Easter Lily appeal in Belfast City Hall

BELFAST National Graves Association and the Belfast Executive of Sinn Féin launched the annual Easter Lily appeal in Belfast City Hall on Thursday 14 March.

This is the third year running that the annual Easter Lily appeal has been launched in City Hall and Councillor Jim McVeigh says this "marks the changing face of Belfast’s primary civic building".

Liam Shannon, Chairperson of the Belfast National Graves Association, was the main speaker.

In an example of the changing nature of politics in the North, Liam recounted how he had been arrested “close to City Hall in the 1960s for selling Lilies”.

As well as members of the National Graves Association, invited guests included Dessie Cassidy from north Belfast, a grand-nephew of Winifred Carney.

Winifred Carney played an important role alongside James Connolly in the Irish Citizen Army and it was particularly fitting that her relative should be present at the Lily launch in this centenary year of the founding of the Citizen Army.

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