Ireland (Lonely Planet, 9th Edition) - Fionn Davenport [564]
On radio and TV, to avoid giving offence to either side, some announcers use both names together – ‘Derry-stroke-Londonderry’ – while the BBC uses Londonderry at its first mention in a report, and Derry thereafter (the local radio station avoids the dilemma by calling itself BBC Radio Foyle). Road signs in Northern Ireland point to Londonderry, those in the Republic point to Derry (or Doíre in Irish), and some tourism industry promotional material covers all bases, using Derry-Londonderry-Doíre.
In 2006 Derry City Council asked for a judicial review in the High Court of Belfast, claiming that the renaming of the council in 1984 effectively amended the charter of 1613, but in January 2007 the judge rejected the claim, saying that only new legislation or royal prerogative could change the city’s official name.
Luckily, not everyone takes the Derry/Londonderry controversy too seriously. One local radio presenter opted instead for the simpler ‘Stroke City’! In fact, the majority of people in Northern Ireland, no matter what their political persuasion, still use ‘Derry’ in everyday speech, which is why we use the shorter version in this book.
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As you enter the city across Craigavon Bridge, the first thing you see is the Hands Across the Divide (Map) monument. This striking bronze sculpture of two men reaching out to each other symbolises the spirit of reconciliation and hope for the future; it was unveiled in 1992, 20 years after Bloody Sunday.
Outside the city walls to the southwest is Long Tower Church (Map; 7126 2301; Long Tower St; admission free; 9am-8.30pm Mon-Sat, 7.30am-7pm Sun), Derry’s first post-Reformation Catholic church. Built in 1784 in neo-Renaissance style, it stands on the site of the medieval Teampall Mór (Great Church), built in 1164, whose stones were used to help build the city walls in 1609. Long Tower was built with the support of the Anglican bishop of the time, Frederick Augustus Harvey, who presented the capitals for the four Corinthian columns framing the ornate high altar.
The Roman Catholic St Eugene’s Cathedral (Map; 7126 2894; Great James St; admission free; 9am-8.30pm) was begun in 1851 as a response to the end of the Great Famine, and dedicated to St Eugene in 1873 by Bishop Kelly; the handsome east window (1891) is a memorial to the bishop. The bells of St Eugene’s still ring every night at 9pm as a reminder of the Penal Laws (in force from 1691 until the early 19th century) which forbade Catholics from attending mass and subjected them to a 9pm curfew.
BOGSIDE
The Bogside district, to the west of the walled city, developed in the 19th and early 20th centuries as a working-class, predominantly Catholic, residential area. By the 1960s, its serried ranks of small, terrace houses had become an overcrowded ghetto of poverty and unemployment, a focus for the emerging civil rights movement and a hotbed of Nationalist discontent.
In August 1969, the three-day ‘Battle of the Bogside’ – a running street battle between local youths and the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) – prompted the UK government to send British troops into Northern Ireland. The residents of the Bogside and neighbouring Brandywell districts – 33,000 of them – declared themselves independent from the civil authorities, and barricaded the streets to keep the security forces out. ‘Free Derry’, as it was known, was a no-go area for the police and army, its streets patrolled by IRA volunteers. In January of 1972 the area around Rossville St witnessed the horrific events of Bloody Sunday (see the boxed text, below). ‘Free Derry’ ended with Operation Motorman on 31 July 1972, when