Large Orange parade at Altnaveigh will emulate 1923 Twelfth - the year after the IRA atrocity
One of the largest Orange parades ever to be held in south Armagh will take place from Bessbrook this Sunday.
The event will emulate the 1923 Twelfth of July celebrations – when the Orange brethren from Armagh and Down joined together to hold their main demonstation as a show of solidarity following the previous year’s massacre of Protestant civilians by the IRA.
Six Protestants were brutally murdered, and up to twelve homes burned, after 30 IRA men left Dundalk in the early hours of June 17, 1922 to carry out the attack.
According to local IRA member James Marron, their orders were “to burn every house and shoot every male we could get”.
Another IRA man involved in the murders, Patrick Casey, later recalled the sense of shame over what had happened.
Thirty-five years after the event, he told the Bureau of Military History in the Republic of Ireland: "Nothing could justify this holocaust of unfortunate Protestants.”
The News Letter, published on June 19, described the Altnaveigh attacks as “a series of atrocious murders”.
In a message on social media, the Co Armagh Grand Lodge said: “The County Grand Lodge is attending this service next Sunday afternoon (June 18) to mark the 100th anniversary of the attendance by Co Armagh at the 12th July at Altnaveigh in 1923.
“District representatives and District Standards to meet at Bessbrook Orange Hall at 2.15pm to be led by Drumderg Loyalists Flute Band which is celebrating it's 100th anniversary.”
The parade will leave Bessbrook Orange Hall at 2.30pm.