Andersonstown 1916 Easter Rising Commemoration sets high standard

THERE WAS A BRILLIANT TURNOUT at the 1st Battalion Memorial Garden in Andersonstown's South Link on Saturday 26 March for this year's Centenary Commemoration of the 1916 Easter Rising organised by Uachtar na bhFal Commemoration Committee.

The main speaker was former Hunger Striker Pat Sheehan MLA and in a speech, delivered with the experience of more than 50 days on hunger strike, he praised the courage, commitment and vision of the 1916 leaders and the Volunteers who fought during Easter Week “fearlessly taking on the might of an brutal empire and turning the tide of history against Britain”.

The event was chaired by another former POW, Rosie McCorley, who along with Pat has been selected by Sinn Féin to contest this May's Assembly elections which coincidentally occur on the 35th anniversary of Bobby Sands's death in the H-Blocks of Long Kesh.

The colour party, guard of honour and the recreation of an IRA Flying Column in period dress added pageantry and drama to a commemoration that was poignant and a fitting honour to our patriot dead from the area.

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