Holy
Cross Girls’ Primary School, September 2001
Observations by Carol K. Russell,
Lawyers Alliance for Justice in Ireland
Ardoyne, North Belfast
In a picturesque valley between Crumlin and Oldpark Roads, lies the densely
settled triangle of land called Ardoyne, North Belfast. At its southern
edge is a large linen-weaving mill dating back to 1810. In this mill,
several generations of Ardoyne women have stood ankle deepin water for
ten-hours a day spinning wet linen threads. Other Ardoyne women guided
the shuttles of clanking industrial looms back and forth between the fine linen
threads. It was the skilled fingers of North Belfast women that
handcrafted the world-renowned Irish linen cloth. Today the mill houses a
range of community activities instead of looms but Ardoyne is still a
neighborhood of hard working Irish families.
Demographically, Ardoyne is nationalist, mostly republican, overwhelmingly
Catholic. In the most recent election, Sinn Fein received more than 70%
of the votes. During the thirty-odd years of the Troublesin Northern
Ireland, more than one-third of those killed in the armed struggle were
residents of this area of Belfast. Here today live the families of those
victims. Here today live surviving republican heroes of the 1981 blanket
protests and hunger strikes in the H-Blocks of Long Kesh Prison. Here
also lives a new generation of families whose children were born into the
relative peace of cease-fires, obeyed until recently by both loyalist and
republican paramilitaries.
Here and there at the edges of Ardoyne live Protestants with unionist or
loyalist points of view. Intermittent brick walls separate the two
communities but often there are no well-defined peace lines between Catholic
and Protestant housing estates. With or without peace lines, areas where
Catholics and Protestants live in close proximity are called interfaces or
flashpoints, meaning areas of potential conflict in Northern Ireland’s deeply
divided society.
Protestant/unionist/loyalist areas are clearly marked with red, white and blue
curbstones. Union Jacks and flags representing various loyalist
paramilitary organizations fly in profusion from every light post. Gabled
ends of estates are decorated with menacing murals depicting loyalist heroes,
their weapons and their victories over Catholics.
Catholic/nationalist/republican neighborhoods are usually denoted by
Irish tricolors. There are fewr eferences to the IRA. Murals
here would likely portray scenes from Irish history or symbols of Irish
culture. I was to learn that Catholic neighborhoods welcomed mixed
marriages and the children born of such unions. In Protestant
neighborhoods “half-breeds” are shunned or worse.
Holy Cross Girls’ Primary School
In the mid 1800s, Belfast’s population exploded as thousands poured into the
city to escape the hunger of rural Ireland. The Catholic Church bought
land in the countryside areas of Ardoyne to accommodate the inevitable growth
of Holy Cross Parish. Over time, several schools were built there
including Holy Cross Girls’ Primary School. A hostile sectarian struggle
for housing in North Belfast during the 1970s brought a series of demographic
shifts to the area and eventually an influx of Protestants who took control of
the Glenbryn neighborhood situated near this small school. Irish
President Mary McAleese, a young girl during this era, lived near a flashpoint
in Ardoyne until her family was forced out of their home by loyalist attackers
emptying their machine guns through the windows. President McAleese,
interviewed on 11/11/01 on Ulster TV, says of Ardoyne, “This has always been a
place where territory has been marked in ways that are so inhumanely indecent
and so awful. Much of the sectarian tensions that exist here are exactly
as it was when I lived there.”
Even though most Catholics had been likewise expelled from their homes in
Glenbryn, Holy Cross pupils and their parents walked for years in relative
peace along the sidewalks of the Protestant enclave. In fact, many of the
mothers escorting their daughters to school under protest in 2001 had safely
taken the same route to school when they were children. Not until June of
2001, when Glenbryn residents decided to block all Catholic passage along
Ardoyne Road, was there any reason for the Holy Cross pupils to fear their
daily walk to school.
Since 1969, Holy Cross School has occupied a tiny slip of land carved almost as
an afterthought out of a hillside behind the sprawling campus of St. Gabriel’s
Boys’ College facing Crumlin Road. Holy Cross School faces Ardoyne Road
and the Glenbryn housing estates. It also faces Wheatfield School, an
elementary school attended by Protestant children livingin the Glenbryn
estates. Until the fall of 2001, pupils at Holy Cross often joined those
at Wheatfield for special classes. I was shown drawings done by girls in
one of these combined classes. Both Catholic and Protestant children drew
happy, colorful pictures of the baby chickens brought to class by a guest
teacher. One Holy Cross seven-year-old admitted she missed a particular
friend from Wheatfield School.
There are about 220 girls enrolled at Holy Cross School ranging in age from
four to eleven. Academically the school is highly regarded. Even while
functioning under siege, the teachers with whom I met maintained both a
positive attitude and the discipline necessary to get in a bit of learning.
In spite of the daily harassment through which they must walk, the older
girls prepared for their eleven-plus exams in November 2001. These much-feared
exams determine which secondary school a girl will attend. All Holy Cross
girls wear the requisite navy blue skirts and red sweaters (called jumpers in
Belfast). As with their American counterparts they express feminine
individuality with fancy braids and hair ornaments.
