PUL

Peace Cannot Be Kept By Force

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The theme “Remember the fallen from war” is illustrated by a bombed-out Ballymacarret library on Templemore Avenue and St. Patrick’s church, which is just across the street from the mural, both of which were hit during the blitz in 1942, a police land rover perhaps indicates the dead during the Troubles, while Cuchulainn stands for the IRA (and/or for the UDA?). The word “peace” appears next to an image of Stormont (bottom right) painted in white rather than grey.

We are supposed to remember the dead because (perhaps) their deaths were unnecessary and misguided as means to peace, at least according to the saying along the bottom (sometimes attributed to Einstein): “Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding” – understanding of the Nazis during the blitz, it seems, and of loyalists during the Troubles. If you have a better interpretation, please (please!) leave a comment.

The mural was imitated on the hoarding around the Cultúrlann on the Falls Road during its renovation, though this version does not mention the blitz and seems to be lamenting the CNR dead and calling for understanding of the CNR community (sc. by Britain and the Orange state) – see X01279.

Lendrick Street, east Belfast

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Copyright © 2010 Peter Moloney
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Fountain Young Defenders

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Neither the Fountain Young Defenders or the Young Loyalists seem to have existed as an organisation, just as an idea in the mind of an artists on the walls of Wapping Lane. “No surrender 09”, “UDA Fountain Wombles“.

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Copyright © 2009 Peter Moloney
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Irish Regiments

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Insignia of the Royal Irish Rangers, the Inniskilling Fusiliers, the Royal Irish Rifles, the 36th (Ulster) Division, the Paras, the B Specials, the Irish Guards, and the Ulster Defence Regiment, outside the Cathedral Youth Club in the Fountain, Londonderry, perhaps as inspiration to the young people, as many of the regiments still exist. The ‘odd man out’ here is the Paras – they served in Northern Ireland but were not raised from Ireland.

The Fountain, Londonderry

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Copyright © 2009 Peter Moloney
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Still Under Siege

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The Fountain is the only Protestant area on the west bank of the Foyle river and it is surrounded by a “peace” line. The original siege of Derry was in 1688.

This is a new location for a message that has been in the Fountain since the 1980s. See previously 1988 and 1990 in Kennedy Place and 2002 | 2004 | 2006 in Hawkin Street.

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Copyright © 2009 Peter Moloney
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