Somme Commemoration SpeechMonkstown 25th June 2000
Billy Mitchell�We have assembled here this morning to commemorate the courage and the sacrifice of those who served with the� 36th (Ulster) Division during the Great War. The bulk of that Division was made up of volunteers who responded to Edward Carson�s call for loyalists to provide a vehicle for armed resistance to the inclusion of Ulster within an independent Irish state.�Before the Home Rule issue could be settled, war was declared in Europe, and some 80,000 members of the Ulster Volunteer Force responded to Carson�s call to make themselves available for service in Kitchener�s army. Kitchener had hoped that Ulster could provide him with a Brigade of soldiers. The response was so great that Ulster provided him with a full division of loyal volunteers.�Formed and trained to fight a domestic foe, the 36th (Ulster) Division was tried and tested on the bloody battlefields of France and Belgium. The names of those places where Ulster Volunteers displayed their courage and made their sacrifices are familiar to all of us �Thiepval Wood, Passchendaele, Messines Ridge, St. Quentin, Cambria, Ypres. Those of us who served in Long Kesh will remember that we named our huts after many of the battle sites where the 36th (Ulster) Division engaged the enemy.�The courage and the tenacity of the Ulster Division became a legend within the British Army. But the sacrifice was great and the price paid in terms of human life was terrible. On the 1st July 1916, at the Somme, some 5,500 Officers and Volunteers gave their lives in the service of their country. That was the sacrifice made on one day alone.�The Rev. John Lyle Donaghy later commented that on �the 1st July 1916 the Ulster Volunteer Force made for themselves a name that would never die� and Colonel John Buchan wrote �that nothing finer was done in the war. Those splendid troops drawn from those Volunteers who had banded themselves together for another cause now shed their blood like water for the liberty of the world�.�We stand here this morning, not to celebrate war or the spoils of war, but to cherish the memory of those who served their country with honour and distinction and who displayed bravery above and beyond the call of duty.�The maintenance of Ulster as an integral part of the United Kingdom was purchased with the blood of our forbears. As Prime Minister Herbert Asquith was forced to admit after the war � the UVF�s patriotic spirit made the coercion of Ulster unthinkable�.�The Ulster Volunteer Force was a political army. Its objective was to maintain and defend our cherished British citizenship. Its leadership took political analysis from Carson, Craig and other Unionist leaders. Together, the Volunteers and the Political Leaders secured victory. Today we face the same enemy with the same strategic plan � a coalition of Military Potential and Political Activism. The Volunteers and the Political Activists must stand united in a common purpose.�To return to the 36th (Ulster) Division - The purchase price for your British citizenship and my British citizenship was the broken bodies and the life blood our those who served with the Ulster Volunteer Force. If there was no other reason for me remaining a loyalist, this one reason would be sufficient for me.�My British citizenship is precious to me because it was bought at such a great price � the price of human blood � the blood of my kith and kin. I will never surrender that citizenship and I trust that you will not either.�God Save the Queen
(Note to readers: In commemorating the courage and sacrifice of the 36th (Ulster) Division, we in no way forget or neglect to acknowledge the courage and sacrifice of the other Irish Divisions (!0th and 16th) which served King and Country during the Great War.�The people of the Irish Republic appear to have suffered a severe bout of national amnesia when it comes to honouring those from the 26 secessionist counties who served in the Great War. Thankfully, in recent years there has been some movement within the secessionist� counties to address this situation.