With great pride, four-year-old Rachel took me on a tour of her school. I
admired her clay project, met her compassionate kindergarten teacher and
trekked upstairs to her older sister’s classroom. From a second-story
window, however, I was distracted by some disturbing graffiti painted on the
exterior of the school. Clearly visible were the letters KAT and UVF,
meaning “Kill all Taigs” and the paramilitary organization “Ulster Volunteer
Force.” To better photograph these caveats, we walked outside where I was
shocked to find many menacing messages painted on the school’s exterior walls.
KAT was repeated several times along with the identifying initials of loyalist
paramilitaries. Several given names, neatly lined up, were painted on the
macadam pavement. Were these the artists’ signatures—or their intended
targets? I recalled an incident in New Jersey where the desecration with
spray-painted swastikas of a Jewish temple brought forth condemnations from
both the authorities and the wider community for such abhorrent “hate crimes.”
Yet, in my ancestral homeland it seems accepted practice to express
publicly one’s intention to kill all Catholics.
Continuing my walk around the school, I discovered a badly blackened wall and
roof adjacent to a playground filled with little girls at recess.
Apparently, there had been a largefire there at one time. Rachel’s
mother dismissed the evidence as a juvenile pyromaniacal threat and assured me
that if loyalists had wanted to burn down the school, they would have done a
more thorough job. Evidently though, all the Queen’s horses and men
standing guard along the road in front of the school were not able to prevent
loyalists from gaining direct access to the building. As Rachel ran her
little fingers along the graffiti, it became clear that she herself might be
too easily accessible to whoever painted the malevolent “KAT.”
Loyalism in North Belfast
Adjacent to the
southern edge of Ardoyne is the Shankill neighborhood, named after a main
thoroughfare bisecting the grim, working-class community comprised almost
exclusively of Protestant loyalists. During the summer of 2000, a bitter
feud broke out between two pro-British paramilitary organizations, the Ulster
Defence Association (UDA) and the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) which has ties
to the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).
During this feud, senior UDA leader Johnny Adair, released from prison under
the Good Friday Agreement (GFA), was rearrested for engaging in violence and
thereby breaking the terms of his parole. Adair’s high-profile
participation had further inflamed the volatile feud. More about turf wars and
drug dealing franchises than political ideology, the civil unrest of this era
left more than 800 men, women and children homeless. The stories of this
feud have become legendary. We heard of an elderly woman having been put
out of her home by her own grandchildren.
Many of these loyalist Protestants, perhaps those most militant in their views,
were resettled into the Glenbryn housing estates along Ardoyne Road. Over
time, the neighborhood was redecorated with red, white and blue curbstones,
Union Jacks and loyalist paramilitary flags. Much of this was done just
ahead of the summer 2001 parade season.
In June, a loyalist youth installing flags on a light postwas threatened by an
angry Catholic man passing by in a car. Loyalists claimed that the driver
of the carrammed the ladder knocking the youth to the ground. This may
have been the trigger that caused the road to be blocked days later by scores
of loyalists as Holy Cross pupils walked to school.
When Catholic parents insisted that their children’s walkway to school be
opened, the RUC, attired in full riot gear, stood between the families and the
demonstrators. Angry loyalists turned against the RUC when it seemed as
though protection and advocacy were becoming weighted too heavily in favor of
the nationalists. British soldiers were called in to back up the RUC in
this operation.
Important to note about this first blockade was that the RUC and military
faced, for the most part, the young girls and their parents. In their
riot mode, Northern Ireland’s security forces face whichever direction they
expect trouble to come from. It has not gone unnoticed by this and other
observers that they nearly always face the Catholics. Confronted by a
solid black line of RUC with helmets, masked faces, batons and riot shields,
the pupils of Holy Cross School were effectively denied their rightful access
to education by the very civil authority paid to protect all citizens of
Northern Ireland. More effectively, the demonstrating loyalists had
their blockade of Ardoyne Road reinforced by that same authority.
Arguing that it would be impossible to guarantee their safety, the RUC turned
the children and their parents away from the Ardoyne Road entrance to their
school. One officer justified his inability to facilitate the Catholics’
safe passage to school by insisting that in reinforcing the loyalists’ blockade
they were keeping violence to a minimum.
At one point the demonstrators said they would allow the girls to walk only on
the left side of Ardoyne Road and only with women accompanying them—no
nationalist men. These edicts defied logic because Protestant homes line both
sides of Ardoyne Road and many Catholic men accompany their daughters to school
if mothers are at work, busy with other children or perhaps ill.
Moreover, given the menacing nature of the demonstration it would seem wise
that masculine hands be there to hold those of all the women walking to Holy
Cross School. In the face of increasing perils to the Holy Cross pupils,
PUP Councillor Billy Hutchinson and Gerry Kelly of Sinn Fein tried and failed
to resolve the standoff.
