Somme Commemoration Speech
Monkstown
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.
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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.