BUNCRANA WEEPS - BUT JOY WILL RETURN
Buncrana weeps but joy will return
A WEEK ago this morning Buncrana was a happy holiday resort praying for an Indian Summer of sunshine and laughter. In its Market Square this afternoon, the residents will gather instead to remember those who died in Omagh last Saturday and to pray for the survivors and for peace.
IAN STARRETT, the News Letter's Londonderry correspondent, examines what lies ahead for the North West seaside town after today's service
BUNCRANA will bounce back but it will never forget. When the dark Satanic cloud that has overshadowed the seaside resort since Oran Doherty, Sean McLaughlin and James Barker had their innocent young lives shredded by the evil bomb on the streets of Omagh last weekend finally lifts Buncrana will one day learn to smile again.
Though it's hard to believe on this poignant Saturday and while every day there for ever the three schoolboys and the two Spanish friends who died with them will be remembered, Buncrana will once again echo to the joyful sounds of a seaside resort.
The cheery buzz of flirtatious excitement as boy chats up girl and vice versa, of traditional music lilting from the quaint flower-bedecked pubs will restore the lazy, hazy summer-time days when the only screams of children will be from those on the white-knuckle fun-fair rides.
There will also be solitude for those who cherish their peace, on the breathtakingly scenic shores of Lough Swilly, among the gentle breezes on the endless beaches and up hills and down dales, with their patchwork quilt of corn, maze and grazing fields.
For Buncrana's strength lies in its families, those in the close-knit local community and those who holiday and day-trip there in their thousands.
They include even the famous. Scots comedian Billy Connolly holidays at Phil Coulter's home there and the zany funnyman affectionately tells the true story of the night he and Phil felt like fish and chip suppers at 4am and the local chippie happily opened up to feed them.
Then there was the week when Oasis superstar Liam Gallagher and film star wife Patsy Kensitt dropped by for a holiday, away from London's celebrity spotlight.
It is with local families though that Buncrana holds particular affection, especially for those of us raised in Londonderry. It's a tradition dating back to the halcyon days of the red and cream carriages of the Lough Swilly Railway Company when city families made day trips or holiday visits to Buncrana.
It's a tempting haven on a hot summer's day. Londonderry families galore down the passage of time will be familiar with the pattern and for my generation the relaxing routine was pretty much the same.
Many are the bonds between Londonderry and Buncrana for thousands of people and it is ties like these that will bind this fractured resort together in its darkest hours and enable the still gaping wounds to heal in God's own good time.
That generations-old family bond in Buncrana has extended to embrace Spanish visitors who come there every year to learn English. They have come, for the last decade, from places like Madrid and Barcelona, and left with rosy memories and friendships made to last a lifetime. This week two of them - Fernando Blasco, 12, Baselga and Rocio Abad Ramos, 23 - went home in coffins.
Yet remarkably, courageously even, the Spanish have pledged to return, so infectiously comforting have they found the deep glowing warmth of Buncrana's people, Eire's people, Ulster's people. They too turned out at the triple funeral of Oran, Sean and James in Buncrana.
I saw at that Requiem Mass in St Mary's Church, at Cockhill just past Tullyarvon Mill, some glimmer of hope at last for this bloody land.
David Trimble and Gerry Adams sitting feet from each other in a Roman Catholic church, the Ulster Unionist First Minister receiving a burst of loud and long applause from within and outside the church when he was specially welcomed and wished "a fair wind" from the altar by Derry Bishop Seamus Hegarty, was in itself a sight to ponder its potential significance for us all.
Poles apart politically, Mr Trimble and Mr Adams were united in grief for three children just like the ones probably pictured in little oval and square-shaped frames on your mantle-piece right now.
I studied too the face of Martin McGuinness, the Sinn Fein Mid Ulster MP and chief negotiator. His still boyish face suddenly looked middle-aged.
He, like so many of us, looked shaken by the nauseating enormity of what had been done to three schoolboys and 25 others in pursuit of a 32-county Ireland.
So many rampant emotions, I know, were racing about Mr McGuinness's head. He said: "For me, this is a very poignant situation in Buncrana. I spent many of my summer holidays here in this town. My mother comes from here."
St Mary's Church was actually where his mother and father were married, his own wedding took place there, and his father is buried in the graveyard where the three boys were laid to rest. "So I understand absolutely how deep this runs in the community," he said.
As we all shuffled silently up the steep hill towards the little church, the piercing wails of deeply distraught children drowning out the summer sounds of birds singing in the surrounding countryside, I wondered if he would go home afterwards to his own family, deep in the Bogside, and re-pledge his efforts to work for peace. I think he probably did.
Mr McGuinness, a politician with a shrewd knowledge of Irish history, knows that exactly 200 years ago next month at Buncrana, Wolfe Tone was brought ashore before being taken on for execution elsewhere.
In more recent history, Lough Swilly, the myth-steeped Lake of Shadows, was a safe haven for allied ships in wartime before embarking on forays or crossings of the Nazi-patrolled North Atlantic.
Once again history has left its mark on this place of outstanding natural beauty where the legacy once again, in Market Square, at 3-10 this afternoon, will be one of tears and yet more anguish.
If Buncrana, with Omagh, finished forever the list that includes Warrenpoint, Ballykelly, Greysteel, Belfast, Loughinisland, Enniskillen and so many more place names then it would, as James Barker's father Victor suggested, provide some consolation.
Then perhaps too Buncrana will begin to soothe its grief, calm its heartache, and again enhance its place in the childhood memories for future, peace-enjoying generations throughout the century to come.