Newspapers worldwide carried photographs of little girls in red sweaters denied
access to their school. Comparisons were made with the situation in the southern
states in America during the 1960s when African-American children were vilified
for exercising their civil right to attend school in their own neighborhood.
In response to the blockade, RUC officers escorted the girlsto school along a
circuitous route back down Ardoyne Road, up Crumlin Road, through the grounds
and playing fields of St. Gabriel’s Boys’ College and into the back entrance of
Holy Cross School. The issue had not been resolved by the end of the 2000-01
schoolyear. Regrettably, many girls, frightenedby the demonstration,
stayed home and missed important end-of-term schooldays.
Evenings brought more violence and rioting in the North Belfast communities.
Cars were hijacked and set alight. Scores of police were injured by
blast, petrol and acid bombs. Police retaliated by firing plastic
bullets. A senior RUC officer warned the two communities that they must
now either, “ . . . live together or die together.”
Parade Season in Northern Ireland
For several summers, the Drumcree Parish Church in Portadown has been the
primary battlefield upon which the Protestants of the Orange Order defended
their right to march through captive Catholic neighborhoods. As well,
North Belfast has endured its share of seemingly intractable parading disputes
beginning every June and continuing for several weeks thereafter.
Formed in 1997, the Parades Commission for Northern Ireland has attempted to
address and negotiate issues regarding certain parades, especially those that
could lead to violent confrontations or undue restriction in Catholic
neighborhoods. The rights of loyal order lodges to exercise their
cultural traditions have been weighed by the Parades Commission against the
rights of nationalist residents to live free of the contentions and civil
disorder often accompanying these marches.
Clearly, loyal order parades celebrate Protestant military victories over
Catholics; they reinforce Protestant unionism in a society deeply divided over
political views about its increasingly tenuous alliance with Britain. One
must ask why then, if such parades are a ritualization of a specific faction of
Northern Ireland’s culture, must they be forced through neighborhoods with
differing, yet still widely upheld points of view?
During the summer of 2001, I and other international observers witnessed many
such parades in Portadown, West Belfast and Ardoyne. Most passed off
without incident, even the dreaded Drumcree parade which was restrained by a
steel barricade from proceeding along Garvaghy Road in Portadown. The
wisdom of the Parades Commission spared this mostly Catholic community from the
hideous violence that has for too many summers invaded its streets on the heels
of Orangemen in bowler hats and white gloves. Ardoyne, however, became
the scene of the worst rioting in more than twenty years in Northern Ireland.
On 12 July at 8:30 p.m., when the Ballysillan LOL No. 1891 marched through
Ardoyne, the community already had been hemmed in for hours by a massive
security operation. Hundreds of RUC and British soldiers equipped with
full riot gear, scores of armored vehicles, Alsatian dogs, water cannons, guns
loaded with live ammunition or plastic baton rounds were sent to facilitate a
twelve minute parade of inebriated bigots through a Catholic community that
could not even safely shepherd its youngest female children to school. My
first-hand account of the Ardoyne riot of 12 July 2001 may be found elsewhere
in the Lawyers Alliance report on Summer 2001 in Northern Ireland.
Sectarian Attacks in North Belfast
Along with the usual Protestant parades, Summer 2001 brought wave upon wave of
sectarian attacks on Catholic homes in North Belfast. Another observer
and I remained on-call in Ardoyne during the latter half of July to document
examples of this violence. On Alliance Avenue, a young family with four
children, including two girls enrolled at Holy Cross School, had their home
repeatedly bombed by loyalists. A vulnerable kitchen window, through
which the bombs had been hurled, faced a low wall separating their back yard
from the back yards of Protestants living along Glenbryn Park.
The pretty mother appeared very thin from the daily stress of her daughters’
being threatened on their way to school, her home being attacked and her own
mother’s battle with cancer. Still, she found time to share with us a
plea for prayers written by her son Marc. From his neatly printed letter
I quote:
“My name is Marc I am seven years old I have got one brother and two sisters.
My sisters are called Danielle and Rachel and my brother is called Kieran and
say a happy birthday to Kieran 12th of August. We live in Alliance Ave.
and we are getting pipe bombed and petrol bombed and shooting say a prayer.
Thank you.”
A few doors farther down on Alliance Ave., we photographed the backyard of a
frightened pensioner whose home had been stoned, not for the first time.
The yard reeked of the unmistakable odor of petrol. That fact alone
would logically have called for a thorough investigation. As the pensioner
sat trembling in her livingroom, we hovered around and waited for the RUC to
respond to her call for help.
After nearly 30 minutes, a neighbor called again. The dispatcher insisted
that officers had responded to the first call but had seen nobody around the
house. This seemed odd because we had arrived immediately on the scene
and had spent much time in the backyard taking photographs. From
the living room where the lady was sitting it would have been impossible not to
have seen the RUC pull up in front and walk to the back of the house.
There was no comforting the lady. She was certain whoever had
stoned her would be back to do worse. As with the young couple, she had
little faith in the RUC’s willingness to protect her.
