Rain greeted us on waking and dogged
us all day; however we persevered with our plans for the day. If one were to
let a little rain stop activities here in the British Isles, life here would
grind to a standstill.
Our route took us north to Strabane on
familiar roads, then continuing on up the A5 to Derry (aka Londonderry), the
fourth largest city in the island of Ireland, and second here in Northern
Ireland. How one identifies the name of this city is a super-political matter.
When Helena and her daughter were here last night, they had been curious as to
why we spoke of it thus. In our guides, the longer version is given, and it is
also the version our Tomtom is familiar with. However since learning the genesis
of the name, we have decided to adopt the shorter and original version
ourselves.
Plantation, or colonisation, by
planting one’s own people in a foreign land, was initially carried out during Henry
VIII’s reign, then again after Elizabeth I’s attempt to wipe out all Irish
opposition to British rule, mainly driven by the fear that British enemies,
namely the Spanish, would use Ireland as the back door to attack. But it was
not until Elizabeth’s successor, James I granted the Irish Society, made up
principally by London guilds, its charter in March 1613, that the city of
Londonderry was formally established.
Needless to say this act and the whole affair of plantation by the Scottish and
English is not well celebrated by the majority of the city’s occupants, most of
whom have very long memories; “Derry” is the happier appellation.
Apart from its fascinating history,
stretching back to that time and through to just yesterday in historical terms
and the fact that the city is situated on the banks of the River Foyle, at the
base of the Lough of the same name, it is the wonderful city walls that are the
star of the city, attracting tourists from afar and providing a wonderful
traffic free walking zone.
We parked in the Foyle Shopping
multi-story car park which meant we were not tied to any particular return
time, simply settling our fee on our return. Apart from a rather frustrating
long winded search for the Information Centre which is not situated at the
point marked on all the tourist maps about the town, mainly because
bureaucratic bungling has delayed the relocation, we spent our day walking the
one mile long mediaeval walls with little side detours to see selected
attractions.
The walls were built in the time of
James I’s plantation plans, begun in 1613 and completed in 1619 at a cost of £11,700,
about one third of the Plantation’s entire budget. They are very wide, but this
is because they are based on an earth foundation, reinforced with stone walls,
ramparts, bulwarks, bastions and parapets, often as high as two story buildings
and sometimes low enough to step out onto the street.
We visited the Guildhall, but found
the hall itself closed for a private function. Much later in the day we saw
what this was; the celebration of a lesbian wedding, always best celebrated in
a secular spot than testing the waters of a religious establishment.
The Guildhall was constructed by The
Honourable The Irish Society and named in honour of the city’s connection to
the City of London and its guilds, and opened in 1890 as the administrative centre
for Londonderry Corporation, but today is the seat of Derry City & Strabane
District Council. It is the only
surviving guildhall still in civic use in Ireland.
Fire destroyed the building in 1908
but the neo-gothic replacement was completed in 1912, only to be devastated by
bomb attacks in 1972.
Inside we were greeted warmly and
after receiving apologies for the closed hall, shown into a wonderful little
museum exhibition all about the Ulster Plantation, which is so very well done.
Here we learned so much more about the
Plantation, history we thought we understood but it is such a big subject, so
very complex; we are but fleeting visitors and will never really understand the
stain it has left on those who call Ulster, or indeed, Ireland in its entirety,
home.
We learned that in the 1550s, areas in
the south and west of Ireland were “planted” with English settlers, with
carrying degrees of success in the hope of establishing colonies in an attempt
to tame what was considered Ireland’s most unruly province. In terms of its
scale at least, the Plantation of Munster, begun in the 1580s, provided a
precedent.
While there were further private and
small scale attempts at plantation in Ulster, with carrying degrees of success,
in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, the Flight of
the Earls in 1607 cleared the way for an official, wholesale and altogether
more ambitious scheme.
We learned about the “Test Act” of
1704, which excluded Catholics and Presbyterians from holding office in
Ireland. Many emigrated from Derry Port to North America in the following
years.
James I believed that the imposition
of the Anglican religion would have a civilising effect on Ulster. Although the
Church of Ireland had been established in 1536, it had not been active in the
north of the country. James promptly appointed the first bishops to the Ulster
dioceses and efforts were made to persuade native priests to embrace
Anglicanism.
From a “god’s eye view” one can see
that the whole Irish situation has always had a political base, but at ground
level it has become solely a religious matter, and here in Londonderry, with
the political gerrymandering that has gone on in the last century, when the
Irish Catholics have outnumbered the Ulster Protestants two to one, but had no
control of their own welfare, it is so understandable that matters have come to
a head from time to time over the years in the most violent manner.
From the top of the wall we looked
down upon the Bogside area of Derry, that outside the walls where the “natives”
were obliged to live, and over the centuries, a cultural “ghetto” (my words)
has grown. It was here in the late 1960s and the 1970s that the incidents which
sparked the Troubles began, the unjustified killing of innocent civilians by
the British forces, and before that by the constabulary. Today there are dozens
of murals painted on the end of buildings which memorialise those times, a
memorial to remember those who lost their lives on Bloody Sunday and a wonderful
little museum, The Free Museum of Derry, where one can hear the other side of
the story.
Many will suggest one should take a
taxi tour or a bus tour, expressing a reluctance to enter the Bogside
themselves, but life has moved on and there is no reason why one cannot wander
about here anymore than any other part of the city. But the mere fact that
these murals continue to grace the walls of homes, and that posters, of recent
creation, spell out the frustrations and anger of politically motivated folk
today, shows that this whole business has not gone away and that it will not
anytime soon.
This is probably not helped by the
high wire fences seen about and the three armoured Police landrovers we saw on
the road south of Derry today.
The murals are not great works of art
although one can always question when is art, art. Here are portraits of
Bernadette Devlin who even I can remember appearing on the television news with
megaphone in hand, young Annette McGavigan who at a mere 14 years of age was
caught in the cross fire between the British and the IRA, a British soldier
smashing down doors of civilians, another with the bullet holes still visible and
so much more.
From here we walked on down through
the Bogside, back down into the town where Chris had his hair cut at the
Turkish Barbers, by a young resident of that same Bogside, who spoke with so
much hope about the future. Perhaps there is a future for Ulster if the likes
of Helena’s daughter, Anna-Mae, and this young barber can let the past go and
move on in a really fresh way.
Back on the wall, we checked out the
Church of Ireland’s St Columbs Cathedral, built in 1633 and (wom)anned with
good Christian ladies with their hands out for donations. We decided a quick
peak in the door was sufficient and retreated to the walls, all this while in
the rain, sometimes miserably heavy and sometimes just tedious drizzle.
Down at the river, we checked out the
Peace Bridge, a graceful arch across the Foyle, opened in 2011, the design
representing the symbolic handshake between the city’s east and west banks. It
is quite lovely, and even more so because it is only for foot or cycle traffic.
Back in the car park, we wandered
about for some time, not able to find our car, despite the fact I had taken a
photo of the “address”. Eventually the custodian on a pope-mobile style vehicle
helped us and we headed home without further ado, pausing at Strabane for
groceries, rain still falling and the temperatures as low as we have suffered
for some weeks.
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