Samuel Morrison: It is a commentary on Northern Ireland that many people objected to Bobby Storey IRA funeral only because of Covid breach

I note a number of commentators on the media, principally the BBC, who have made excuses for the funeral of Bobby Storey because of the important place funerals play in republican history.
By Samuel Morrison
Published 15th Jul 2020, 16:59 BST
Updated 15th Jul 2020, 17:57 BST
Former Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams (left) speaks at the funeral of Bobby Storey. Samuel Morrison writes: "A key part of any republican funeral is the oration to the faithful where you spout guff about how oppressed Ireland is, how the next generation must pick up the cause. Adams did not disappoint"Former Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams (left) speaks at the funeral of Bobby Storey. Samuel Morrison writes: "A key part of any republican funeral is the oration to the faithful where you spout guff about how oppressed Ireland is, how the next generation must pick up the cause. Adams did not disappoint"
Former Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams (left) speaks at the funeral of Bobby Storey. Samuel Morrison writes: "A key part of any republican funeral is the oration to the faithful where you spout guff about how oppressed Ireland is, how the next generation must pick up the cause. Adams did not disappoint"

It’s almost as if everyone else should have to forego their traditions, including obviously the Twelfth, for the greater good but greater latitude needs to be shown when it comes to republicans.

Frustratingly, no one has to my knowledge challenged the general morality of this macabre obsession. Some might say that if it wasn’t for death and graveyards republicanism as a movement wouldn’t exist.

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In 1915 Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa died in the United States after a long life planning and directing Fenian terror targeting such champions of British oppression as celebrated Baptist preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon and the 15-year-old boy murdered in a dynamite attack.

Upon news of the old terrorist’s death reaching Ireland, there was a rush among republicans to bring his body back so that they could use it for political purposes.

He was given a semi-state funeral in Dublin with Irish Volunteer Force men providing a guard of honour and the body lay in state in Dublin City Hall for a while before a massive funeral followed by Patrick Pearse‘s funeral oration which included the famous words: “The fools! The fools! They have left us our Fenian dead, and while Ireland holds these graves, Ireland unfree shall never be at peace.”

Adams quoted Pearse‘s words at Martin McGuinness’s funeral while leaving out the last thirteen words. Of course, he didn’t need to finish the quote because every republican listening to the speech already knew how it ends.

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Down through the years, republicans have used the death of many terrorists for similar propaganda purposes, drawing on the tradition of the O’Donovan Rossa one in 1915.

A key part of any republican funeral is the funeral oration to the faithful where you spout guff about how oppressed Ireland is, how the next generation must pick up the noble cause advanced by terrorist groups, etc. Adams didn’t disappoint the masses (and there was a mass of people there) when it came to Storey’s funeral in that regard either.

Unionists would do well to reflect on the fact the rather than close with a traditional quote from a republican like John Mitchel (which probably wouldn’t be the in thing given his vocal defence of slavery), Robert Emmett or Theobald Wolfe Tone Adams ended with a quote from Dr Ian Paisley.

Is that because the legacy he left us is, in part, a system of government in which republicans can act as they did last week without any effective sanction?

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Regardless of what one’s answer to that question is it is surely a commentary in itself on the state Northern Ireland is currently in that a sinister display of power by the Provisional movement is only objected to by many because of its breach of the Covid-19 regulations.

Samuel Morrison, Traditional Unionist Dromore, Co Down

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