Looking eastward, we could not help but notice the RUC barracks situated
strategically on a hilltop near Oldpark Rd. The considerable surveillance
towers around the barracks loomed like giant sentinels over Alliance Ave. and
indeed over the entire Ardoyne valley. Since so much serious physical and
psychological harm is done in Northern Ireland’s residential communities would
there not be some way this surveillance equipment could be used to find out who
has committed such attacks on innocents?
One warm evening in July we photographed a mess on a mostly nationalist street
in Duncairn Gardens. Several lovely brick homes had been paint bombed red,
white and blue by loyalist thugs who gained access to the street through a
steel gate in a nearby peace line. The gate was supposed to have
been locked by the RUC every day at 4:30 P.M. A few of the explosions of
paint had been aimed to smash through lace-curtained bay windows.
The residents, many of whom were pensioners, were frightened and understandably
angry that their neighborhood had been violated, especially since measures had
been taken to prevent this. One gentleman showed me a log he had been keeping
of the exact times during the past weeks that the gate in question had been
closed to intruders—especially those with a particular fancy for the colors
red, white and blue. The gate had never been secured at the time promised
by the RUC but in fact from ½ hour to 2 ½ hours later.
During these lapses of security, attacks on nationalist homes and residents had
been occurring nearly every day. On this particular day, the attacks were
followed by intense rioting. Rocks, bottles and petrol bombs were hurled
over the now-closed gate by youthful sectarians. One teenager from the
loyalist side repeatedly pelted the RUC, his nationalist neighbors and us with
stinging stones catapulted with impressive accuracy from a rooftop fortress.
Several people were injuredby this kid, including an elderly man cut
severely on his tender head.
Wading through broken glass, slippery puddles of paint and petrol, we
photographed the riot, the youth with the catapult and the badly damaged homes.
We were glad to see SDLPand Sinn Fein Councillors arrive on the scene to
support their traumatized constituents. In Northern Ireland sectarian
attacks unfortunately occur in both communities. However, recent
statistics compiled by thePat Finucane Centre indicate that the overwhelming
majority of such attacks are carried out against nationalists.
September 2001, The Beginning of a New School Year
At the request of community leaders, I arrived in Ardoyneat Holy Cross School
in early September. I was told that from the first day of school, crowds
of loyalists positioned themselves along Ardoyne Road holding placards advising
their Catholic neighbors to take the alternative route to school. The
demonstrators shouted at them, “whores,”“sluts,” “Fenian Bs,” “Who let the
Taigs out?” and other even more unspeakable insults.
Missiles, including rocks, bottles and paving stones were hurled at the
Catholic families as they walked to school with poise and dignity. There
were casualties, though. I spoke with two grandmothers who had been hit
with chunks of paving stones while holding their granddaughters’ hands.
In both cases,the injuries were sufficiently deep as to require several
stitches each in the ladies’ heads. A mother was scalded with hot tea
thrown at her by a loyalist. She was later arrested by the RUC and charged with
assault for defending herself with her brolly.
On the third day of school, a blast bomb was thrown by a loyalist youth into
the path of the girls. Four RUC officers were injured by the explosion.
A police dog went down as well. No children were physically harmed
but that was not yet known to the panicked Catholics running from the total
chaos on Ardoyne Road toward the safety of the school gates. Nobody knew
what was happening or if they were still in danger. One small child fell
down and tried to crawl under a land rover. News reports indicated that
the bomb had been intended for the RUC as they defended the Catholics from a
hail of rocks. Parents on the scene, however, disputed that theory and
concluded that if the RUC had been the target of the bomb, it could more easily
have been aimed at them when children were not in the road. The bomb was
tossed quite accurately from only a short distance directly into the path of
the little girls.
Another clue came from Mandy, a thirteen-year-old Glenbryn resident who, when
asked about the terrible bombing of her neighbors, replied, “Them Fenian Bs
should’ve all had their legs blownoff! Then they wouldn’t be walking up
this road!”
Shortly after the explosion, the loyalist Red Hand Defenders, a cover name used
by the UDA, claimed responsibility for this atrocious bombing of innocent
Catholic girls. On that day, PUP Councillor Billy Hutchinson stated
for the press, “I am totally ashamed to call myself a loyalist.” Hutchinson
would later recant this statement.
Documentation of the Demonstrations
For the first ten days of September, Ardoyne Road was a media circus.
Newspapers worldwide scrambled to get shots of frightened little girls as
they ran the daily gauntlet of sectarian hatred. Interestingly, very few
photos of the demonstrators appeared in print.
I was to learn why upon arriving on Ardoyne Road with my camera. Perhaps
because their actions are regarded as heinous and completely unacceptable to
the world outside the Glenbryn community, the demonstrators did not like being
immortalized in photographs. In this regard, the RUC supported their wishes
even to restraining the international media. Another observer was warned
by a BBC photographer, “Don’t point the camera at them [the demonstrators],
they don’t like it. We did it last week and it nearly caused a riot.”
