The Lily of the Valley

The Poppy

This is the text of a letter I have just submitted to the Irish News.

Jackie McAnee (23 November) states that the poppy is 'a British symbol'.  He also states that, 'The French, Belgians, Dutch, Americans etc do not wear the poppy - this is purely a British thing.'  However McAnee is wrong in both statements.

In the United States of America the American Legion sells poppies to raise funds for its work.  I was also struck by the symbolism of the poppy when I visited the National World War I Museum in Kansas.  Poppies were on sale in the museum and at the entrance there is a Western Front poppy field where each of the 9,000 poppies represents a thousand combatant deaths.

There is also a strong poppy tradition in Canada, where it is the official symbol of remembrance.  Indeed it was a Canadian doctor, Lt Col John McCrae, who wrote the poem In Flanders Fields in 1915.  The first line of that poem is 'in Flanders fields, the poppies blow' and this poem did much to establish the poppy as an international symbol of remembrance.

Today the poppy has become such a powerful symbol that in some countries, such as Malta and South Africa, Remembrance Day is actually referred to as Poppy Day.  Even in Belgium, one of the countries mentioned by Jackie McAnee, there is a Poppy Parade to the Menin Gate in Ypres and poppies are released from the roof of the Menin Gate.

If we are to create a shared and better future in Northern Ireland then we need to explore and plode the myths that have contributed to so much misunderstanding.  I am therefore grateful for the opportunity to explode the myth that the poppy is 'purely a British thing'.

Nelson McCausland MLA

256 Ballysillan Road

Caller herrin'

This week  Diarmaid O Muirithe turned to the Ulster word caller in his column Words We Use in the Irish Times.  According to the Concise Ulster Dictionary it means, of fish or vegetables, fresh, in proper season, newly caught or gathered.

The word used to be very common in Ulster and in Scotland and Northumberland.  Robert Burns wrote in his poem The Holy Fair (1785), 'I walked forth to view the corn, An' snuff the caller air.'  Walter Scott in The Antiquary (1816) has: 'There's fish nae doubt, - there's sea trout and caller haddocks.'

I can recall hearing the word many times on the White Heather Club when Moira Anderson sang the old Scottish song Caller Herrin', which was written by Carolina Oliphant (Lady Nairne) in the early 19th century.

Wha'll buy my caller herrin'?
They're bonnie fish and halesome farin';
Wha'll buy my caller herrin',
New drawn frae the Forth?

The Easter Rising that didn't take place!

Today in the Assembly three Sinn Fein members had tabled oral questions about commemorations and of course their focus was on the forthcoming centenary of Easter 1916.  I took the opportunity to share with them some of the facts about what happened in Ulster at Easter 1916 because it is helpful to raise awareness of the facts rather than the fiction.

Denis McCullough (1883-1968) was born in Belfast and in 1901, at the age of 17, he was sworn into the Irish Republican Brotherhood.  However he was disappointed by the moribund state of the organisation and in 1905 the young activist decided to revitalise the IRB.  Along with Bulmer Hobson and Sean MacDermott he formed the Dungannon Clubs as a means of recruiting new people into the IRB.

Late in 1915 McCullough was elected president of the Supreme Council of the IRB but he was not a member of the Military Committee responsible for planning the Easter Rising and he may not even have known of its existence until later.  Nevertheless as Easter approached he heard of what was planned and travelled down to Dublin to question Thomas Clarke and Sean MacDermott, the other two members of the IRB executive.  They avoided him as long as they could but in the end they informed him of their plans and eventually he supported them.

McCullough was an officer in the Irish Volunteers in Belfast and had two hundred men under his command but it was agreed that there were not enough members in Belfast to stage a rising there.  Instead he was to take his men to Dungannon in county Tyrone and then link up with Liam Mellows in Connacht.

McCullough took 150 men and Cumman na mBan women with him on the train from Belfast to Dungannon to meet up with the Irish Volunteers in Tyrone, who were led by Patrick McCartan (1878-1966).  However McCartan said that the Tyrone volunteers would not rise until they received confirmation that the Pope had received word that a Rising was due to take place and that the German guns had landed in County Kerry.  In the end McCartan and his men refused to move.

The abortive rising petered out with McCullough returning home to Belfast but he managed to shoot himself accidentally in the hand.  That was the extent of the bloodshed in Ulster!

Is that what Sinn Fein want to commemorate - a futile trip by train to Dungannon and a leader who managed to shoot himself?

With God on our Side

On Armistice Day 11 November the film With God on Our Side was shown in a room at Stormont. According to the American director of the film, Porter Speakman Jr, it is a critique of the theology of Christian Zionism.

The following report was taken from the website of Rev Stephen Sizer, who is a Church of England minister and vicar of Christ Church, Virginia Water. He promotes the film and its stance and he is the person on the right of the photograph, which shows some of the people at the film showing.

Yesterday on Remembrance Day, the film With God on our Side was shown to an invited audience at Stormont, home of the Northern Ireland Assembly. Those present represented the spectrum of political opinion and religious tradition that make up Northern Ireland. All present were impressed with the film and the question time had to be extended afterwards.

On the day we remember with great respect, the dead from two World Wars as well as the 50 or more regional wars since 1945, in which allied servicemen and women have made the ultimate sacrifice in the service of mankind, it was most appropriate to be showing the film at Stormont.

In With God on our Side we meet Jews, Moslems and Christians who have disavowed racism, ethnic cleansing and violence as a means of resolving conflict, but instead are working for justice, peace and reconciliation for all who live in the Middle East.

The event was indeed held at Stormont but it was not held in any of the public rooms. As the photograph shows it took place in a party room belonging to Sinn Fein. 

