Have Gourock’s Catholics Brought The Bands To Town?

 

It’s probably worth stating from the outset that I am not actually opposed to Orange Walks and I didn’t submit an objection to the upcoming parade through Gourock.

This is because, like many people on the west of Scotland, my own identity, religious heritage and ethnicity is a rich mix of Scottish Free Church Presbyterian, Irish Catholic and German Lutheran, alongside Episcopalian, Welsh, Ulster Scots and Highland Gael on my wife’s side. 

As such, I can generally see things from both perspectives and I often suspect that much of the tension which surrounds marching season, is rooted in suspicion, rather than reality.

For instance, a significant number of Scottish Catholics feel that those banging the big Lambeg drum outside the chapel each summer, are the descendants of the very same ‘Peep-o'-Day Boys‘, who once carried out the mass wrecking of Catholic cottages and burned their Irish forefathers out their homes, centuries ago.

For some within the Catholic community, these seemingly militarised parades are simply a continuation of that same old intimidation carried out by those who, if given the chance, would still do them harm. Others would disagree with this but say that anti-Catholicism remains the last acceptable prejudice in Scotland and even in this age of wokeness, wider Scottish society continues to tolerate an unacceptable expression of prejudice and intimidation, directed at a minority.  

And to be fair, these suspicions are understandable if one considers the fact that, my own parish of St Ninian’s in Gourock, was established by families evicted from Gweedore in Donegal, who strongly associated with Irish Land League, establishing their own branch of the League here in Gourock in the late 19th century. The Thomas Sexton Branch used to meet in the Gamble Halls but during the 1880s the Orange Order was embraced by the landlords and used to oppose to both the Irish Land League and the tenants rights movement, although some within the Orange Lodges did also oppose evictions and landlordism. 

There was even once an entire week of anti-Catholic riots here in 1851, with a different 'March on Gourock' culminating in one Gourockian named Charles Duffy being dragged from his home by the mob and thrown into the Clyde off Gourock pierhead, for refusing to recant his faith. 

As such, Catholics can perhaps be forgiven for feeling that the Orangemen have followed them from Ireland to places like Gourock, and the only reason they are now holding a triumphalist march past their Churches and celebrating the defeat of Catholicism, is because Catholics now live here. 

Meanwhile, those marching will strongly argue that these assumptions are deeply unfair, inaccurate and not remotely true and that the proposed route of the march has nothing to do with where Catholic churches are situated. 

Rather, they will state that they are commemorating a victory for liberty over tyranny and expressing a specific cultural identity, alongside loyalty to crown and county. Most of all, they will tell you that they are simply enjoying their democratic right to walk the ‘King’s Highway’ in peace, with a celebratory pageant of music and colour, which harms no one but includes all.

For my part, I have been fortunate enough to spend some time, very briefly, working in loyalist areas of East Belfast and I have always been made very welcome.  Similarly, I’ve seen plenty of examples of Orange parades passing off peacefully, without any trouble, even in predominately Catholic areas. 

It is also worth noting that the vast majority of observant Scottish Presbyterians don’t belong to the Orange Order and maintain positive ecumenical relations with their Catholic friends and neighbours, especially here in Gourock where Churches of all denominations have been very close for many decades.

In reality, people’s motivations for marching are complex and varied, as are all our associated identities but what isn’t complicated or up for debate is the myth of disloyal and unpatriotic Catholics; If you enter St Ninian’s Church in Gourock you’ll see a brass plaque on the wall in the day chapel, commemorating all the boys of the parish who gave their lives in the service of their country during the Great War. 

The lie that all Catholics are secret nationalists and republicans (So-called Fenianism), died at Gallipoli, died at the Somme and also died in the green fields of France, alongside very many young Catholic men, including those from St Ninian’s Gourock. 

Equally, a great number of St. Ninian's boys were also called up again during WWII, our parish's most famous soldier being the legendary Gourock born footballer John "Soldier" Jones, who played inside left for both Third Lanark and Morton Juniors alongside my Grandfather Robey Ritchie Ahlfeld, also Gourock born and of St Ninian's parish.  

Similarly, the following praise for Fr Willie Doyle written by an Orangeman, appeared in the Glasgow Weekly News in 1917 -  ‘Fr. Doyle was a good deal among us. We couldn’t possibly agree with his religious opinion, but we simply worshipped him for other things. He didn’t know the meaning of fear, and he didn’t know what bigotry was. He was as ready to risk his life to take a drop of water to a wounded Ulsterman as to assist men of his own faith and regiment. If he risked his life in looking after Ulster Protestant soldiers once, he did it a hundred times in the last few days. The Ulstermen felt his loss more keenly than anybody, and none were readier to show their marks of respect to the dead hero priest than were our Ulster Presbyterians. Fr. Doyle was a true Christian in every sense of the word, and a credit to any religious faith. He never tried to get things easy. He was always sharing the risks of the men, and had to be kept in restraint by the staff for his own protection. Many a time have I seen him walk beside a stretcher trying to console a wounded man with bullets flying around him and shells bursting every few yards.’

So, let us remember the spirit of Fr Doyle this marching season and freely express each of our working class identities and beliefs, detached from hatred, fear and suspicion, but instead expressed through neighbourliness towards each other. 

Let us also recall the collective unity that was achieved by once bitterly divided, working class Catholics and Protestants during the 1889 Dock Workers Strike, where William Booth of the Salvation Army and my hero Cardinal Manning, marched together in the common cause of the Dockers. And in doing so, established our modern labour and trade union movement.  

At the time, there was much outrage from the press and the establishment over this act of solidarity, not because they were defending workers but because Protestants had aligned with Catholics for their shared mutual self interest and to seek out a common life together. A terrifying thought for the ruling class!   

To paraphrase those radical Ulster Scots Presbyterians of 1798, let us unite all people of Scotland and abolish the memory of all past dissension, substituting the common name of Scotsmen in place of Protestant or Catholic. Or as the 1797 constitution of The Society of United Scotsmen states, 'We are friends to mankind, of whatever nation or religion'.

Enjoy the parade if you are going along, I will be at the Gourock War Memorial the following week, remembering the Gourock Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders who fell at Achi Baba on the 12th of July 1915, including those of St Ninian's parish.