The first few days, as I walked to school with the children and their parents,
I carried my camera openly and took quite a few excellent photos by scampering
along with the media. It was even possible to capture a few vignettes of
the brutish Glenbryn community until the RUC noticed and put one of its finest
on me. Unceasingly, a tall officer dogged me so closely that I could feel
his shield on my back. If I stopped for a second to snap a photo,
he pushed me with a huge leather-gloved hand and said, “Movealong.” If I
tried to sneak in a quick shot of the demonstrators, he would nudge me and
spoil the photo.
After 11September, the media disappeared. I became too visible with my
camera and the loyalists resented my involvement. A beefy loyalist
ordered my removal by yelling to the RUC, “Get that woman with the camera out
of here!” The RUC upheld his petition and thereafter, it seemed in the
childrens’ best interests if I kept a lower profile.
For many reasons, it was crucial that the Catholic families document what was
happening to them. The Holy Cross School situation is unprecedented in
Irish history in that childrens’ human rights have been spotlighted there as
never before.
The events unfolding at the little Catholic primary school in a forgotten
corner of an old mill town shocked even those of us well experienced with
Northern Ireland’s violent social clashes. At the very least, the
childrens’ plight deserved substantiation on film. As cameras cannot lie,
one cannot help but question the demonstrators’ fear of the truths told in
pictures taken from the perspective of the Holy Cross pupils. Yet they
themselves clicked away freely with video and still cameras. In fact,
there were video cameras installed in some Glenbryn residents’ second-story
windows, an excellent vantage point for filming little Catholic faces in the
Protestant-controlled street.
At one point, Polaroid photos were being taken of the Catholics and handed off
to a well-recognized reporter from the Shankhill Mirror. When this was
pointed out to the RUC, no action was taken. As well, RUC TV filmed the
scene every day with their vehicle-mounted cameras pointed at most times toward
the Catholics. Important to note hereis that any footage from RUC video
cameras is for official use only. Parents of the Holy Cross pupils were
forbidden to carry cameras as they walked with their children. One
community worker, not a parent and therefore not permitted to accompany the
children to school, attempted to film scenes from behind police barricades but
when she aimed her camera in the direction of the demonstration, she was
threatened with arrest by the RUC. An observer from Pennsylvania had her
camera lifted by the RUC her second day on the scene. Effectively, all
documentation of the situation from a neutral or nationalist perspective had
been repressed by the RUC.
Community Protection and Advocacy
Community leaders and elected officials were present on both sides from the
first days of the demonstration. Sinn Fein and SDLP representatives
appeared nearly every day at the intersection where parents and children
gathered for their walk to school. The politicians’ presence, while quite
important and comforting to the nationalist residents, was one of support and
advice. Understandably, politicians did not accompany the families on
their walk to school. Wisely, they avoided political implications of the
demonstration. On a regular basis they were briefed by parents and the
RUC.
A measure of physical and moral support for the parents was given by their
community’s stewards who for a few days walked to school peacefully and
unobtrusively with the tense parents and children. In fact, both communities
work closely with their respective stewards during times ofconflict.
Stewards from opposing Northern Ireland factions have been known to
cooperate on occasion to quell violence before it starts. At the Ardoyne school
demonstration, however, it was decided by the loyalists and enforced by the RUC
that only loyalist stewards would be allowed at the scene.
Walking up Ardoyne Road at schooltime, I noticed amongst the demonstrators
several loyalist stewards, most of whom were identifiable in luminescent yellow
vests. It must have been comforting to the Glenbryn women and children to
be supported in their demonstrations by so many big strong gentlemen.
However, the Catholic women and girls were denied any additional masculine
protection from their own community even as they walked terrified through solid
walls of hostility. Catholic fathers, for the moment still admitted
through the police barricade with their wives and daughters, wondered if the
loyalists would succeed in their repeated attempts to ban all nationalist men
from Ardoyne Road.
Groups of observers from West Belfast brought outside eyes to the increasingly
perilous situation. When I first arrived in Ardoyne there were several of
these well-trained observers wearing dark blue vests. They walked to
school alongside the Catholics and took careful note of all that was going on.
They at first carried cameras but were stopped by the RUC. Worse,
the RUC, admittedly in response to the loyalists’ wishes, gradually reduced the
number of West Belfast observers allowed to accompany the Catholics, then
forbid them entirely.
As an American observer, I was permitted to accompany the Catholics for several
days until I was stopped on 17 September by Sgt. Kevin Barry Burns, RUC, OIC.
He took my personal details, refused to give me his, then explained to me
that “these people,” pointing toward the loyalists, were concerned about people
“marching up the road” who were not parents of children or members of the
legitimate press corps. He went on to tell me that he himself was Catholic and
his wife taught at a Catholic school.
Nevertheless, the situation here could not be allowed to become like Drumcree
where anybody who wanted to “march” can just join in. “These
people” wanted nobody in the road except children and their parents. Sgt.
Burns then went on to tell me that his job was to “get this march peacefully up
the road.” Interesting to note, he used the word march three times during
the course of our conversation while a woman from North Belfast stood beside me
in shock at his comparison of little children going innocently to school with
the Orange Order’s march at Drumcree.
