Welcome to the Old Pound Loney
Hostoric and folklore references by Joe Graham
MAGGIE WALSH
I’m a dacent wee girl Maggie Walsh is my name,
I was born in the Loney, the Falls Road, the same.
Sure I went over Millfield, and the Peelers were there,
They put their hand on my shoulder and then called a car.
It was early next morning about ten o’clock,
Before Judge McCarthy I was placed in the Dock.
He put on his eye glass and to me he did say,
“Is it you Maggie Walsh, that’s before me this day,
If it had been your first time,
Sure you might have got free,
But this is the third time on the books I can see.
One month I will give you, you’ll be out of the way,
For shouting “Home Rule on St Patrick’s Day!”
Sure the warder comes in and he opens your cell,
“Roll up yer aul blankets and empty yer poes,
And right about turn to the bone yard you go.!
Baker Street Pound Loney Residents pictured in1968 during the redevelopement of the historic old Catholic Nationalist area of Belfast to make way for the new Divis Complex. The original Pound area name for the local animal Pound which was sited in a triangle of land bordered by the Pound Burn (river) BarrackStreet and Divis Street, an old lane leading from the pound westwards was called rthe Pound Loney from which the old district "Pound Loney" got its name, having been built on that land, Pound Street actually followed the line of the old Lane.
Corner of Gilford Street, 1935. Joe Fox, P. O'Neill, Joe Rogan, N. McCann N. McDonald. and Annie Hanna.
Scotch Street with the sun setting on a sumers night
Divis Street 1969, showing Divis Tower in background
Divis Street seen from the same spot 70 years earlier, the street to the left of the public house corner is Barracks Street. which was the site of a British Military Barracks .
Swinging on the lamp post.
Barney Hughes Flour Mill Divis Street which sat roughly on the site on which now stands the Divis Tower Flats. Barney was a great influenece in the developement of the area becoming a Catholic Parish, having acquired the land for St. Peter's to be build on through a Presbyterian friend.
Cullingtree Road showing Hopkins old Flax store
Cinnamond Street in the old Pound Loney
Looking down Cullingtree Road from Pound Street
Divis Street showing Divis Tower and Boundary Street
Looking down Alexander Street, I used to have a great pal who lived here, Brian Gallagher, who moved to London.
Children stock pile street cobbles as ammunition for the men to defend the area by night from RIC attack.
The Model School in Divis Street, towering over the little houses of the Pound Loney and since a new Model school was built in North Belfast to replace this local republican quickly assumed by a pattern so obvious that the British Military would sieze the building as a foothold of power in the area turning it into a military barracks.
Above the Model School after republican forces acted swiftly and burned the building scuppering the plans of the British Military.They also burned the Tivoli Cinema in nearby Christian Llace which would also have made a strategic British Military strong hold on the area.
Joe Devlin the constitutionalist Nationalist's funeral leaving St. Peter's Cathedral, 1930's. Sadly the Falls was never a republican area, but always a constitionalist nationalist power base, often showing deep hatred and violence toward Irish republicans.