Courage of Belfast Brigade ‘D’ Company Volunteers recalled

» Peadar Whelan

‘The resistance of the people of the area never faltered’

ADDRESSING a large crowd containing many family members of Volunteers from the IRA’s Belfast Brigade ‘D’ Company who died on active service, Sinn Féin MLA Pat Sheehan praised them as “one of the most effective IRA units” to have engaged the might of the British Army during the conflict.

Former H-Blocks Hunger Striker Pat Sheehan, the main speaker at the annual ‘D’ Company commemoration last Sunday against the backdrop of the area’s magnificent Garden of Remembrance which contains the names of those IRA Volunteers who made the ultimate sacrifice through the decades since partition in the fight for Irish freedom.

Among those remembered were five young men from the area – Jimmy Quigley, Daniel McAreavey, Patrick Maguire, John Donaghy and Joseph McKinney – who were killed in action during a two-week period from 29 September and 11 October 1972.

While Pat Sheehan focused on the guerrilla prowess of the IRA, he reminded us:

“The resistance of the people of the area during the pogroms of 1969, in breaking the British Army curfew in 1970, and then faced with internment and attack by loyalist death squads never faltered.”

Pat Sheehan’s address came at the end of a parade which took place through the streets of the area where the IRA battled with the British Army and its local surrogate forces.

Led by a republican colour party behind which a contingent of relatives of the area’s patriot dead carried portraits of their family members, the Éire Nua Republican Flute Band filled the warm afternoon air with republican resistance music.

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