ST Colmcille's GAC, Ballyhackamore may be gone, but it is not forgotten,
writes Andy Watters.
Pat McKeown was stunned when he saw the black and white picture that included his dad Paddy in The Irish News on March 9.
Paddy was pictured third from right in the middle row in a photo of the St Colmcille's squad from the mid-1940s which accompanied an article on a BBC radio programme recalling the 'forgotten' GAA club that introduced Gaelic football to east Belfast for a time before it was snuffed out by the sectarian violence of the Troubles.
In a remarkable coincidence, Pat, from Inniskeen in Monaghan, had dug the photo out just two days previously to show to his niece Anne O'Hare.
Anne had mentioned a night out at the Errigle Inn on the Ormeau Road and Pat's dad 'served his time' in the iconic bar when he moved to Belfast 80 years ago.
Paddy left Inniskeen in 1943 looking for work and after a stint as a barman/waiter at an Orange Hall, he ended up working in the Errigle. During his time there he turned out for St Colmcille's as a defender. "He enjoyed his time and they were good to him," Pat explained.
"St Colmcille's never won anything, but they were there."
They were there in the 1940s and again in the '60s after Down's three All-Ireland wins during that decade. Paddy was long gone by then as he left Belfast in 1945 and settled in county Louth, where he represented the now defunct Fane Rangers GAC of Channonrock who became notorious for their physical confrontations with Dreadnoughts. Paddy Lambe, from Cyprus Park in Belfast and pictured far right in the front row, sent Paddy, who passed away in 2007 aged 87, the picture with the names of the squad back in 1990.