Policing a Demonstration
The four-block demonstration against the Holy Cross pupils originated at the
southern end of Ardoyne Road where it intersects with Alliance Ave.
During the times children would not be walking to school, Ardoyne Road is
open to vehicle and foot traffic but with heavy RUC and military presence in
the area. Ardoyne Road is barricaded with armored vehicles before and
after school and during the time that the youngest girls are collected after
their shortened school day. There are two metal doors on this barricade
both of which were opened during the first days of the demonstration allowing
the Catholic parentsand children to pass through.
This opening provided a space wide enough for several people to pass through at
once. The Catholic parents and children felt most secure if they could
walk to school in a group while keeping the smallest children protected with
adults on either side. However, after several days it was decided by the
loyalists and enforced by the RUC to open only one metal door of the barricade.
This smaller opening permitted the entrance of only a single child and
parent to pass through at one time, thus giving the loyalists a better
opportunity to see who was coming up the road and to photograph them more
easily. It also served to elongate the group and to isolate certain parents and
children making them feel more insecure and open to threats.
Parish priest Father Aiden Troy and many of the parents tried to convince the
RUC to open both metal doors for the safety and security of the children but it
became a battle because the loyalists wanted it otherwise and, by this time, it
had become obvious that the RUC frequently took direction from the
demonstrators.
Sgt. Burns said, as I have heard so many times in the past, “We are doing this
to prevent further violence.” The issue was eventually resolved and both doors
were opened. Policing of the demonstration proved to be one of my more
disturbing observations. There seemed to be an enormous amount of
personnel, vehicles, weapons and technology, yet the children themselves were
widely open to an increasingly hideous repertoire of verbal, physical and
emotional abuse from their loyalist neighbors.
Often there was only a shoulder’s width between the loyalists and the
Catholics. More than once I saw flag-waving groups of loyalists actually in the
street just as the Catholic families passed through the barricade.
Moreover, demonstrators were able to get close enough to spit on the
children and even wipe spit from their hands onto little cheeks passing by.
This close, agressive contact upset the girls and made them wonder what
they had done to make their Protestant neighbors hate them so much.
One Holy Cross pupil insisted that she did not hate the Protestants and did not
understand why they hated her. Land Rovers parked along the walkway were
intended to separate the demonstrators from the children but I watched
loyalists scoot on their bellies across the hoods of these vehicles to get
close enough to touch the children. Words too disgusting for this American
observer to repeat reached very young ears that should still be in a blissful
state of innocence about such matters. Deafening sounds from whistles and
horns assaulted those same little ears and caused worry about the possibility
of other sounds—perhaps those of gunfire or bombs—being masked bythe noise.
Firecrackers startled all passing by and made even the most experienced
amongst us think of gunfire. Posters bearing pornographic images
that no child should be subjected to were held in front of young faces not able
to view them with anything more than fear.
It seemed the little Catholic girls were twice intimidated. First by the
loyalist demonstrators chanting “Scum, Scum, Scum” directly in their faces,
then by the heavily armed and menacing-looking security forces which, by reputation,
culture, actions and appearance were not exactly on their side. Even on 1
November 2001, when the RUC became PSNI [Police Service of Northern Ireland],
the mostly cosmetic “softening” of their image related them more to the
demonstrating side of the Ardoyne community than to the side being demonstrated
against. Many Catholic parents were startled to see florescent yellow
vests issued to the PSNI that were quite similar to those worn by loyalist
demonstrators.
A Partial List of Abuses of the Pupils of Holy Cross Girls’ Primary School
A blast bomb packed with shrapnel was hurled at the children. On
another school day, as the children walked by, a second blast bomb exploded in
the garden of a Catholic home on Alliance Ave. injuring an occupant.
Demonstrators threw bottles, bricks, fireworks and balloons filled
with urine or dog excrement at the children.
When urine rained down over the Catholics walking to school, many parents
assumed it was petrol and that they would all go up in flames. One cannot
imagine the fears these innocent people faced on a daily basis. The
children were spat upon and when demonstrators could get close enough, they
would spit on their hands and wipe it on a child’s cheek. Demonstrators
blew whistles and horns and even sounded their car horns to make deafening
noises as the children passed. The verbal abuse was mostly unmentionable.
The girls were called every sectarian slur imaginable. They were
reminded daily that there were “ . . . four Fenian schools in our
neighborhood.” They were referred to as “Wee Whores.” When it was
feared by the demonstrators that this word might not be understood by the
little girls, the graphic actions of whores were held up on placards for all to
see. Their attending priests were repeatedly insulted by being referred
to as their probable “real fathers.”
Demonstrators donned masks to further frighten the children. Masks in the
loyalist crowd included devils, the Queen, George Bush, Ian Paisley, and even
loyalist killer Johnny Adair. A young mother I interviewed described a
loyalist woman who ran into the street and attacked her physically. She
is convinced that if the RUC had not pulled the woman off she would not be
alive to tell me this story. Other mothers told me of death threats they
had received signed by loyalist paramilitary groups.
