Queen Elizabeth once described Northern Ireland’s Orange marches as ‘silly business’, newly unsealed government papers have revealed.
The annual Orange marches of Protestants in Northern Ireland are highly contentious – mainly with their Catholic counterparts.
The parades, which take place on July 12, are a Protestant celebration of King William’s victory over Catholic King James II at the Battle of the Boyne some 329 years ago.
Celebrations begin on July 11 every year with bonfires and fireworks before thousands of members of the Orange Order take to the streets of Northern Ireland the following day.
On the 12th, up to 500,000 ‘Orangemen’ don instinctive bowler hats, white gloves and orange collarettes to parade through 18 areas of Northern Ireland with marching bands playing drums and pipes.
Though most parades remain peaceful, to many Catholics the marches are seen as provocative, disrespectful and triumphalist – given they are celebrating a historic Protestant victory over the Catholics.
The planned celebration has even caused riots in the past – with the Orange Order making attempts in recent years to rebrand the inherently Protestant marches.
It has this week been revealed though, that on a visit to Northern Ireland in 2000 Queen Elizabeth called the annual march ‘silly.’
State papers released by the Dublin government unveiled that the late Monarch referred to the celebrations as a ‘silly marching season.’
Shockingly, Ambassador Ted Barrington, who had met the Queen at a Buckingham Palace garden party said that it was not the first time he had heard her ‘dismissive views of the Orange marches.’
There is no official recording of such a conversation, however, with a senior member of the Orange Order describing it as a ‘throwaway comment,’ the BBC reported.
Rev Mervyn Gibson, the Order’s Grand Secretary, added: ‘Let it be clear, four words from a ‘private’ conversation with no explanation, quoted by a foreign ambassador and open to interpretation will not diminish the affection the Orange Institution had for her late Majesty, nor will it affect the loyalty we have for the current King.’
Earlier this year, one American Swifty went viral after inadvertently coming across the 2024 Orange parade.
Florida native Lizwizdom had been visiting the Republic of Ireland for a Taylor Swift concert in Dublin when she decided to explore the island.
However, when her GPS led her down a ‘narrow’ road, the Swifty accidentally crossed the border and ended up at what she thought was an ‘Irish parade.’
She documented her experience in a TikTok which gained more than 1.3 million views.
The Swifty explained: ‘I’d started the morning outside of Sligo viewing the Gleniff Horseshoe which is gorgeous. Ireland is on another level with these mountains and these views.
‘But they are also on another level with their narrow roads so our GPS led us down one and straight into a parade route.
‘There were hundreds of coach buses and absolutely nowhere to go. My dad was not happy that we ended up parked in the middle of the road for 40 minutes.
‘I thought well lets just make the best of it and enjoy the parade from the car not knowing what the context was.
‘I saw a lot of orange but I just thought you know America has red, white and blue, Ireland has green, white and orange. Turns out there’s a lot more to it than that.’
The oblivious American highlighted her surprise in a reply to a comment on her video, writing: ‘I didn’t know that this was a controversial thing. I thought I just stumbled upon a parade out in the Irish countryside, turns out major politically divisive situation going on.’
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