00160 M00159