A WEEK ago this morning Buncrana was a happy holiday resort praying for an Indian Summer of sunshine and laughter. In its Market Square this afternoon, the residents will gather instead to remember those who died in Omagh last Saturday and to pray for the survivors and for peace.
IAN STARRETT, the News Letter's Londonderry correspondent, examines what lies ahead for the North West seaside town after today's service
BUNCRANA will bounce back but it will never forget. When the dark Satanic cloud that has overshadowed the seaside resort since Oran Doherty, Sean McLaughlin and James Barker had their innocent young lives shredded by the evil bomb on the streets of Omagh last weekend finally lifts Buncrana will one day learn to smile again.
Though it's hard to believe on this poignant Saturday and while every day there for ever the three schoolboys and the two Spanish friends who died with them will be remembered, Buncrana will once again echo to the joyful sounds of a seaside resort.
The cheery buzz of flirtatious excitement as boy chats up girl and vice versa, of traditional music lilting from the quaint flower-bedecked pubs will restore the lazy, hazy summer-time days when the only screams of children will be from those on the white-knuckle fun-fair rides.
There will also be solitude for those who cherish their peace, on the breathtakingly scenic shores of Lough Swilly, among the gentle breezes on the endless beaches and up hills and down dales, with their patchwork quilt of corn, maze and grazing fields.
For Buncrana's strength lies in its families, those in the close-knit local community and those who holiday and day-trip there in their thousands.
They include even the famous. Scots comedian Billy Connolly holidays at Phil Coulter's home there and the zany funnyman affectionately tells the true story of the night he and Phil felt like fish and chip suppers at 4am and the local chippie happily opened up to feed them.
Then there was the week when Oasis superstar Liam Gallagher and film star wife Patsy Kensitt dropped by for a holiday, away from London's celebrity spotlight.
It is with local families though that Buncrana holds particular affection, especially for those of us raised in Londonderry. It's a tradition dating back to the halcyon days of the red and cream carriages of the Lough Swilly Railway Company when city families made day trips or holiday visits to Buncrana.
It's a tempting haven on a hot summer's day. Londonderry families galore down the passage of time will be familiar with the pattern and for my generation the relaxing routine was pretty much the same.
Many are the bonds between Londonderry and Buncrana for thousands of people and it is ties like these that will bind this fractured resort together in its darkest hours and enable the still gaping wounds to heal in God's own good time.
That generations-old family bond in Buncrana has extended to embrace Spanish visitors who come there every year to learn English. They have come, for the last decade, from places like Madrid and Barcelona, and left with rosy memories and friendships made to last a lifetime. This week two of them - Fernando Blasco, 12, Baselga and Rocio Abad Ramos, 23 - went home in coffins.
Yet remarkably, courageously even, the Spanish have pledged to return, so infectiously comforting have they found the deep glowing warmth of Buncrana's people, Eire's people, Ulster's people. They too turned out at the triple funeral of Oran, Sean and James in Buncrana.
I saw at that Requiem Mass in St Mary's Church, at Cockhill just past Tullyarvon Mill, some glimmer of hope at last for this bloody land.
David Trimble and Gerry Adams sitting feet from each other in a Roman Catholic church, the Ulster Unionist First Minister receiving a burst of loud and long applause from within and outside the church when he was specially welcomed and wished "a fair wind" from the altar by Derry Bishop Seamus Hegarty, was in itself a sight to ponder its potential significance for us all.
Poles apart politically, Mr Trimble and Mr Adams were united in grief for three children just like the ones probably pictured in little oval and square-shaped frames on your mantle-piece right now.
I studied too the face of Martin McGuinness, the Sinn Fein Mid Ulster MP and chief negotiator. His still boyish face suddenly looked middle-aged.
He, like so many of us, looked shaken by the nauseating enormity of what had been done to three schoolboys and 25 others in pursuit of a 32-county Ireland.
So many rampant emotions, I know, were racing about Mr McGuinness's head. He said: "For me, this is a very poignant situation in Buncrana. I spent many of my summer holidays here in this town. My mother comes from here."
St Mary's Church was actually where his mother and father were married, his own wedding took place there, and his father is buried in the graveyard where the three boys were laid to rest. "So I understand absolutely how deep this runs in the community," he said.
As we all shuffled silently up the steep hill towards the little church, the piercing wails of deeply distraught children drowning out the summer sounds of birds singing in the surrounding countryside, I wondered if he would go home afterwards to his own family, deep in the Bogside, and re-pledge his efforts to work for peace. I think he probably did.
Mr McGuinness, a politician with a shrewd knowledge of Irish history, knows that exactly 200 years ago next month at Buncrana, Wolfe Tone was brought ashore before being taken on for execution elsewhere.
In more recent history, Lough Swilly, the myth-steeped Lake of Shadows, was a safe haven for allied ships in wartime before embarking on forays or crossings of the Nazi-patrolled North Atlantic.
Once again history has left its mark on this place of outstanding natural beauty where the legacy once again, in Market Square, at 3-10 this afternoon, will be one of tears and yet more anguish.
If Buncrana, with Omagh, finished forever the list that includes Warrenpoint, Ballykelly, Greysteel, Belfast, Loughinisland, Enniskillen and so many more place names then it would, as James Barker's father Victor suggested, provide some consolation.
Then perhaps too Buncrana will begin to soothe its grief, calm its heartache, and again enhance its place in the childhood memories for future, peace-enjoying generations throughout the century to come.
Further Information
Publisher: NEWS LETTER
Ref: NL/094
Published Date: 22-Aug-98
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