Demonstrators jeered and laughed at a child who tripped and fell while walking
to school. One loyalist shouted, “You can’t even walk you stupid Fenian
bastards.” In response to the anniversary of the 1993 bombing of the
Shankhill fish shop, the Red Hand Defenders threatened [through the media] to
“take military action” against children and parents walking to Holy Cross
School on 23 October.
Many of the children have been identified by their physicians as in emotional
distress and are taking medication to calm theirnerves. Eleven children
have been withdrawn from Holy Cross School. Glenbryn residents interviewed for
news articles during the weeks of the demonstration stated repeatedly that
their actions were not against the Catholic children. I found this
impossible to believe. Every day I witnessed unconscionable abuses of
little girls going to school. For twelve weeks it was these little girls
going to school who bore the brunt of a demonstration which was not by any
means peaceful nor was it within the terms of international treaties intended
to protect children of all races and religions from sectarian abuse and
harassment.
Abuses of the loyalists’ children
Much of the world outside Ardoyne is not aware that loyalist children
participated fully in the demonstrations against the Catholic children.
It was quite disturbing to witness young children dressed neatly in
school uniforms mimicking the actions of their parents waving flags, blowing
horns, hurling missiles and yelling vile words of abuse at their Catholic
neighbors. These impressionable Protestant children also have been
victimized.
The Alternative Route
The alternative route to Holy Cross School suggested by both the RUC and the
Glenbryn residents has never been an acceptable option. Walking down
Ardoyne Road to Crumlin Road would add several miles each week to some very
small legs; it involves passing the back edge of the same Protestant
neighborhood in which many of the demonstrators live; it requires a
circuitous walk through the large active campus of a boys’college—not the best
thing for self-conscious pre-adolescent girls; it requires the scaling of a
steep hillside—not an attractive proposition for mothers pushing prams with
younger siblings on the walk to school; it requires walking across an often
muddy football pitch. What if there is a game in progress? Most
important, the alternative route would mean the girls’ accepting a lowered
status in their own community. One parent writes, “I don’t want to take
my child through any back entrance. What sort of message does that send
her? That she’s a second-class citizen and that just sows the seeds for
future conflict. We feel we’re treated as second class citizens in this
area anyway. I mean, what right has anyone to say: ‘You can’t bring your
child this way to school.’”
On the afternoon of 24 October, loyalists blocked asection of Crumlin Road
stopping traffic and entrapping children for hours in Mercy Primary School, Our
Lady of Mercy Girls’ Secondary School and St. Gabriel’s Secondary School.
Apparently the alternative route could be blocked at the whim of the
demonstrators affecting the other three “. . .Fenian schools in our
neighborhood.”
Ardoyne, North Belfast 11 September 2001
Prior to 11 September, Ardoyne, North Belfast was command central for a front
page news story of international interest. Media trucks and reporters
took over Ardoyne Road and the lives of many of its residents. We had
become accustomed to reporters pushing each other out of the way to capture any
scrap of breaking news about the ugly demonstration at Holy Cross School.
I was to learn that the media also afforded a perverse measure of
protection for the Holy Cross pupils and their parents.
When the media disappeared on 11 September to cover the attacks on New York and
Washington, Catholic parents expressed great fear that now, without the eyes of
the world keeping close watch, the loyalists might use even greater physical
force to assert their demonstration along Ardoyne Road. I found it
interesting that Catholics in Ardoyne regarded unarmed photographers and
reporters as greater protection and advocacy than the RUC and British Army.
One mother said to me that without the media, “ . . . they [the
loyalists] can now do whatever they want to us.”
Near the close of the school day on 11 September, I was gently steered into a
home on Ardoyne Road to be shown what I thought to be a bad horror film of
first one then another airplane crashing into the twin towers of the World
Trade Center. This was the reason for the intersection of Ardoyne Road
and Alliance Avenue suddenly becoming eerily empty and quiet.
For the rest of that day, parents attempted to interpret for their daughters
the horrible images repeated endlessly on the television. Unspoken by any
of the adults was our cold, numbing apprehension of what might possibly happen
next. A cup of hot Irish tea was pressed into my shaking hands. Telephones
were offered that I might call my family. Computers were offered that I
might contact New York by E-mail. At once, the little girls I had come to
Belfast to support switched roles and responded to my anguish with remarkable
compassion and many sweet hugs. I was truly blessed to have been in
Ardoyne, North Belfast during this unprecedented American tragedy.
On the morning of 12 September, the Catholic families gathered at the police
barricade and prayed with me for the victims of the terrorist attacks in America.
We had all assumed that on this sorrowful day the loyalists would at the
very least, suspend their demonstration if not cancel it out of respect for the
many dead Americans. Would this not have been the perfect opportunity for
these badly-led bullies to walk with dignity out of the increasingly
uncomfortable corner they had backed themselves into?