Sizer and Speakman are entitled to their views on Christian Zionism but is there not something inappropriate about asking Sinn Fein to host a film about Israel?  During the Second World War, while the Nazis were persecuting Jews in Europe, the IRA allied themselves with the Nazis.  They saw Britain's difficulty as their opportunity and ignored the record of the Nazi regime.  Stephen Sizer seems to be remarkably naive and ill-informed.

His blog gives the impression that this was in some way an 'official' showing associated in some way with the Northern Ireland Assembly.  In fact it was not - it was just a private event sponsored by Sinn Fein.

Ulsterite

In 1921 the American historian James T Adams (1878-1949) wrote The Founding of New England, which won the Pulitzer Prize for History.  In it he said: 'The Puritanism of any individual today may derive quite as directly from an ancestral Bermudian, Georgian, Jamaican Commonwealth man, Carolinian Scotch Covenanter or Pennsylvanian Ulsterite as from a settler in Salem or Plymouth.'  A century ago the word Ulsterite was in common use for an Ulsterman and this is but one example of many.'

On 22 September 1913 the New York Times carried the headline: 'Carson Getting Bellicose: But Liberals are loath to take action against the Ulsterite'.

Back in 1914 James Connolly wrote Labour in Irish History.  It was reviewed in the Socialist Standard, a journal of the Socialist Party of Great Britain,  in June 1914 and the reviewer said that Connolly's work 'cuts through the sham superficialities of the struggle between Home Ruler and Ulsterite, Catholic and Protestant'.

In December 1919 the Chicago Tribune also described Sir Edward Carson as an Ulsterite.

A headline in Time magazine on 16 November 1925 said, 'Book Flung across House of Commons!' 'Wild Ulsterite Attacks Winston Churchill!'  This was a reference to an occasion when Ronald McNeill MP threw a book at Churchill.

Dr H M J Klein wrote A History of Lancaster County in Pennsylvania in 1926 and said: 'It is generally recognized that the first dominant Scotch-Irish settlements in Lancaster county were in its 'Upper End' or northern part, not in the 'Lower End', as the five Scotch-Irish townships of southern Lancaster are sometimes called.  The settlement of the aggressive Ulsterites in Lancaster county seated a power which soon became evident in the local government.

Thomas Jefferson Wertenbaker (1879-1966) wrote The Planters of Colonial Virginia, which was published by Oxford University Press and Princeton University Press in 1922.  In it he referred to waves of immigration and said, 'The indentured servant differed in no essential from the poor Ulsterite or German who followed him in the Eighteenth century, or the Irishman, the Italian or the Slav in the Nineteenth.'

Lewis Clark Walkinshaw wrote Annals of Southwestern Pennsylvania [c1939] and in a short biography of Judge Richard Drum Laird he said that 'his first American ancestor was John Laird, an Ulsterite from County Donegal'.

Time magazine used the word again on 14 July 1947, describing the golfer Fred Daly as 'jaunty little Ulsterite Fred Daly of Belfast'.

Today the word is comparatively rare but it is an alternative word for an Ulsterman.

The word is also used in relation to a resident of Ulster County, New York.

Commonwealth bid gaining momentum

This article appeared in the  News Letter on 18 November.

The camaign to send a Northern Ireland hockey team to the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in 2014 is gathering momentum.

The management board of Ulster Hockey is investigating the possibility after receiving a letter from the squad members of the successful Ulster under 18 side.

The Sports Minister Nelson McCausland said it would be up to the Ulster Hockey Union and the Irish Hockey Association to consider how such a move would impact on the development of hockey in Northern Ireland.

But he went on: 'I am always keen to see Northern Ireland well represented in international competitions.  All our athletes should have the opportunity, wherever possible, to represent their country in international competition under their national banner.'

One of Northern Ireland's best hockey players has backed the idea.  Emma Clarke, who currently plays for the top team in the English Premier League, Leicester, says it would be an amazing opportunity for players to represent Northern Ireland on the big stage.

'It would be a great experience to compete against some of the best teams in the world and with hockey being a main focus in Ulster, the aim of Glasgow 2014 would mean the development of a very strong squad who could do very well in the Games,' said Emma.

Ulster Elks coach Ricky Lee was at the recent Commonwealth Games in Delhi to assist the Northern Ireland team.  He believes there is nothing to compare with the sheer size of the Games.

'The 6,500 athletes and officials from 72 nations and territories from all round the Commonwealth, competing across 17 sports in 12 spactacular venues was a real eye opener,' Ricky explained.

'Northern Ireland had medal successes in boxing, cycling, lawn bowls and shooting and many other personal successes in the 11 sports that we were represented in.  As a hockey player and coach I would have loved to see our wee country compete in that sport.'

The Chief Executive of the Irish Hockey Association, Angus Kirkland, said the idea [had] been reviewed in the past and a team from Northern Ireland had been ineligible to be considered for entry as Northern Ireland is not an affiliated member of the FIH and therefore has no official world ranking.'

'The issue of Northern Ireland competing in the Commonwealth Games at hockey is with the Ulster Hockey Board and we await communication from them in this regard.'

This is an important development as it has been initiated by hockey players themselves.  These are Northern Ireland athletes and they should surely be able to participate in the Commonwealth Games as part of a Northern Ireland team.  However we were unable to enter a hockey team in the 2010 Delhi Games.  The next games in Glasgow are four years away and I hope that the Ulster Hockey Board will press forward on this matter with urgency.  The current situation is the result of the way that hockey is organised on an all-Ireland basis and it needs to be addressed.

We did well in Delhi but there were some sports in which we did not enter a team and if we had entered teams in those sports we might well have done even better.  The same situation applies in rugby.  When I travelled out to Delhi there was an English rugby team on the plane and rugby is a popular sport in Northern Ireland but we did not have a Northern Ireland team in the Games.