On the contrary, the demonstrators were out in full force—this time noisily
celebrating the deaths of my countrymen as I walked past. There were shouts
that now the United States would “ . . . take care of the IRA.” Most
difficult for me to hear were the expressions of glee over the “ . . . cremated
Irish-American cops and firefighters who would not be sending any more money
over here to yez Fenian Bs.”
Later that week, the demonstration at Holy Cross School was suspended briefly
in coordination with a memorial service at Belfast City Hall. I flew home
in late September entrusted with candles, cards and messages of condolences
from Catholic families in Ardoyne, North Belfast. I carried these
offerings and these powerful images of Ardoyne to a memorial in New York City
befittingly enriched by the sounds of an Irish harpist.
The End of the Demonstration
On 23 November 2001, the demonstration against the pupils of Holy Cross Girls’
Primary School was suspended, not because it had been a reign of terror against
innocent children nor because the international community criticized it as a
blatant abuse of civil and human rights nor because it was vicious and
ill-advised, but because the Glenbryn residents received at that time a promise
from the government that certain amenities for their community would be funded.
These amenities included: a roundabout at Holy Cross School making it possible
for parents to drop off their children at the front door rather than at the
Ardoyne Road gate near the Protestant Glenbryn neighborhood, speed bumps along
ArdoyneRoad, CCTV along Ardoyne Road, regeneration of the Alliance Avenue
intersection, upgrades of housing and recreational facilities, development of a
community action project in north Belfast, a dedicated 24-hour community
policing unit and the setting up of a Joint Community Forum for community
dialogue.
Quotations on the Demonstrations at Holy Cross Girls’Primary School
Mary Banotti, Fine Gael MEP: “I feel I will have to inform the European
Parliament about what is really happening here [at Holy CrossSchool] because no
other event in Northern Ireland has caused so much concern. I have been
approached by so many people looking to find out how something as frightful as
this can actually be happening within the European Union.
”Angie Boyle, Holy Cross parent: “This is part of a wider campaign. This isn’t
about school children. It is focusing here now, but once it has run its course
it will just move on somewhere else and someone else’s children will be in the
front line.”
Quentin Davies, MP Conservative Party, Shadow Northern Secretary: “Anybody who
targets children puts themselves beyond the pale of civilised behavior.”
Professor Brice Dickson, Chair of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission
after declining to walk up the road with the children: “A peaceful protest like
that is not harming anybody.” Later Professor Dickson would say to the press,
“The [Human Rights] commission doesn’t envisage that the Bill of Rights is
going to change our society overnight or even at all. “It isn’t going to
make what happened in Ardoyne not happen. It’s not going to make people love
one another. It’s going to give people extra rights if they are terrorised or
discriminated against.”
Nigel Dodds, DUP, North Belfast MP: “The long-running protest should act as a
warning to the Government of what can happen if community problems are allowed
to fester.”
Harold Good, President, The Methodist Church in Ireland: “May I reassure you
that I and my colleagues have been loud and clear in our condemnation of the
protest. The record is there within our papers for all to see - plus live and
recorded interviews on radio and television - on the Ardoyne Road and in the
studios. As a minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, I am beholden to no
man or woman or any political party or ideology! So please do not assume
I/we have been either silent or inactive! However, I do have to say that
we are also deeply concerned about the way in which children are being used as
well as abused. It is now widely acknowledged that there are many forces
at work in this situation, by all sorts of people. Ultimately, whatever
we or others may or may not do, the solution lies with the protestors and with
the parents and those who are advising them. We hope and pray that this
will be sooner rather than later.”
Billy Hutchinson, Councillor PUP, quoted on the day the first blast bomb
exploded: “I’m ashamed today to say that I’m a loyalist. I’m totally
ashamed.” Later Hutchinson would tell the press, “After the blast I said
I was ashamed to be a loyalist. But at the end of the day I am a political
representative and have to defend the human rights of the residents. I have to
ensure they have representation. We can’t walk away from this. We need a
structured process. I cannot leave it until it is finished.”
Jane Kennedy, Minister of State: “The British Government condemns the appalling
scenes witnessed during the course of the Holy Cross dispute. There is no
justification for preventing young children and infants from attending school.
These children are the victims of the inability of adults from both communities
in Northern Ireland to live together in peace.
”Brendan Mailey, spokesperson for the Holy Cross parents’ group: “We would like
John Hume, David Trimble and Ian Paisley to come and talk to the parents so we
can put across our message of what’s happening here. We would also like
the four church leaders to walk up this road to show support for children and
to tell the people who have tried to kill parents and children that that’s not
the thing to do. It just alienates the Protestant people further in the
eyes of the world. We want to have dialogue, it’s the only way to resolve
this issue.”
Mary McAleese, President of Ireland: “The children have done nothing to incur
the protest, they own nothing that can provide an answer.”
David Trimble, First Minister: “People passing and re-passing along a major
route should be unquestioned, especially if they are children. But not
just for children, for others as well. There is a right to freedom of
movement.”
Fr. Aiden Troy, Pastor of Holy Cross Parish: “Afghanistan is the only other country
in the world where girls are stopped from being educated.”
Carol K. Russell